Tom Brennan: Re-Run of My Top Prospect Series. Today? 21-25

I wrote up on my top prospects last fall.

I am re-running my Top 25 prospects series

- covered the top 20 over the past few weeks

- here's the Final 5.

(21) OF Freddy Valdez year one for the bonus baby 6’3”, 215 17 year old went OK.  He his .274/.367/.448 in the DSL, good but not great….BUT went 4 for 10 in a brief seasons-end cameo with the GCL Mets.  He improved power-wise in August to .279/.372/.544, a good sign, and SNY sees him as a potential 25-30 homer kid if all goes right.

I am hoping that as an 18 year old, he starts out in hitter-friendly Kingsport, and maybe ends up with a promotion to Brooklyn and perhaps a cameo with Columbia in 2020.  Freddy is expected to have BIG power. 

Three triples and 6 of 8 in steals shows there is at least decent speed there.  Six assists and just 3 outfield errors in the error-prone DSL shows he has defensive chops as well.

(22) RHSP Harol Gonzalez - What a comeback season for Harol Gonzalez.  A painful 1-16, 4.80 in 2018.  Many guys would have gone home and curled up in a ball and switched from baseball to tiddly winks.  Not Gonzalez.

His last 8 AAA starts, he went 8-1, 2.01, a pretty incredible turnaround performance if I’ve ever seen one.  He ended the full 2019 season (AA/AAA) with a 12-4 record, 3.01 ERA, a WHIP of 1.08.  Harol, who will be 25 come next March, has to be under consideration for a ticket to Queens for at least part of 2020.  Which is a mighty, mighty long way from his recent 1-16 past.  I would call that “Comeback Player of the Year.”  How about you?

(23) C Ali Sanchez – great defense, but sub-par and slowly improving offense, the 22 year old has already been in the organization 6 seasons.  He hit .278/.337/.337 this season in AA, but was overmatched in AAA, hitting .179/.277/.250 in 21 games.  He has thrown out 174 of 375 lifetime (46.4%), which is the only reason I have him in my top 25…barely.  Sorry – I like hitters.  Will play all of 2020 as a 23 year old. 

I thought about putting fellow catcher, lefty hitting Patrick Mazeika, here at # 23 instead of Sanchez, but Pat, despite more power than Ali, is decent but not as good defensively as Sanchez, and his late season 3 for 30 slump in AA that dragged his batting average down to .245 as he is close to turning 26 made me lean to Ali for inclusion instead in my top 25.

(24) OF Alexander Ramirez – the Mets agreed to a $2.1 million deal this past July with this outfielder, ranked 26th on MLB Pipeline's Top 30 International Prospects list.  I know little else about him, other than he was 6’3”, makes good contact, and could stick in CF. 

But 2.1 mill is a lot of cabbage, so he must be thought of at the same age as Ronny Mauricio was, and I therefore wanted him wedged somewhere in my top 25.  Why not earlier?  Everyone wanted a similarly compensated bonus baby, Greg Guerrero, in their Top 25 before he too had played a single pro game, and that hasn't panned out - I like to see guys actually play before I rank them.

Hopefully, Ramirez can start his career in 2020 with the GCL Mets rather than in the DSL, and hit like the dickens.

(25) C Andres Regnault – as a 20 year old in Kingsport, this 6’0”, 250 catcher continued to show, as he had in 2018, that he’s got a dangerous bat.  

He hit .292/.328/.489, with 49 RBIs in 44 games in 2019.  Stop and re-read: 49 RBIs in 44 games.  Youza!  

He hit .369/.369/.646 with runners in scoring position, as opposed to just .213 with the bases empty.   That's clutch hitting!

Last year in the DSL, he rocked at .330/.420/.573 in 53 games, with better hitting with runners in scoring position than the bases empty.  

So, one can assume, as he focuses harder in ALL at bats, his strong hitting output should get even stronger. And just 36 Ks this season in 44 games, a decent #.

Of course, this is only Kingsport, and he has to prove he can continue to hit robustly as he climbs higher in the organization.  The big guy has some Wilson "Buffalo" Ramos in him already, going 0 for 2 in steal attempts, and with only one of his 56 career extra base hits being a triple.   S...L...O...W.

Defensively, he has thrown out nearly 35% of runners the past two seasons, a solid figure, but made 9 errors in 55 catching games this year and last combined, so he needs to get better as he climbs the rungs.  I would ticket him for Columbia next season.

No...I am not done. I hate leaving some guys out, so I added two guys as my alternate # 25.

(25 alternate #1) RHSP Franklyn Kilome – the 24 year old 6’6” Tommy John surgery victim got operated on in October 2018, so he should be ready to go in 2020 in a manner similar to Tom Szapucki in 2019. 

Szapucki got 62 innings in during 2019 after his TJS, and my guess is Kilome may get closer to 80-100 innings in 2020.  

Considered perhaps the hardest Mets minors thrower prior to his surgery, we will see how he is when he comes back.  

His career pre-TJS stats, to me, were not particularly impressive (22-27, 3.55, 1.34 WHIP, 419 Ks in 471 IP), but you can’t teach high velocity…perhaps he comes back better than pre-suregery, where maybe the elbow was bothering him and impacting his pitching results.  If so, he should clearly be in the top 25.  If not, not. All told, though, I am sticking him at # 25, alternate # 1.

(25, aternate # 2) RHRP Jared Biddy – I am not sure if he even deserves to be in the Mets Top 50, but I am putting him at the last rung of my Top 25 as “# 25, alternate #2” because, doggone it, I love underdogs who are superior performers.   Just ask Jeff McNeil.

The undrafted Biddy is both underdog and outperformer.  The 23 year old righty was 4-0, 0.86 ERA and 0.86 WHIP in his debut season. Wow.

He only had 1 mediocre outing in his 18 relief outings, with 35 Ks in 31.1 IP (mostly for top rookie league team Brooklyn) against just 3 walks and no homers allowed.  He is considered to have good stuff. 

First, in my mind, he has to prove he is as good as Paul Sewald.  Then, hopefully, he will also someday prove he is better.  Sewald had a very solid first season in Brooklyn in 2012, but not as good as Biddy’s 2019.   Biddy was perhaps the best performer of the 2019 class - but undrafted.  Way to go, Jared!  May 2020 be more of the same for Columbia and St Lucie.

Lastly, I did not include Jordan Humphreys in my Top 25 due to his having missed nearly 2.5 seasons due to Tommy John surgery.  How do you rate someone who last pitched when Babe Ruth was hitting 60?  

But Humphreys was great for 3 innings in his first Arizona Fall League appearance just the other day, so may he prove he not only belongs in the Top 25, but that he really belongs in the Top 10.

Hope you enjoyed re-reading my 5 part series, folks.  

Have a good day.  Stay safe.