Mid-Year Top 10 Prospects

[Dam8610]

7 hours ago, Jose Abreu said:

I like Madrigal but my god people are going to be disappointed with him because of unrealistic expectations. .350 average with a .908 OPS?? 

Is a high end outcome projection for one of his best seasons. With his contact and speed profile, I don't see how that's extreme. The most extreme thing about it is the nearly .160 ISO and that's basically a league average ISO. I don't see a .370ish BABIP as extreme for someone who Ks as little as he does and has speed as a big component of his game.

7 hours ago, Jose Abreu said:

Ceiling? I don't know enough about his contact profile to estimate a BABIP but maybe somewhere around .330/.380/.480 with good defense? 

More realistically, I think he's a solid .300/.350/.450 guy long-term. 

The difference between your .330/.380/.480 and my slashline is roughly 7 singles and 5 doubles over the course of 650 PAs. I think to hit .300, he'd have to have a BABIP in league average range because of how rarely he strikes out, and that seems low to me.

7 hours ago, turnin' two said:

I seem to remember that Dam couldn't help but to say Madrigal was Altuve at every point leading up to the draft. 

I thought and still think that Altuve is a 95th+ percentile outcome for Madrigal.

45 minutes ago, Chicago White Sox said:

I just don’t see a .290 batting average being reasonable for him upon maturity.  To me, that is a downside case and suggests a BABIP in the .290 to .300 range (which is league average or slightly below).  Given his contact profile & speed, that seems ridiculously low.

 

Exactly. Hitting .290-.300 would require a BABIP in the .300-.320 range. It's possible he could end up in that range, but that to me is an extreme projection on the low end because of his speed and tendency to not strike out.

[Jose Abreu]

51 minutes ago, Dam8610 said:

Is a high end outcome projection for one of his best seasons. With his contact and speed profile, I don't see how that's extreme. The most extreme thing about it is the nearly .160 ISO and that's basically a league average ISO. I don't see a .370ish BABIP as extreme for someone who Ks as little as he does and has speed as a big component of his game.

The difference between your .330/.380/.480 and my slashline is roughly 7 singles and 5 doubles over the course of 650 PAs. I think to hit .300, he'd have to have a BABIP in league average range because of how rarely he strikes out, and that seems low to me.

I thought and still think that Altuve is a 95th+ percentile outcome for Madrigal.

Exactly. Hitting .290-.300 would require a BABIP in the .300-.320 range. It's possible he could end up in that range, but that to me is an extreme projection on the low end because of his speed and tendency to not strike out.

What I don't get is your expectations for his BABIP. Why does his lack of strikeouts influence his BABIP in any way?

What matters is his quality of contact, which I don't know enough about, but I haven't seen anything to suggest that his contact profile is so good that he'll be Moncada or Judge like with his BABIP 

[SoxBlanco]

11 minutes ago, Jose Abreu said:

What I don't get is your expectations for his BABIP. Why does his lack of strikeouts influence his BABIP in any way?

What matters is his quality of contact, which I don't know enough about, but I haven't seen anything to suggest that his contact profile is so good that he'll be Moncada or Judge like with his BABIP 

I was thinking the same thing. I’m a big Madrigal fan, but I always assumed his high contact rate and lack of strikeouts would produce a high batting average but not a high BABIP. 

[Buehrlesque]

I come at this from a bit of a different angle than many of you, in that I don't demand as many HRs out of prospects, so I don't have that obsession with power. I find it too reductive to pin such a majority of a player like Madrigal's value purely on power production. This isn't HR derby, or a WAR contest or fantasy baseball. The idea is to build a good, balanced, winning major league team. He's going to be in a lineup with Eloy, Vaughn and Robert — three guys with monster power, TA — a guy with good power for his position, and possibly Collins or Burger — two guys with massive power if they make it. The White Sox will not lack for HRs to the point they desperately need their 2B to hit a lot of them. How many HRs Nick Madrigal hits is just not that important to me to how he will provide value to the White Sox. JMO.

[fathom]

1 minute ago, Buehrlesque said:

I come at this from a bit of a different angle than many of you, in that I don't demand as many HRs out of prospects, so I don't have that obsession with power. I find it too reductive to pin such a majority of a player like Madrigal's value purely on power production. This isn't HR derby, or a WAR contest or fantasy baseball. The idea is to build a good, balanced, winning major league team. He's going to be in a lineup with Eloy, Vaughn and Robert — three guys with monster power, TA — a guy with good power for his position, and possibly Collins or Burger — two guys with massive power if they make it. The White Sox will not lack for HRs to the point they desperately need their 2B to hit a lot of them. How many HRs Nick Madrigal hits is just not that important to me to how he will provide value to the White Sox. JMO.

It’s less about home run power for me and more about being able to keep outfield honest and hit it over their heads.  If he can do that, he will have a good career.  

[mqr]

10 hours ago, Jack Parkman said:

One of these things is not like the other; one of these things doesn't belong. 

Moncada and Robert can throw leather and have blazing speed, Eloy can do neither. With the bat, sure, Eloy belongs in the same league as the other two. But as overall baseball players? Moncada and Robert blow Eloy away. 

Yeah that's why I added the 'and even', I think Eloy has that generational hitter potential that Vaughn doesn't quite have. 

[Dam8610]

55 minutes ago, Jose Abreu said:

What I don't get is your expectations for his BABIP. Why does his lack of strikeouts influence his BABIP in any way?

What matters is his quality of contact, which I don't know enough about, but I haven't seen anything to suggest that his contact profile is so good that he'll be Moncada or Judge like with his BABIP 

Quality of contact and speed are the two factors that influence sustainable differences between league average BABIP and a given player's BABIP. The quality of contact is the question mark at the ML level as of now. He has the speed. My projection was based on a high end outcome for him, say 80th percentile or higher. Thus, the projection assumes that the quality of contact question resolves at least mostly favorably for him.

[SoxBlanco]

20 minutes ago, Dam8610 said:

Quality of contact and speed are the two factors that influence sustainable differences between league average BABIP and a given player's BABIP. The quality of contact is the question mark at the ML level as of now. He has the speed. My projection was based on a high end outcome for him, say 80th percentile or higher. Thus, the projection assumes that the quality of contact question resolves at least mostly favorably for him.

When you strike out so infrequently, isn’t your quality of contact going to be lower?

[steveno89]

11 hours ago, Chicago White Sox said:

What are realistic expectations for his ceiling?  While I think Dam has gone to the extreme, I think some here are underestimating what he could be capable of.

A realistic expectation for a guy like Madrigal would be a batting average around .300, .350 OBP, plenty of doubles, 20+ steals, quality baserunning and excellent defense. While he might not have the 6+ WAR ceiling of certain prospects, I feel Madrigal can consistently become a 3-5 WAR player, a very valuable piece to have.

The plus defense at second base could be worth 1-2 WAR on its own. 

Edited July 9, 2019 by steveno89

[thxfrthmmrs]

1 hour ago, Dam8610 said:

Quality of contact and speed are the two factors that influence sustainable differences between league average BABIP and a given player's BABIP. The quality of contact is the question mark at the ML level as of now. He has the speed. My projection was based on a high end outcome for him, say 80th percentile or higher. Thus, the projection assumes that the quality of contact question resolves at least mostly favorably for him.

His quality of contact is pretty poor actually. Too many weak grounders or choppers right now where at MLB level he’s going to see defensive shifts and OF playing in to take away some of those hits. He has 60 grade on speed, so you aren’t talking about a burner on base paths either. All in all, you’re giving a projection of the absolute best case scenario and not the most likely scenario. If he does hit .350 with .900+ OPS he’d be a top 3 MVP candidate when coupled with his other tools, which again, would be an unrealistic projection for Nicky.

[bmags]

2 hours ago, fathom said:

It’s less about home run power for me and more about being able to keep outfield honest and hit it over their heads.  If he can do that, he will have a good career.  

Exactly this, I haven't been discouraged by Madrigal's lack of HR power, though I definitely do use it as a shorthand admittedly, it's the lack of doubles.

I do think he is a guy that can turn doubles into triples, but to do that you need to get more basehits to the gaps which he has not done a good job of to date. It's his lack of xbh that has been discouraging to me, but that said, I was a high person on Madrigal and I am not saying he is now a bad player or prospect. But the pitching in the big leagues is going to be much better more often, will that lead to more of his bad contact?

I think what has been heartening is his BB rate improving as he's gone up. I thought his power would be better, but I do think his path to plus-starter is through walking more often. The common wisdom that players without power will get walked less because pitchers aren't afraid of challenging them I have found to be overblown - because too many pitchers aren't that great at control if the hitter can actually avoid swinging at balls. And I think I'm being positive when I'm saying madrigal will improve his obp skills as he advances.

So if Madrigal can refine his sense of the zone and really only swing at strikes, he can optimize his production. I just don't think that will be peak Rod Carew. But if he hits .390 I will not be complaining he doesn't hit enough home runs, it's just I don't think a player can hit .390 while making such light contact.

[TomPickle]

50 minutes ago, thxfrthmmrs said:

His quality of contact is pretty poor actually. Too many weak grounders or choppers right now where at MLB level he’s going to see defensive shifts and OF playing in to take away some of those hits. He has 60 grade on speed, so you aren’t talking about a burner on base paths either. All in all, you’re giving a projection of the absolute best case scenario and not the most likely scenario. If he does hit .350 with .900+ OPS he’d be a top 3 MVP candidate when coupled with his other tools, which again, would be an unrealistic projection for Nicky.

He was one of the few guys in the Futures Game to top 30 ft/sec, so to start his career at least he's probably at 70 grade speed. That hasn't translated to great stolen base numbers in the minors though so I don't know if that will change as he gets to higher levels.

[mqr]

3 minutes ago, TomPickle said:

He was one of the few guys in the Futures Game to top 30 ft/sec, so to start his career at least he's probably at 70 grade speed. That hasn't translated to great stolen base numbers in the minors though so I don't know if that will change as he gets to higher levels.

I find it hard to trust speed grades, even though in theory that should be by far the easiest thing to scout. Robert is always around 60, but I watched him run almost 32 miles an hour two days ago. That's easily 80 speed. 

[bmags]

4 minutes ago, TomPickle said:

He was one of the few guys in the Futures Game to top 30 ft/sec, so to start his career at least he's probably at 70 grade speed. That hasn't translated to great stolen base numbers in the minors though so I don't know if that will change as he gets to higher levels.

This is one of the many mysteries where we have to figure out whether Madrigal's tremendous "soft" traits end up maximizing and improving skills that currently aren't showing up in lower competition.

[bmags]

2 minutes ago, mqr said:

I find it hard to trust speed grades, even though in theory that should be by far the easiest thing to scout. Robert is always around 60, but I watched him run almost 32 miles an hour two days ago. That's easily 80 speed. 

Too many times the speed grades seem to overemphasize time to first, which isn't how a lot of us think about it. Players like TA have slower times to first because of their swing that gets them out of the box slow.

[Chicago White Sox]

3 hours ago, Jose Abreu said:

What I don't get is your expectations for his BABIP. Why does his lack of strikeouts influence his BABIP in any way?

What matters is his quality of contact, which I don't know enough about, but I haven't seen anything to suggest that his contact profile is so good that he'll be Moncada or Judge like with his BABIP 

Groundballs, low line drives, and speed are huge factors on BABIP and those are all reflective of Madrigal.  He should easily be a .330 BABIP guy IMO and potentially much higher.

[bmags]

16 minutes ago, Chicago White Sox said:

Groundballs, low line drives, and speed are huge factors on BABIP and those are all reflective of Madrigal.  He should easily be a .330 BABIP guy IMO and potentially much higher.

I'm glad you said this, because it caused me to fall into this article, which was absolutely fascinating.

https://www.pitcherlist.com/going-deep-an-exposition-on-babip/

[Jose Abreu]

16 minutes ago, bmags said:

I'm glad you said this, because it caused me to fall into this article, which was absolutely fascinating.

https://www.pitcherlist.com/going-deep-an-exposition-on-babip/

Fascinating but also disappointing. Not the article itself but the findings. Basically tells me that there's no one size fits all approach at evaluating BABIP and that every player needs to be evaluated on a case by case basis. 

[Chicago White Sox]

40 minutes ago, bmags said:

I'm glad you said this, because it caused me to fall into this article, which was absolutely fascinating.

https://www.pitcherlist.com/going-deep-an-exposition-on-babip/

Lol...that’s the exact I was referencing when I made my statement.  Definitely a great article.

[bmags]

17 minutes ago, Jose Abreu said:

Fascinating but also disappointing. Not the article itself but the findings. Basically tells me that there's no one size fits all approach at evaluating BABIP and that every player needs to be evaluated on a case by case basis. 

Not totally true. 

If the claim is that Nick Madrigal will be able to support a higher BABIP (and therefore average since nearly all of his balls are in play), this article states the following in support:

- Harder contact does not correlate with BABIP

- RH pull hitters have higher babip (Nick Madrigal 46% pull% // 44% league wide in upper levels of minors)

- BABIP goes up as higher GB% goes up (Nick Madrigal 52% GB% // 43% league wide in upper levels of minors)

- BABIP goes down as FB% goes up (Nick Madrigal 24% fB% // 37% FB% league wide in upper levels of minors)

The following does not support it:

- Speed of player does not correlate with BABIP

Unknown

- Low Line drives correlate with higher BABIP

HOWEVER:

None of these are VERY strong correlations, but multiple together may indicate a higher BABIP.

Nick Madrigals AA BABIP is .400. League wide is .315. How much do the + correlations mean for elevating his BABIP? We will see. 

[Jack Parkman]

I have Vaughn and Madrigal in a dead heat right now. Vaughn has a tiny pro sample size, so I'm not ready to put him ahead of Madrigal just yet, as Madrigal is raking in AA. 

[bmags]

28 minutes ago, Jose Abreu said:

Fascinating but also disappointing. Not the article itself but the findings. Basically tells me that there's no one size fits all approach at evaluating BABIP and that every player needs to be evaluated on a case by case basis. 

The other thing I did not know which is helpful is its assertion that GB% and FB% normalize faster than LD%. James McCann's higher babip was not a result of increasing LD%, it actually decreased, while GB% increased. HE also cut his IFFB% wayyy down. So to what extent his BABIP reduces to in the second half will be interesting to see!

[bmags]

7 minutes ago, Chicago White Sox said:

Lol...that’s the exact I was referencing when I made my statement.  Definitely a great article.

I had very much thought that Moncada would be able to maintain a higher BABIP due to speed and his hard hit % so it is wild to me that this is not true.

[Chicago White Sox]

10 minutes ago, bmags said:

Not totally true. 

If the claim is that Nick Madrigal will be able to support a higher BABIP (and therefore average since nearly all of his balls are in play), this article states the following in support:

- Harder contact does not correlate with BABIP

- RH pull hitters have higher babip (Nick Madrigal 46% pull% // 44% league wide in upper levels of minors)

- BABIP goes up as higher GB% goes up (Nick Madrigal 52% GB% // 43% league wide in upper levels of minors)

- BABIP goes down as FB% goes up (Nick Madrigal 24% fB% // 37% FB% league wide in upper levels of minors)

The following does not support it:

- Speed of player does not correlate with BABIP

Unknown

- Low Line drives correlate with higher BABIP

HOWEVER:

None of these are VERY strong correlations, but multiple together may indicate a higher BABIP.

Nick Madrigals AA BABIP is .400. League wide is .315. How much do the + correlations mean for elevating his BABIP? We will see. 

Speed doesn’t correlate on its own, but speed definitely helps when it comes to turning ground balls into hits.

[thxfrthmmrs]

This helps explain BABIP from a quality of contact perspective. Hard hit data is not available in MILB, but I think soft GB and FB are the most common occurrence for Madrigal right now. If he becomes more a line drive hitter, even making soft to medium contact would help boost his BABIP tremendously

https://www.fantraxhq.com/sabermetrics-quality-contact-babip/