Prospect rankings are a great tool to get to know what a team has coming in the pipeline. However, each one is different, as the writer’s own biases naturally come into play, and everyone has a different opinion
on a player’s future. After all, projecting what players in their late teens and early twenties who have never played in a Major League game will be in five or ten years down the line is not an exact science.
Nevertheless, we always obsess over what prospects could be stars, which could be trade bait, and what the farm system looks like as a whole. Most of the major outlets have published their thoughts and rankings of the Phillies farm system already. For your convenience, here’s the links to the updated lists that have been published so far:
Phillies Minor Thoughts (Matt Winkelman)
The overall consensus among prospect writers is that the Phillies have three top 50ish overall players in Aidan Miller, Andrew Painter, and Justin Crawford. As we’ve discussed ad nauseum, this trio projects to all have some sort of impact on the big-league club at some point over the next calendar year. After that, most outlets note a drop-off to the next crop of players in the Phillies system, classifying the next tier with the likes of Aroon Escobar, Gage Wood, Gabriel Rincones, and Dante Nori among others as players with interesting tools but also varying levels of flaws that they may or may not ever be able to overcome. Following that tier is an even bigger drop-off to where the farm system really thins out. Overall, the Phillies system as a whole is generally regarded as below average, with the big three doing most of the heavy lifting in its ranking.
So, what do you think of the Phillies farm system as a whole? Do you more or less agree with the prospect writers? Or are you even lower? What are your expectations for the big three? Which player, if any, from the second tier do you see possibly moving into the spots that the top three will soon vacate? What in your view is the most specific thing the team needs to improve on when it comes to player development?
