the Big Dumper<\/a> in front of him, and Ford didn\u2019t look good in a brief trial in left field last year. The Mariners didn\u2019t play him anywhere else but catcher with Triple-A Tacoma this year, so it seems like it\u2019s catcher or designated hitter for now. If he\u2019s really a .400 OBP guy, or even a .375 OBP guy, with grade 45 power, he\u2019s probably an everyday player as a DH, but you\u2019d like to get more from him than that.<\/p>\nCarter Jensen, C, Kansas City Royals<\/p>\n
Jensen is a strong defensive catcher who\u2019s always shown good feel for the strike zone as a hitter, but this year he took a big step forward at the plate, hitting .292\/.360\/.420 in Double A and then .288\/.404\/.647 in 43 games in Triple A, although his strikeout rate of 28.2 percent at the higher level was a career worst.<\/p>\n
The Royals haven\u2019t gotten much production from behind the plate this year, with Salvador Perez regressing back to replacement level and playing worse as the season wears on, so Jensen doesn\u2019t have to hit that much to contribute, and as a left-handed hitter he could at least start against better right-handers to give Perez time off.<\/p>\n
George Valera, OF, Cleveland Guardians<\/p>\n
Valera was a top 30 MLB prospect going into the 2022 and 2023 seasons. He had right wrist surgery before the 2023 season, and the wrist started bothering him again that March, and when he returned for good in early June he wasn\u2019t the same hitter. He was somewhat better in 2024, at least in terms of power and hard contact, but was slowed first by a hamstring strain and then by a torn patellar tendon that ended his season in September, scotching any chance of a big-league promotion and keeping him out well into 2025.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s shown plus power in the last two years, with a handful of balls hit at 110 mph or harder, swinging hard and fast, with the potential to be a solid platoon outfielder if he can stay healthy. He hasn\u2019t hit lefties at all in Triple A, and overall his contact rates aren\u2019t good enough for him to project as an average regular without some sustainable improvement.<\/p>\n
Kevin Alc\u00e1ntara, OF, Chicago Cubs<\/p>\n
Bending the rules a little bit here, as \u201cThe Jaguar\u201d came up last year for 10 at-bats, so this won\u2019t be his MLB debut.<\/p>\n
This season, the Cubs\u2019 top prospect hit .266\/.349\/.470 in his first full year in Triple A, improving as the season went on \u2014 but he struck out 29.8 percent of the time, a result of his 6-foot-6 frame and the big hack he takes. I hoped we\u2019d see some improvement in his strikeout rates between him having another year of experience and the use of ABS in Triple A; I\u2019m still bullish on him long-term because of the tremendous upside he offers at the plate and in center field.<\/p>\n
For now, he might hit some moonshots, but I\u2019m afraid MLB pitchers will wreck him with breaking stuff (40 percent whiff rate on breaking pitches in Triple A this year). The Cubs sent fellow top prospect Owen Caissie, who struck out nine times in 25 PA in his MLB debut, back to Triple A in a corresponding move.<\/p>\n
(Photos of Alc\u00e1ntara (left) and Stewart: Katie Stratman, Mark J. Rebilas \/ Imagn Images)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"We\u2019ve had a few prospects called up in the past week, either right before or right after the…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":196889,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[1271,5048,1282,2084,1284,1266,1288,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-196888","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-chicago-cubs","9":"tag-cincinnati-reds","10":"tag-cleveland-guardians","11":"tag-fantasy-baseball","12":"tag-kansas-city-royals","13":"tag-mlb","14":"tag-seattle-mariners","15":"tag-sports","16":"tag-united-states","17":"tag-unitedstates","18":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115140538167018202","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196888","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=196888"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196888\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/196889"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=196888"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=196888"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=196888"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}