Reviewing off-season ranks from pundits last winter was a ton of fun, culminating in my publishing my own ranks once all the major pundits had reported.
We’re now a month into the season, and the first of a few expected “mid season updates” have published. These are useful re-ranks that take into account promotions, graduations, injuries, and the like. So, here’s a reaction to the 5/6/24 Update to the Baseball America Rankings for the Nats.
Here’s the May 2024 rankings.
| BA May2024 rank | Last Name | First Name | Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Wood | James | OF (Corner) |
| 2 | Crews | Dylan | OF (CF) |
| 3 | House | Brady | SS/3B |
| 4 | Cavalli | Cade | RHP (Starter) |
| 5 | Morales | Yohandy | 3B |
| 6 | Rutledge | Jackson | RHP (Starter) |
| 7 | Hassell III | Robert | OF (CF) |
| 8 | Vaquero | Cristian | OF (CF) |
| 9 | Lipscomb | Trey | 3B |
| 10 | Parker | Mitchell | LHP (Starter) |
| 11 | Susana | Jarlin | RHP (Starter) |
| 12 | Green | Elijah | OF (CF) |
| 13 | Lile | Daylen | OF (CF) |
| 14 | Hurtado | Victor | OF |
| 15 | Bennett | Jake | LHP (Starter) |
| 16 | Sykora | Travis | RHP (Starter) |
| 17 | Herz | DJ | LHP (Starter) |
| 18 | Nunez | Nasim | SS |
| 19 | Pinckney | Andrew | OF (Corner) |
| 20 | Brzykcy | Zach | RHP (Reliever) |
| 21 | Millas | Drew | C |
| 22 | Henry | Cole | RHP (Starter) |
| 23 | Feliz | Angel | 3B/SS |
| 24 | Made | Kevin | SS |
| 25 | De La Rosa | Jeremy | OF (Corner) |
| 26 | Cruz | Armando | SS |
| 27 | Baker | Darren | 2B |
| 28 | White | T.J. | OF (Corner) |
| 29 | Alvarez | Andrew | LHP (Starter) |
| 30 | Brown | Marcus | SS/2B |
In this post, i’ll highlight just those changes in these rankings from their Jan 2024 system rankings, reviewed here (all stats quoted were as of 5/8/24 and may be slightly different when you read this).
- At the top, BA officially does what many others have been threatening to; switch Crews and Wood at the top of the ranking. Wood had a monster spring and is at AAA, while Crews has scuffled out of the gate to continue his poor AA career numbers (he hit .208 there for a month last year and is hitting .235 there so far this season). Meanwhile, Wood is destroying AAA pitching so far in 2024; current slash line .339/.444/.529. I think it’s more than safe to say that the current depth chart of outfielders on the 40-man roster (roughly: Winker, Thomas, Young, Robles, Rosario, Call, and Garrett) may be ready for a shake up the next time they have an injury. I’m not sure how much longer the team will stand for Rosario to hit .125 when they have a top-5 prospect in AAA with nothing more to prove.
- Lipscomb bumped up from #16 in January to #9 today, and he may not be eligible for this list much longer. He’s already got 87 ABs this season and doesn’t seem to be going anywhere as a useful backup infielder. Meanwhile, Rule5 draftee Nasim Nunez has three (3!) total ABs this season, and if the team stays in Wild Card contention much longer I see his usefulness being exhausted pretty soon.
- Parker bumped up from #29 to #10. Well of course he’s been bumped up. Show up in the majors as a mid-20s prospect on every sheet, shut down the Dodgers, shut down the Astros? Come on. Nobody saw this coming. I liked Parker a lot after seeing him in person last year and I could only push him into my mid 20s. Hopefully its not a complete mirage and he continues along an bests what most pundits saw initially; 4th/5th starter ceiling.
- Susana jumps ahead of Green in the rankings. Not sure what Susana has done to merit jumping ahead of anyone, let alone being this high. So far in 2024: 5 starts, 16 innings, and a 5.51 ERA. Interestingly, his K/9 is way up and his BB/9 is way down … but they can’t let him throw more than 3 innings a stint? Meanwhile, Green continues to not hit in the low-A, with a .170 BA and 52 (!!) Ks in 25 games so far this year. I mean … unless the franchise has told him to swing out of his ass every time he gets up, this is just not good.
- Nunez remains 18th on the list, with no movement up or down relative to where he was in January. Really?
- Jacob Young, ranked 18th in January, has officially graduated from rookie eligibility/prospect status by hitting his 150th PA in April. Like Parker/Lipscomb he never really was a heralded prospect but is succeeding so far in the majors.
- The rest of the list from 19 to 29 is identical from January.
- To add in the new 30th prospect to replace Young, BA has added … Marcus Brown. Which is weird b/c they had a list of 8-10 “honorable mentions” after posting their Jan 2024 list, and Brown wasn’t on it. I guess they released this before seeing what Marcus did in High-A when he got promoted earlier this year (.129/.206/.145). In January their “31st”prospect was Andry Lara, who has looked awesome so far in 2024, so that doesn’t make much sense.
So, some movement for some players, but not a full overhaul based on the SSS of 2024.