Tony-OH

Hmm, interesting. I've always liked rWAR over fWAR but this is interesting. Did you go back to last year and see if rWAR or fWAR was closer to the record to see if this is an anomoly?

I'm too young to remember Paul Blair in his prime, but I know he's widely considered one of the best defensive CF of all-time. Saying that, Mullins is not great, but about league average on coming in on balls. He's never had a negative or positive OOA coming in in balls. So basically, he's get to what he's supposed to get to, but he's not going to make that amazing play coming in very often.

Rutschman has clearly made the adjustment to the major league breaking stuff that he was struggling with at first. This is very common and why I'm in favor of bringing guys like Henderson and Westburg up at some point this year so they can have time to make that adjustment this year instead of next. As for Rutschman, everything in his statcast info shows an above average major league hitter already. Barrel %, Barrel/PA, EV, XBA, XSLG, XWOBA, XWOBACON, Hard Hit %, K% are all over MLB average. His walk percantage will be soon I'm sure. If that's not enough, his XWOBA is .356 while his WOBA is at .318 (.317 MLB avg) so he's actually been a bit unlucky. He's arrived!

And that OBP is going to continue to rise as he sees more pitching.

Yes, his arm is a solid 70. He's got enough foot speed to play RF, but I don't think he days are done on the hot corner yet.

My problem is when your SS and 3B prospects have had consistently low fielding percentages, it might be time to get them focused by AA, and especially at AAA.

It's really hard to know how good a player is based off where the Orioles play them in the minors. The Orioles clearly have an opinion that playing most players in multiple positions help them vs the typical philosophy of trying to get a guy as much experience as possible in the positions he will most likely play in the majors. Personally I think the Orioles are stunting their positional players defensive growth by playing guys all over, unless they are viewed as a utility guy.

But Prieto wasn't hot for a couple of weeks, he was hot basically the entire time in Aberdeen. He's clearly hit a bit of a bump in Bowie and that could drop him a bit if it continues, but I think he's done quite well with as little affiliated professional experience as he has.

Another thing to remember is Mayo would be college sophomore right now.

I could have jumped Kjerstad, but I want to give him some time. Obviously these are power rankings so I won't get into too much disagreements, but what do you like about Haskin so much? Since his torrid 7-game start to the season where he hit like Barry Bonds on one his roidfest tears, he's slashed .213/.307/.328/.635 with a 16 to 42 BB:K ratio in his last 208 PAs. While Prieto has certainly come down from his tear in A+, you have to remember a few things. He hadn't played since the winter of 2020-21 and had only 105 High-A PAs before his quick promotion to AA compared to Haskin who had 363 PAs between Low and High-A before AA. Tavera over Rhodes? Honestly, the problem here was you can't improve in the trainer's room and that's where Rhodes has been for a month and he really hasn't hit well since April. Tavera has more upside so i went with him but I'm being aggressive with Tavera a bit despite being in the DSL. Hopefully Rhodes will pick it back up a bit. So hard to judge hitters power in that cavernous Aberdeen Stadium. the orioles really need to get them to bring the fences in or think about changing back to Frederick if Frederick will upgrade their stadium.

Rhodes has been in just six games since being on the IL for a month. They may just want to get him some more PAs in A+ before moving him. Oh, and since his red hot start in April, he's slashed .172/.364/.310/.674 in 77 PAs.

Just the fact that he's got some serious upside and has done ok. Honestly, the guys behind him, especially the hitters, no one really jumps out as a sure fire starting pitcher or every day average big leaguer. I had Basallo and Hernandez pretty high last year but Hernandez is quickly playing himself into a bust unless he doesn't start hitting. Basallo is very young for his league so I'm holding on him a bit. Oh, and he really only jumped Basallo, John Rhodes and Carlos Tavera. Carlos Tavera had a bad outing and went on the IL, Rhodes hasn't hit for much game power, and Basallo hasn't done much in the FCL and his K% jumped up in the FCL. Basallo is only 6 months older than Tavera.

Name BA OBP SLG WOBA BB% K% ISO wRC+ PAs Pro PAs prior to A+Henderson .230 .343 .432 .341 13.8% 30.1% .202 109 289 278 Mayo .250 .326 .479 .356 9.3% 22.2% .229 114 270 216 Mountcastle .314 .343 .542 .390 3.7% 16.1% .228 146 379 698 Final A+ numbers. Remember Mountcastle played in a much more hitter friendly park at Frederick, but wRC+ takes park considerations into effect. Mountcastle also had significantly more pro experience prior to playing in High-A with Henderson and Mayo missing 2020 due to COVID. With a little less experience than Henderson, Mayo showed a bit more power (.229 to .202 ISO), hit for a higher average (.250 vs .230), struck out 7.9% less, had a better WOBA (.356 to .341) but walked 4.5% less. Mountcastle struggled in his first taste of Bowie after being promoted to AA Bowie (First Mountcastle numbers below). I excluded Henderson's last five games of last year in AA (17 PAs and 10Ks) just because it wasn't easy to put these numbers together, but these are Henderson's AA numbers at a year older. I added in Mountcastle full season at AA to compare to Henderson's gaudy numbers. Name BA OBP SLG WOBA BB% K% ISO wRC+ PAs Pro PAs prior to AAHenderson .312 .452 .573 .441 19.7% 18.3% .261 180 208 584 Mountcastle .222 .239 .366 .266 1.9% 22.0% .144 146 159 1081 Mount (AA) .297 .341 .464 .357 6.1% 18.5% .168 121 428 1207 Mayo 486 It will be interesting to see if Mayo hits the Mountcastle speed bump or takes off like Henderson did. Mayo enters AA with the least amount of pro PAs, 98 less than Henderson who also got Bowie Camp PAs during 2020 when Mayo was at home.

There may be an adjustment period, but their power numbers should go up away from cavernous Ripken Field.

Having Prieto makes the Norby move that much more of a headscratcher unless they plan to start playing Prieto at SS more. Ortiz has hit himself out of a priority play and will need to find PAs where he can.

Interesting that they moved Norby as well. He's been in quite the slump over his last 100 PAs, slashing .211/.290/,344/.634. Both Cowser and Mayo have been hitting better of late so nice to see them get the bump. Gotta imagine Kjerstad is going to Aberdeen.

Denoyer's stuff as taken a jump this year. 93-95, t 96 with a nice slider and workable change. He's been impressive.

He only dropped because of Vavra stayed healthy and performed well. I'd take a potential everyday guy (even if that's a super utility) over a lefty one inning reliever. I've been very impressed with Vespi so far, but he's still got a limited ceiling with his 89 MPH fastball. Right now he's getting guys out on plus horizontal movement.

Or maybe he was feeling under the weather weather a bit and that affected him more than usual? I'm not making excuses for the poor outing, but the drop in velocity in the 4th inning, the ad body language, the struggles of command all seem like a guy who was a bit exhausted out there.

Great report D. Thanks!

Like Bradish, long term his best role may be i the pen, but with four pitches, I think you gotta see if he can stick as a starter, even if it's a 4th/th guy on a good team.

Rutschman is the #1 overall pick and a great prospect, but let's remember, had Henderson gone to collegel, he would be getting drafted this year. If you take his current skill level, where do you think he would be drafted this year? I'd have to imagine he'd be inconsideration for the 1:1. So let's say he's drafted and they put him straight into AAA and he puts up the numbers he has. Now where would you rank him? It's not a knock on Rutschman that I think Henderson now gets the nod as the #1 in my opinion, it's more based on how far Henderson has come in such a short time. Henderson hasn't even grown into his man strength yet.

I'm trying to temper his ranking until we see him at a higher level. He's obviously doing fantastic and if he can make his way up to AA by the end of the year and does well, could see back in the top 5.

I don't think Elias is going to give Mancini and Santander away just to free up playing time and I'd imagine he's going to try and trade them for pitching. Mancini is one of the few guys on this current lineup that has a good OBP and he should have value to a contender. Santander probably doesn't have a ton of trade value. It would be nice if Stowers got hot again in AAA. He would be the most likely replacement in the lineup for either one.

Well the team is 15-13 in gams he's started. They're 6-1 when he starts at DH, which is of course a SSS but just thought I'd note it. The pen he has been pretty amazing so far. Gotta give Elias credit for rebuilding his pen with several DFA guys who have done well (Perez and Krehbeil) along with converting Lopez and Akin to relief, and giving in house guys like Tate and Bautista high leverage roles and giving Vespi a chance when he hadn't pitched effectively above AA until this year. I think this team's lineup will be much better when Westburg and Henderson arrive and even potentially Vavra and Stowers. The starting pitching is really the issue overall. There's no one really knocking on the door (Rodriguez is hurt and Hall is not ready yet).