Andrew Benintendi and Recent #1 Prospects
This past weekend saw the release of MLB.com’s Top 100 prospects, including a show on MLB Network highlighting the Top 50. Andrew Benintendi was named their #1 overall prospect, a fact that’s sure raise his price some in the draft market, especially after Keith Law ranked him the same last week. Back in December, our own Trey Baughn gave him the top spot in his fantasy prospects list and CBS slotted him 2nd in a similar list focusing on fantasy impact.
I’m a little torn on Benintendi for 2017. On the one hand, he’s an advanced college bat who blitzed through the minors in 151 games and acquitted himself very well in a 34-game sample at the majors. On the other, he’s going into his age-22 season with a whopping 118 PA under his belt and that first six-month grind has a way of punching players in the face at some – or multiple points – throughout the season. But then back on the first hand, we know from Jeff Zimmerman that aging curves are moving up so maybe Benintendi is ready to be an impact bat already.
All that said, I’m not necessarily here to determine how good Benintendi will be, but rather review recent #1 prospect performance in the year they were anointed as such. I’m looking at the last 10 years, and while I did cite MLB.com’s list out front, I’m actually looking Baseball America’s #1s because MLB’s archive uses the dynamic in-season lists making it tough to get a read on the actual #1s at the beginning of each season. It just so happens that all 10 #1s have been hitters so that works out well.
2008: Jay Bruce – 452 PA, .254 AVG, 63 R, 21 HR, 52 RBI, 4 SB
I forgot that Bruce was even a #1 prospect to be honest. He never struggled as a minor leaguer and in fact got better every year. He was drafted #12 overall in 2005 and posted an .825 OPS in 54 games that year. He then had full seasons of .871 and .962 culminating with a 1.023 in 49 games before his call-up in 2008.
He didn’t debut until late-May and a fast start (1.293 OPS in first 56 PA) generated some excitement until a cold snap left him with a .728 OPS through 53 games. He had an .806 OPS and 14 HR in his final 55 games to salvage the season. The biggest issue was his inability hit lefties (.562 OPS in 152 PA), something that has hampered more often than not during his career.
2009: Matt Wieters – 385 PA, .288 AVG, 35 R, 9 HR, 43 RBI, 0 SB
If you weren’t into prospects around the time of Wieters ascending through the minors, then you missed the greatness that was Matt Wieters Facts. It was like Chuck Norris Facts, but for baseball. “The Most Interesting Man in the World” ad campaign for Dos Equis came out around this time, too. It was all the rage. Unfortunately, Wieters’ tears haven’t cured cancer and he’s never been able to live up the hype of his 1.010 minor league OPS.
Like Bruce, he didn’t debut until late-May, but didn’t take off immediately. In fact, his 95 wRC+ was very underwhelming against the massive expectations, slotting just 12th among catchers (min. 350 PA). Using his raw homer total doesn’t tell us much given the playing time disparities, but his .124 ISO was 18th.
All that said, it’s tough to glean much from this season and apply it to someone like Benintendi because catching is just unlike anything else in the game. While Wieters has never shown the bat of his prospect days, he’s been a strong presence behind the dish, particularly with his arm.
2010: Jason Heyward – 623 PA, .277 AVG, 83 R, 18 HR, 72 RBI, 11 SB
Heyward might be the best analog for what we can expect out of Benintendi. I’m not exactly comparing their styles, but Heyward’s line most closely resembles Benintendi’s projection of the guys in this list. You see Heyward’s numbers above and compare that to the .283-64 R-10 HR-60 RBI-13 SB projection from Steamer in 516 PA. Extrapolate to Heyward’s 623 PA and you’re essentially trading some homers for AVG and SB from Benintendi.
I think if you want to be realistic about it, this is about the high watermark that you should project for Benintendi. Sure, he can exceed it, but if you project him to do so or draft him at a level that requires him to do so, you’re likely to wind up disappointed. Unfortunately for Heyward, he hasn’t been able to recapture the heights of that debut season with his 134 wRC+ remaining a career-high through eight seasons. He’s aiming to rebound from his career-worst season when 2017 kicks off.
2011: Bryce Harper – DNP in the majors
2012: Bryce Harper – 597 PA, .270 AVG, 98 R, 22 HR, 59 RBI, 18 SB, Rookie of the Year
Harper went back-to-back, but was worth the wait with an award-winning campaign in 2012. Even as the #1 prospect in 2011, he wasn’t pushed up too high in fantasy drafts as he was an 18-year old who had all of nine games in the Arizona Fall League under his belt as a pro. I wish I could remember exactly where he was going in 2012 drafts, though.
I don’t have any ADP data handy and my memory may be a bit dodgy, but I seem to remember him going in the early double-digit rounds with regularity. This was after a strong A-ball/Double-A campaign plus a very productive repeat of the AFL, but if I recall correctly, we had a firm idea that he’d start in Triple-A so anyone buying in was still getting a dead roster spot for some amount of time in April which helped keep the price down.
All #1s are not created equally and Harper stands alone in this generation. Mike Trout was never a #1 prospect, he went #2 and then #3 in ’11 and ’12, so Harper is really the high water mark for not only hype, but also panning out on it thus far. Sure, last year was a disappointment after the MVP season, but we’re still dealing with a guy holding the 5th-best OPS+ through his age-23 season in the integration era. Benintendi is not on this level.
2013: Jurickson Profar – 324 PA, .234 AVG, 30 R, 6 HR, 26 RBI, 2 SB
Profar had a meaningless 17 PA sample in September call up, making the jump from Double-A. That said, a year later at age-20, he split his season between Triple-A and the majors with his MLB time being just as bad as the cup of coffee the year before. Even though we’re four full years removed from his debut, he’s still something of an Incomplete on the grading scale because he missed all of ’14 and ’15 with injuries. He’s further proof that there’s just no such thing as a can’t-miss prospect.
2014: Byron Buxton – DNP in the majors
Buxton was a two-time #1 at MLB.com and Baseball Prospectus, but he’s gone 1-2-2 the last three seasons at BA. He debuted in ’15 with a .576 OPS in 138 PA and then put up a .561 in 218 PA before a huge September last season. It was only 113 PA, but he looked different after some changes at Triple-A. He had a 1.011 OPS with nine homers leaving on a Costanzian high note that will increase his price at the draft table this year. Benintendi is a much more refined hitter than Buxton so I’d be surprised he struggled to Buxton’s level (.672 OPS in 469 PA).
2015: Kris Bryant – 650 PA, .275 AVG, 87 R, 26 HR, 99 RBI, 13 SB, Rookie of the Year
Bryant was on the fast track from day 1. Drafted out of college as the 2nd pick in 2013, he promptly cut up the lower levels for 36 games (1.078 OPS in 146 PA) and then ravaged the AFL for another 20 (1.184 in 92). In 2014, he treated Double- and Triple-A like batting practice with a 1.098 OPS and 43 HR in 594 PA. The Cubs still send him to Triple-A to start 2015, likely to manipulate his service time, and so he just embarrassed pitchers for another 33 PA (1.042 OPS) before finally debuting.
It took him 21 games to hit his first MLB homer, but he clubbed 26 in his final 131 games en route to the Rookie of the Year award. Bryant started the 2015 draft season deep in the teens rounds before surging into a top-100 pick. Benintendi is already starting higher (9th-10th round on average), but could have a similar surge despite not carrying quite the same overall upside Bryant had prior to his rookie campaign. Benintendi needs a 40-to-50 pick surge to land around Bryant’s 2015 ADP and I think it’s very plausible if he rakes in the Grapefruit League.
2016: Corey Seager – 687 PA, .308 AVG, 105 R, 26 HR, 72 RBI, 3 SB, Rookie the Year
Seager has the strong September call up in common with Benintendi. In fact, his was even strong (.986 OPS in 113 PA) which had his price soaring by draft season 2016. He was a consistent top 75 pick meaning he had to perform to payoff. He turned in a Rookie of the Year effort that included a sneaky 105 runs in addition to the strong power and average output.
I don’t think Benintendi will surge that high even with a big spring, but he could eclipse the dollar value Seager yielded last year if he reaches his high-end projection because it includes double-digit speed to counter the big power Seager showed. We also can’t sleep on Benintendi’s own power. He grades out above average and could hit 18-22 HR in that perfect world scenario. While neither Bryant nor Seager is all that comparable to Benintendi in terms of player type, they do showcase the big upside of a #1 prospects in their first year and like them, Benintendi could definitely reel in a Rookie of the Year award.
2017: Benintendi
Make no mistake, I wasn’t trying to find a Beni clone by looking over these previous #1s. Rather, I was trying to show the volatility associated even with those prospects we deem to be the very best. We do have back-to-back ROY winners, but Buxton and Profar were unmitigated fantasy disasters the two years before that.
The last thing I did for this was look at players 23 and younger (Benintendi was 21 last year, but I wanted to thicken the sample a bit) over the last 10 years who had a 90-130 PA taste before their qualified rookie season. Seager is actually the best of that bunch with a 174 OPS+. Benintendi was one of eight players with at least a 100 OPS+ in this given group of 35 hitters.
Jorge Soler (146) was next best, but we’re still waiting on him to really click. Jacoby Ellsbury (131) only had a .729 OPS in his true rookie season after the big call up, but it was a fantastic fantasy season with a .280 AVG, 98 R, 9 HR, 47 RBI, and 50 SB. Other luminaries include Rob Brantly (123), Dayan Viciedo (122), Adam Eaton (114), and Albert Almora (102). This just in: small sample success in a cup of coffee is not predictive for your rookie season the following year.
Like I said earlier, this exercise wasn’t meant to find a perfect analog for Benintendi, but just a look back at recent #1 prospects to show the range of potential outcomes. He is an advanced hitter who has looked the part every step of the way in his brief pro career, but the first start-to-finish slog has a way of wearing on everyone.
I think Benintendi’s price only goes up from here. I think he pairs both a high floor with legitimate upside so I can certainly pay a higher price than his 136 ADP right now, but if he’s a top 75 pick by late-March, I’m probably looking elsewhere.
Whether the Redsox trust him enough to put him in the heart of the order have a lot to do with it. If healthy it’s looking like 290/350/450 for Beni, with possible 40 doubles and 15 homers and 20 steals? One thing that separates him from most of that group is his contact/oppo% profile which has always been good, and defense, which in left is strong enough to keep him on the field
That’s near the top of the projection range and I worry that some are EXPECTING it as almost a baseline.
I may be jumping the gun a bit on Nintendo but I really feel that might be his baseline. The kid has been an elite athlete his whole life. He was the baseball and basketball player of the year in Ohio as a senior and a 5’9 white kid. That takes some serious athletic ability. But the most promising I hear in scouting reports is that he is just a natural hitter. And when you watch him swing the bat you see it. He will need to figure out lefties at the major league level but he’s raked at literally every level of his career. I’d be surprised if he hits lower then 280 and doesn’t get 160 hits. I think the player he reminds me of the most is a left handed Mookie Betts. Very similar body types very similar athleticly the both are pure hitters and have smooth swings. Also people said Mookie was gonna be a plus hitter with maybe 45 to 50 power. He turned into a plus plus hitter with plus power while they obviously aren’t the same type of hitter I think Andrews first year will be very similar to Mookies when he hit 291 with 18 homers
I believe Benintendi was an All-State selection for basketball, but not player of the year.
Nah baseball and basketball player of the year in Ohio his senior year for his schools classification
Nah look it up
As Paul said, that’s his upside rather than what you should expect. I’ve underestimated Benintendi (and Betts for that matter) before and may be doing that again, but Andrew is much more of a line drive hitter than Mookie. Furthermore, while Benintendi has speed he has never been all that aggressive in attempting steals during his professional career, so people like ItsPoPtime are likely overestimating him there as well.
Maybe in his prime but not 2017
Thanks for the writeup!
If we exclude the two #1 prospects who didn’t play in the majors, we’re looking at seven player-seasons. Four of the seven are pretty desirable outcomes.
Glad you enjoyed it! Love your handle btw, lol
If the goal, as you stated, was to show the range of possible outcomes for Benintendi, then the method you used is not all that illuminating.
Each year among top prospects, which for argument’s sake might include players ranked in the top 20, those prospects range the gamut from seasoned college players to younger kids who became pros at age 17 or 18, from more polished players to players with higher ceilings but more risk. Selecting those ranked 1 heading into each season among those top prospects is an arbitrary exercise. You end up lumping in a player like Bryant, who has three college seasons under his belt when he was drafted and debuted at age 23, with a player like Buxton, who was 21 with contact problems despite the high, athletic ceiling.
Your results are neither surprising nor helpful: Top ranked players have ranged from total failures their first full years to rookies of the year.
To project a range of probable outcomes, you need to seek players who were comparable to Benintendi based on their age, their skill set and their maturity, and while that would take more time than quickly looking up which players who were ranked first, that leg work could deliver what your shortcut can not: A more reasoned basis for projecting the probable range of outcomes.
The other thing to consider is the Red Sox lineup and where Benintendi fits in, since that will affect his opportunity to accumulate at-bats, runs and RBIs, important considerations for most fantasy leagues. Last year, he batted 8th or 9th in all but two games. But this year it appears likely he will bat second, both because of his OBP skills and because of three leftie bats in the lineup, he profiles best near the top of the order to break up a string of righties, more so than Moreland or Bradley Jr.. Boston’s manager said as much days ago: Benintendi might be Boston’s No. 2 hitter, manager John Farrell John Tomase of WEEI.com. “It’s a possibility, there’s no doubt,” Farrell said. “He’s got very good balance at the plate. He’s got very good strike-zone understanding. He didn’t give way against lefthanders.”
The point was to look at #1 prospects. I’m sorry you didn’t enjoy the piece. I don’t run projections systems like Pod and Zimm, that’s their area of expertise. At no point did I suggest these were all similar players, rather their link was being #1. I repeatedly mentioned as much. If the point was to just run a projection, there are tons out there.
Here’s what you wrote when you summed up:
“Like I said earlier, this exercise wasn’t meant to find a perfect analog for Benintendi, but just a look back at recent #1 prospects to show THE RANGE OF POSSIBLE OUTCOMES.”
Since the purpose of your article was to examine Benintendi’s ADP, I took you to mean the range of possible outcomes for Benintendi; perhaps you meant the range of possible outcomes for number one ranked prospects.
Either way, though, I would suspect every fan who reads this site knows that some top prospects have bombed as rookies and some have excelled. Re-stating that doesn’t add to what baseball fans already know. I think it’s also accepted knowledge that a cup of coffee is not predictive of next season’s rookie year success.
I appreciate that each writer here has a focus and it make sense to leave projections to those who specialize in that area, but to add value, at least for those who read to prepared for fantasy seasons, does it not make sense to examine issues that aren’t already common knowledge? Where might Benintendi be placed in the lineup? What effect might we see from additions and subtractions to the lineup elsewhere? How often is Benintendi likely to face left-handed pitching, given the unbalanced schedules and the way starting rotations are shaping up in the A.L. East, and how might that affect his production?
Prospects are wildly overdrafted every single year by fantasy managers of all skill levels. I wanted to review recent #1s to see how they’ve been performing as the industry gets better at scouting players. Someone like Beni will get a lot of helium and I think folks should still be careful in their expectations even for someone with a high floor.
Who took the jam out of your donut Sher? Pretty clear that Paul was reviewing past #1 overall prospects and how they have done at the MLB level the year after receiving that designation. Take your stawmen somewhere else.
Huh? In your first post you claim the goal of the article was to show the possible ranges of performance for Benintendi. In your second post you claim it’s to examine his ADP. Maybe read the article before being wrong twice:
“All that said, I’m not necessarily here to determine how good Benintendi will be, but rather review recent #1 prospect performance in the year they were anointed as such.”
Seems to me Paul had more than one goal in writing the article but you’d have to ask him. He wanted to show the range of outcomes for the number 1 ranked-prospects and he wanted to share his view on Benintendi’s ADP. I assumed Paul thought those two goals were related when he wrote:
“Like I said earlier, this exercise wasn’t meant to find a perfect analog for Benintendi, but just a look back at recent #1 prospects to show the range of possible outcomes. He is an advanced hitter who has looked the part every step of the way in his brief pro career, but the first start-to-finish slog has a way of wearing on everyone. I think Benintendi’s price only goes up from here. I think he pairs both a high floor with legitimate upside so I can certainly pay a higher price than his 136 ADP right now, but if he’s a top 75 pick by late-March, I’m probably looking elsewhere.”
What do you think Benintendi goes for at an 11-team, $260 AL-Only auction? What’s the most you’d feel comfortable paying for him?
I think he’ll go in the teens. Could be upper teens by late-March which I’d probably pass on because if he doesn’t click right away, the waiver wire isn’t going to offer any relief.
That really depends partly upon information about your league that you have not provided. Which offensive categories for you count? Is your league a keeper league, and if it is, how many keepers are allowed per team? If it is a keeper league, what is the league’s typical inflation rate? What percentage of dollars is typically spent on hitters v. pitchers?
The answers to all these question shape the value of each player. If your league is an old-fashioned 4 x 4 in which BA, RBIs, HR and SB count, Benintendi is less valuable than in a 5 x 5 league that also includes runs (since Benintendi is likely to bat 2nd and score a lot of runs). He’s likely more valuable in an OBP league than a BA league because his above-average walk rate.
It also depend a lot on playing time projections. Steamer has a relatively strong projection records but only projects Benintendi getting 499 at-bats; if you believe he will be a regular and near the top of the lineup and not platooned, he should get another 20% at-bats.
Using the Fangraphs auction calculator and a range of league types, with and without inflation and with platoon-type at-bats or closer to full-time regular at bats. In a traditional 4 x 4 league, a 70-30 hitter/pitcher split and no keepers/inflation, Benintendi is valued at $15.40. Using fan projections with its higher at-bat totals, a 5 x 5 league that includes runs and OBP, and in a league with keepers and 20% inflation, Benintendi is valued between $27 and $28.
You can also use other auction calculators that allow you to input your own projections. For Benintendi, I expect him to score more runs than the projection systems on this site (because I expect him to bat 2nd and not platoon) and I also expect him to steal fewer bases, as he struggled with his steal percentage in AAA, stealing only 8 of 15 in AAA.
I actually have him on my team as a keeper in a 12-owner A.L. league that is 5 x 5 with runs and OBP instead of BA. In November, I projected him to hit 14 homers with 70 RBIs, 80 runs, 10 steals and a .340 OBP. Since he is rookie eligible, our league rules allow him to be kept on the reserve at no cost, so keeping him was an easy choice and his projected value matters little; I use the projections instead to project what my keepers as a group will produce, compare that to targets I need to reach to likely win, then create a plan to reach those targets, tracking the change in projections for my team during the auction.
Fwiw my father who is 60+ and saw Yaz play says Beni reminds him of Yaz. He never lays that comp on ANYONE.
I think Jonathan Sher is going to prepare a 7 paragraph response to this refuting your fathers opinion to the 3rd decimal.
Ha, that’d be a hoot! Mostly just found it an amusing proxy for how excited Red Sox fans are about him.
Heh, Hawk Harrelson is in ***LOVE*** with Yaz, and anybody who puts on a White Sox uniform. Several times a week he’ll say (insert player here) is the best I’ve seen at (arbitrary player trait) since Yaz. Or “Stoney, I haven’t seen a player make a play like that since Yaz”…
But it’s always an exaggeration of the play in front of him, and it always comes with a comparison to Yaz.
I’m actually a Mets fan, not a Red Sox fan, who is clearly too excited about fantasy baseball.
I thought I might instead compose a Haiku, but Benintendi has too many syllables.
In a 5×5 OBP keeper league; which two would you keep between Schwarber, Bregman, and Benintendi?
Anyone is welcome to enlighten me here.
If you believe Schwarber will stay healthy and get a chance to catch enough to qualify for that position, he is more valuable than either Bregman or Benintendi. In that sense, his ceiling is higher. But he also carries more risk; he was still rehabbing his knee over the winter.
Between Bregman and Benintendi, I project Bregman to be be somewhat more valuable, but frankly, its very close, and their range of likely outcomes overlap.
The safer, low-risk option is to take the B-brothers. The more high-risk/high reward approach would be to take Schwarber and either Bregman and Benintendi. Bregman is likely to play some SS, so if your league has a low threshold for eligibility, that might give him an edge over Benintendi.
I’m a Cubs fan, I take Bregman and Benintendi. The Cubs front office loves Schwarber, and they’ve proven that they know what they’re doing, but Schwarber had so much to prove as an outfielder and catcher before the injury, and while I believe he’s got a sky high ceiling as a hitter, he hit 250 as a rookie. There’s a chance Schwarber is the best of the three, but it won’t be this year. Bregman is pretty effing special, so it comes down to Beni or Schwarber…
FWIW, not sure if Wieter’s would have been #1 had it not been for a PECOTA bug.
That played a role in the Wieters facts phenomenon, but I knew some of the BA guys back then and I’m pretty sure they didn’t even know what Baseball Prospectus was, much less let it influence their rankings.
I have him in my keeper league and I’m so confused as I also have Jose Abreu Danny Salazar and Christian Yelich. I’m definitely keeping Chris Sale and Yelich and I have the 2nd pick, so I’ll be able to get a better pitcher than Salazar. As I’m already keeping an OF, is it realistic to keep Benintendi? I feel he’s going to be a superstar and in a keeper league that value is important, having 2 OFers under 30 for most of the duration of the league. Also, I love Benintendi, which may skew my decision, but I don’t want to risk not having the next Mike Trout/Bryce Harper.