The Winter Conferences all the time function trades, however two stood above the fray final week. First, the Guardians traded Andrés Giménez to the Blue Jays in a two-part transaction that briefly left Cleveland with three lefty-hitting first basemen. Then the White Sox traded Garrett Crochet to the Pink Sox for 4 prospects. One of the best of that group, Kyle Teel, occurs to play catcher, the identical place as Chicago’s high prospect Edgar Quero. They even have the identical future worth grade of fifty, which is the cutoff for high 100 prospects.
The Guardians made an additional commerce to keep away from doubling up on related archetypes, sending Spencer Horwitz to the Pirates for 3 younger pitchers, however the White Sox simply saved each catchers. I heard a whole lot of murmured questioning of that call as I walked across the Dallas lodge that briefly hosted the middle of the baseball universe. However I feel each groups have been appearing rationally, and that worrying about Teel and Quero overlapping is foolish. I can’t show it for you – however I did provide you with some knowledge that can hopefully sway your opinion.
Cleveland’s case was easy. Steamer tasks Horwitz as a 2.5 WAR/600 PA participant. It tasks Kyle Manzardo as a 1.8 WAR/600 PA participant. Josh Naylor? Steamer has him down for two.4 WAR/600 PA. Three gamers for 2 positions — first and DH. (Sure, Horwitz has performed second base, too, however he actually shouldn’t be a second baseman, and I don’t suppose the Guardians would’ve used him there.) One in all them would trip the bench regardless of being an above-average contributor, a poor choice for a crew that’s making an attempt to maximise its sources. One thing needed to give.
Then again, there are the White Sox. They, too, traded a younger star, and the perfect participant they acquired again performs a place the place they already had an identical choice. Teel was our 42th-ranked prospect on our up to date High 100 checklist in 2024, a sophisticated all-around catcher who we anticipate to succeed in the majors in some unspecified time in the future within the subsequent two years. Quero was our Fortieth-ranked prospect, and also you’re by no means going to consider this, however he’s a sophisticated all-around catcher who we anticipate to succeed in the majors in some unspecified time in the future within the subsequent two years.
What makes these two conditions completely different? Time. These three two-win first basemen? That’s what they’re proper now. All three can’t play within the majors on the similar time, although, which implies that one is obstructing out the present-day worth of the opposite. On condition that the Guardians are centered on making the playoffs in 2025, that doesn’t actually work. Then again, Teel and Quero aren’t invaluable to the White Sox due to what they’ll do in 2025; for them, it’s extra in regards to the future.
Whenever you hear “High 100 Prospect,” don’t take that as a remaining proclamation on what a participant will probably be. For instance, our 2019 High 100 checklist had a delightfully assorted midsection:
2019 High Prospects, 46-56
Your future worth isn’t any assure of the place you’ll find yourself. There are tons of uncertainty. You’ll be able to consider a 50-FV prospect as extra of a distribution of potential future outcomes:
You’ll be able to quibble over what precisely this implies. Are our estimates imperfect? Undoubtedly. Do gamers enhance or worsen in unpredictable methods? Completely. Is that this randomness? Destiny? Unforeseeable arduous work and confidence? One thing deterministic that we merely don’t have the instruments to detect but? I don’t have a solution for you. The purpose is that whereas the label we’re placing on each White Sox catchers now is identical, what they’ll truly flip into as main leaguers is much from sure.
That’s all pretty apparent, however the magnitude issues. If the unfold of outcomes is slender, if most prospects just like Teel and Quero flip into broadly related main leaguers, perhaps worrying about them blocking one another is affordable. If the unfold is huge, or if the more than likely consequence is failure, that’s much less clear. Estimating that distribution of outcomes isn’t simple, nevertheless it’s actually doable.
I made a number of assumptions to get a tough thought of how this seems to be in actual life. First, I assumed that the White Sox try to compete three years from now – I needed to choose a quantity, and that one felt like an affordable center estimate. Subsequent, I made a decision that I’d take a look at projected WAR per 600 plate appearances as an estimator. Lastly, I needed to choose a pattern of real-life gamers to make use of as comparisons. I used all of the place gamers with 50-FV grades on our High 100 prospect checklist in a given 12 months.
I needed to keep away from having the information overly corrupted by the dearth of a 2020 minor league season, so I settled on utilizing three years: prospects from 2019 projected for 2022, prospects from 2021 projected for 2024, and prospects from 2022 projected for this upcoming season. In plain English, I took our prospect lists and checked out how the gamers who got a 50 FV developed over the following three years. I used projections moderately than outcomes as a result of not all of those gamers acquired full enjoying time, so small-sample variance would swamp the outcomes in any other case. Equally, I made a decision to not restrict my pattern to catchers with 50-FV scores as a result of there merely weren’t sufficient of them.
I selected to exclude pitchers from this examine. I’d should make assumptions about what number of innings equate to 600 plate appearances, and so they don’t appear clearly akin to hitting prospects, so I’m preserving the 2 separate. That also gave me 158 observations, loads sufficient for my functions right here.
My first commentary: There’s an actual likelihood of failure; 33 of the 158 hitters with a 50 FV have been projected for 0.5 or fewer WAR per 600 plate appearances three years later. A few of these guys by no means made the majors. Some did and underperformed. Roughly 20% of the time, in different phrases, your stable hitting prospect by no means materializes into somebody you possibly can rely on.
One other 20% of the prospects (34 out of 158) have been projected for between 0.5 and 1.5 WAR per 600 plate appearances three years later. That’s a pleasant rotational participant, roughly; 2.0 WAR per 600 PA is the league common. Talking of that, one other 40% (64 out of 158) projected for between 1.5 and three.0 WAR three years down the street. That’s the most important inhabitants, and likewise the central consequence. Loads of stable prospects turn into stable gamers, nothing roughly.
The highest finish is extra diffuse. There are 21 gamers between 3.0 and 4.0 WAR, 5 within the 4.0-5.0 vary, after which Gunnar Henderson alone on the high, projected for almost 6.5 WAR per 600 PA in 2025. Listed here are the information I used, in a really stripped-down model, in the event you really feel like enjoying alongside at residence.
Let’s strive that chart once more, this time with some odds on it:
Now that we’ve got a distribution, we are able to take into consideration what the White Sox are doing a little bit extra clearly. Any particular person 50-FV prospect has a 17% likelihood (on this knowledge set, a minimum of) of ending up as a participant projected for greater than 3.0 WAR three years down the street. However when you have two prospects enjoying the identical place, there’s a one-in-three likelihood (31%) of growing an All-Star-caliber choice, assuming their improvement is, broadly talking, unbiased.
Whenever you put it that method, what the White Sox are doing makes extra sense. Having a 31% likelihood of growing a catcher who’s a borderline All-Star or higher sounds loads higher than a 17% likelihood. Even higher, the chance of spoil decreases considerably when you might have two catchers as a substitute of 1. Think about the Padres and Rays. They’re good groups, frequent playoff contenders with loads of star-level performers. And but, during the last three years, they’re twenty third and twenty fourth in catcher WAR.
That unquestionably hurts their capability to compete within the playoffs – every are principally enjoying a roster spot quick in comparison with their opponents. And what are they presupposed to do about it? Good catchers are arduous to amass. You’ll be able to’t simply transfer somebody over from an identical defensive place. One of the best ones largely don’t make it to free company. For those who begin with a nasty state of affairs, and might’t by some means persuade the Braves and A’s to ship you William Contreras for nearly nothing (hello Milwaukee!), you’re out of luck.
With one high catching prospect, the information recommend that the White Sox could be a nasty consequence – a backup or full washout – roughly 43% of the time. Think about exiting a rebuild that took you half a decade and resulted in some completely depressing groups, solely to have your new contender hamstrung by a scarcity of choices at catcher. The chances of that occuring dip to 18% in the event you as a substitute have two 50-FV catchers to develop. So let’s take a look at our chart one final time, this time with the results of two 50-FV prospects on the similar place:
Nobody desires to plan on failure. It will be nice if each prospect panned out. However that simply can’t occur – it’s not even mathematically potential. There are solely so many wins to go round. Hoping your guys pan out isn’t a great team-building technique; it’s necessary to have backup plans and redundancy. Unstable gamers at far-away timelines are dangerous, and I don’t see something unsuitable with managing that danger by concentrating on an thrilling prospect like Teel.
Possibly I’m preaching to the choir on this one. It feels fairly easy to me: Prospects fail, so there’s nothing unsuitable with having extras in the event you’re not making an attempt to place them in your main league roster proper this minute. However the idea of blocking is overused amongst prospects. Getting good gamers is a superb thought. The place they play issues lower than how good they’re, and doubling up will be invaluable in the event you’re making an attempt to keep away from leaving a gap in your roster. Variance is actual – the nice groups account for it of their decision-making.
