The 2026 baseball season is so close that I can almost taste it. And that means the return of not just Major League Baseball, but also Minor League Baseball. But how can Minor League Baseball begin without
prospect lists?? It simply cannot. And so we must finish our 2026 Willie McCovey Memorial Community Prospect List, in which we will rank the top 44 prospects in the San Francisco Giants organization. We’re comfortably past the halfway mark, so we can’t stop now!
Wednesday’s ballot resulted in a fairly one-sided election, and it brings us one of the more hotly debated prospects in the system: left-handed pitcher Joe Whitman, who has been voted as the No. 26 prospect in the system, dropping 17 spots from his ranking of No. 9 last year.
Whitman was a compensation round selection in the 2023 draft, being taken with the pick the Giants received when Carlos Rodón signed with the New York Yankees. With the 69th overall pick, the Giants made Whitman the first college southpaw taken in the draft.
The Kent State product hasn’t quite lived up to that draft billing, though he’s shown some interesting flashes. He spent the entirety of the 2025 season with AA Richmond, where his numbers were so-so: in 117.1 innings, he sported an ugly ERA of 5.29, but with a much-better FIP of 3.61, with 9.51 strikeouts and 3.61 walks per nine innings and a 41.2% groundball rate.
Interestingly, Whitman’s ERA underperforming his FIP seems to be a trend: in 2024, his first full season (which was split between Low and High-A), he posted a 3.80 FIP but just a 4.63 ERA.
Whitman — who turned 24 in September — poses an interesting problem for prospect evaluation, due to a fairly black-and-white issue: his fastball is not good at all. According to Baseball America, Whitman’s fastball got torched last year to the tune of a .305/.372/.469 slash line in a very pitcher-friendly Eastern League, and all of the home runs he allowed came on that pitch. Needless to say, the fact that he stayed afloat with hitters teeing off on his fastball speaks highly to the rest of his arsenal … but you can’t make the Majors, let alone survive in them, without a fastball.
And so, the case with Whitman becomes pretty straightforward, if convoluted when trying to assign value to it. If he can fix his fastball, which sits low-90s, he’ll probably have a lengthy career as a Major League starter. If he can’t fix his fastball, he faces an uphill battle just to get a cup of coffee as a reliever. How do you blend those truths? Well, by making him the No. 26 prospect in the system, apparently.
Needless to say, 2026 will be a critical year for Whitman. If he shows signs of improvement with his fastball, he’ll be much, much higher on this list next year. And if he doesn’t, then he’ll quickly turn into a forgotten draft pick in a long stretch of forgotten Giants draft picks. I would assume that he’ll be back in Richmond for a second pass at AA this season, given his mediocre performance in 2025 and the bevy of arms lined up to start in AAA Sacramento. Keep your eye on him, folks … this is why following the Minor Leagues is so fun!
Now let’s add to the list, and we have some new names to choose from today! As a reminder, voting now takes place in the comment section using the “rec” feature.
The list so far
- Bryce Eldridge — 1B
- Josuar González — SS
- Jhonny Level — SS
- Bo Davidson — CF
- Dakota Jordan — CF
- Luis Hernandez — SS
- Gavin Kilen — SS
- Carson Whisenhunt — LHP
- Blade Tidwell — RHP
- Keyner Martinez — RHP
- Jacob Bresnahan — LHP
- Trevor McDonald — RHP
- Argenis Cayama — RHP
- Luis De La Torre — LHP
- Trevor Cohen — OF
- Jesús Rodríguez — C
- Parks Harber — OF/3B
- Carlos Gutierrez — OF
- Drew Cavanaugh — C
- Daniel Susac — C
- Gerelmi Maldonado — RHP
- Josh Bostick — RHP
- Lorenzo Meola — SS/2B
- Will Bednar — RHP
- Yunior Marte — RHP
- Joe Whitman — LHP
Note: Clicking on the above names will link to the CPL where they were voted onto the list.
No. 27 prospect nominees
Rayner Arias — 19.8-year old OF — .173 OPS/-42 wRC+ in Low-A (30 PA); .699 OPS/87 wRC+ in ACL (178 PA)
Carlos De La Rosa — 18.1-year old LHP — 4.73 ERA/2.30 FIP in DSL (32.1 IP)
Lisbel Diaz — 20.5-year old OF — .725 OPS/96 wRC+ in Low-A (561 PA)
Trent Harris — 26.11-year old RHP — 5.44 ERA/4.69 FIP in AAA (41.1 IP); 1.69 ERA/1.73 FIP in AA (16 IP)
Alberto Laroche — 20.1-year old RHP — 2.11 ERA/3.12 FIP in DSL (38.1 IP)
Joel Peguero — 28.8-year old RHP — 2.42 ERA/3.85 FIP in MLB (22.1 IP); 5.10 ERA/4.79 FIP in AAA (42.1 IP)
Diego Velasquez — 22.3-year old 2B — .677 OPS/107 wRC+ in AA (566 PA)
Note: Each player’s first name links to their Baseball-Reference page, and their last name links to their Fangraphs page. All stats are from the 2025 season.
