Kiley McDaniel's mid-season top 50

[mhd24]

https://www.espn.com/mlb/insider/story/_/id/38197232/kiley-mcdaniel-mlb-top-50-prospects-midseason-update-jackson-holliday

 

1). Holliday

20). Mayo

35). Cowser

49). Kjerstad

 

Povich made the category of "others of note"

[Sports Guy]

35. Colton Cowser, CF, Baltimore Orioles

Age: 23 Level: MLB

Cowser is yet another player who might play up the middle and draws a lot of walks. His contact rate and in-game power are fringy-to-average, as is his defensive reputation in center field, but he's still a solid player even at the low end of that range. Although Cowser has already reached the big leagues, opinions vary widely on him.
 

 

Interesting last sentence there.

I have seen some who think he’s a borderline top 10 guy.

We saw Law didn’t have him to 100 preseason. 

[btdart20]

That's the same order that Tony has on the power rankings.  

Cowser does seem pretty divergent.  BA has him #12.  MLB at #14.  And Law out of the top 100.  The cynic in me wonders if McDaniel's #35 ranking is just a lazy weighted average slotting?

Law didn't have Mayo in the top 60 either.  He's an outlier for both Mayo and Cowser.

 

[Say O!]

Interesting that Kiley didn’t put Ortiz in the “others to note” category. 

[deward]

28 minutes ago, Say O! said:

Interesting that Kiley didn’t put Ortiz in the “others to note” category. 

Or Basallo.

[Alasdaire]

4 hours ago, Sports Guy said:

35. Colton Cowser, CF, Baltimore Orioles

Age: 23 Level: MLB

Cowser is yet another player who might play up the middle and draws a lot of walks. His contact rate and in-game power are fringy-to-average, as is his defensive reputation in center field, but he's still a solid player even at the low end of that range. Although Cowser has already reached the big leagues, opinions vary widely on him.
 

 

Interesting last sentence there.

I have seen some who think he’s a borderline top 10 guy.

We saw Law didn’t have him to 100 preseason. 

Fangraphs didn't have him highly ranked highly either. I believe Longenhagen's case again Cowser was that he wasn't going to stick at center and that the bat wasn't exactly unimpeachable.

I know Pipeline has Cowser in the top 15, but I don't understand how you put him in front of guys who are much toolsier or elite at one skill.

[Sports Guy]

3 minutes ago, Alasdaire said:

Fangraphs didn't have him highly ranked highly either. I believe Longenhagen's case again Cowser was that he wasn't going to stick at center and that the bat wasn't exactly unimpeachable.

I know Pipeline has Cowser in the top 15, but I don't understand how you put him in front of guys who are much toolsier or elite at one skill.

I agree too 15 is too high.  
 

I think Kiley is closer to being right than those that have him top 10-15.

[Hallas]

I'm surprised they're not bumping Holliday's FV grade to 65 or 70.  I wonder if they're going to wait till the offseason to re-evaluate his FV grade  Fangraphs kept him at 60 as well midseason.  That seems low, because his performance to date is on par with guys like Wander Franco and Guerrero Jr, who got 70 and 80 grades.

[Alasdaire]

1 hour ago, Hallas said:

I'm surprised they're not bumping Holliday's FV grade to 65 or 70.  I wonder if they're going to wait till the offseason to re-evaluate his FV grade  Fangraphs kept him at 60 as well midseason.  That seems low, because his performance to date is on par with guys like Wander Franco and Guerrero Jr, who got 70 and 80 grades.

I could be wrong, but I think some services only re-grade individuals tools and overall floor/ceiling during the offseason. In-season, they just re-rank players relative to each other and to reflect their production without re-assessing their career outcomes. Not sure whether Fangraphs specifically does or doesn't.

Also, I don't think Holliday will get the level of grade that Vladdy Jr. got. He had an 80 hit tool and 70 power. Even if Holliday gets the 80 hit (which I personally think should be theoretically possible given that he has been hitting at this level since he was 17), he won't have the power grade or anything else like speed/defense to compensate.

[Hallas]

48 minutes ago, Alasdaire said:

I could be wrong, but I think some services only re-grade individuals tools and overall floor/ceiling during the offseason. In-season, they just re-rank players relative to each other and to reflect their production without re-assessing their career outcomes. Not sure whether Fangraphs specifically does or doesn't.

Also, I don't think Holliday will get the level of grade that Vladdy Jr. got. He had an 80 hit tool and 70 power. Even if Holliday gets the 80 hit (which I personally think should be theoretically possible given that he has been hitting at this level since he was 17), he won't have the power grade or anything else like speed/defense to compensate.

Are you talking about Franco or  Vlad?  Vlad got a 70 hit tool on MLB pipeline, while Franco got an 80.  For OFP they seem to curve based on expected position, so I'd expect Vlad would have to score higher on hit/power categories to hit a higher grade since he's a first baseman.

 

MLB pipeline has already updated their OFP grade for Holliday to 70.  I believe it was 60 or 65 earlier in the year.  That's the same grade they gave to Franco and Vlad Jr.  (For what it's worth, Fangraphs gave Franco an 80 and Vlad Jr a 70.)

Edited August 17 by Hallas

[Alasdaire]

1 minute ago, Hallas said:

Are you talking about Franco or  Vlad?  Vlad got a 70 hit tool on MLB pipeline, while Franco got an 80.  For OFP they seem to curve based on expected position, so I'd expect Vlad would have to score higher on hit/power categories to hit a higher grade since he's a first baseman.

 

MLB pipeline has already updated their OFP grade for Holliday to 70.  I believe it was 60 or 65 earlier in the year  That's the same grade they gave to Franco and Vlad Jr.  (For what it's worth, Fangraphs gave Franco an 80 and Vlad Jr a 70.)

Right, some services update in-season and others don't. What I'm saying is I'm not sure whether Fangraphs does or not. Personally I think it's premature to re-grade tools, which are proxies for career outcomes, after just a few months in-season.

Vladdy Jr. and Franco were the first two players Pipeline gave 80 grade hit tools to. What made Vladdy so hype was the 70 grade power to go with it. But I suppose I'm forgetting how bad his speed/field were. So perhaps Holliday can catch up if his field/speed compensate.

[Hallas]

11 minutes ago, Alasdaire said:

Right, some services update in-season and others don't. What I'm saying is I'm not sure whether Fangraphs does or not. Personally I think it's premature to re-grade tools, which are proxies for career outcomes, after just a few months in-season.

Vladdy Jr. and Franco were the first two players Pipeline gave 80 grade hit tools to. What made Vladdy so hype was the 70 grade power to go with it. But I suppose I'm forgetting how bad his speed/field were. So perhaps Holliday can catch up if his field/speed compensate.

Ehh, I guess you could make the argument that half a season shouldn't be enough to raise your grade, but there's not much that Holliday can do at this point to justify leaving him at 60 (which is where Fangraphs has him.)  I only see MLB and Fangraphs boards but neither service has ever graded a #1 overall prospect lower than 65, and there's nothing about his performance thus far that would suggest he would be the worst #1 overall prospect either service has ever published a report on.

Edited August 17 by Hallas

[sportsfan8703]

18 hours ago, deward said:

Or Basallo.

I know Basallo is building rep, but I can’t take a list serious that doesn’t mention him. Our system has enough hype built up. Basallo is a phenom along with Mayo and Holliday. 

[deward]

15 hours ago, Alasdaire said:

Fangraphs didn't have him highly ranked highly either. I believe Longenhagen's case again Cowser was that he wasn't going to stick at center and that the bat wasn't exactly unimpeachable.

I know Pipeline has Cowser in the top 15, but I don't understand how you put him in front of guys who are much toolsier or elite at one skill.

I'd assume they're putting emphasis on on-field results. Cowser has performed at a high level in AAA while being age-appropriate for the level. That counts for something. They also don't consider him incapable in CF, based on their write-up.