Peripheral Prospects of 2019, but for 2021

In 2019, Brad Johnson and I published a weekly series in which we, each on a semiweekly basis, identified three or four or five players in the Minor Leagues who (1) had not appeared on previous top-prospect lists and (2) appeared to us to be capable of producing admirably, perhaps significantly, at the big-league level at some point for fantasy purposes.

Because of an actual force majeure (i.e., the COVID-19 pandemic), Peripheral Prospects was rendered temporarily null as the Minor League Baseball season was cancelled. Alas, we published nothing about peripheral prospects. But that does not mean peripheral prospects did not thrive! Peripheral prospects indeed thrived.

I figured it would behoove me to not only review my favorite peripheral prospects from the end of 2019 but also highlight my favorite (existing) peripheral prospects heading into 2021, before a whole new batch of peripheral prospects is anointed. Yesterday, I revisited my 10 favorites from 2019; today, I’ll highlight another 10 eight whose progress I’m eager to monitor in 2021.

Presented in chronological order (and not by favoritism):

Week 1: Myles Straw | 26 | HOU | OF

2020 stats (MLB): 0 HR, 6 SB, .207/.244/.256 (40 wRC+) in 86 PA

It’s easy to be skeptical of Straw’s Depth Charts progression, which pegs him for the lion’s share of reps in Houston’s center field. Yet the Astros appear to be done making splashes in free agency and are not exactly flush with internal alternatives (FanGraphs suggests fellow Peripheral Prospect Chas McCormick might be Straw’s most-suitable back-up).

It’s also easy to be skeptical of what Straw can provide from a fantasy perspective. Clearly, his calling card is speed: he has stolen 16 bases in just 224 plate appearances — and stole 70 bases in 2018 alone. It’s game-changing speed, yes, the Mallex Smithian kind that usually requires you take a hit in all other categories to cash it in.

What Straw has that Smith and his predecessors did not is plate discipline. You’ll be lucky to squeeze even one home run out of him, but, in exchange, he will deliver an extremely tidy swinging strike rate (SwStr%) that, in the minors, helped produce walk rates nearly as high as his low-teens strikeout rates. And that high contact rate will cultivate line drives that, with his 70-grade speed, will keep his batting average on balls in play (BABIP) plenty afloat.

In other words, he might be not just a one-trick pony but a two- or even three-trick pony — a pony that provides average, and, amid a still-loaded Houston lineup, plenty of runs to boot. But even if he weren’t, he could hardly be any worse than Smith, who (I think) is less-skilled and (arguably) had more playing time concerns, yet rocked an ADP of 192.95 heading into the 2020 season.

In contrast, Straw’s National Fantasy Baseball Championship (NFBC) average draft position (ADP) of 456.27, offering a zero-risk, high-profit proposition. I mean, full-time players are hard to come by this late in drafts, let alone ones that could finish second in stolen bases behind only Adalberto Mondesi.

Week 5: Nick Solak | 26 | TEX | 2B

2020 stats (MLB): 2 HR, 7 SB, .268/.326/.344 (86 wRC+) in 233 PA

Solak barely qualified for this list in the first place; he missed all the major Top-100 lists but, at the time, was FanGraphs’ 114th-best prospect and 2nd-best on Texas’ farm (which made him about 10th-best on Tampa Bay’s farm, from whence he came). As a FV-50 prospect, one could have reasonably expected him to be a solid everyday player.

I’ll keep this brief: Solak has a clear path to playing time and a healthy 16-homer, 10-steal, .265 projection (and a tidy 8.1% career SwStr% to underpin it). This is basically what we wanted from Jake Bauers however many years ago that was. Difference between Solak and Bauers is Solak is actually good.

Week 5: Erik Swanson | 27 | SEA | SP

2020 stats (MLB): 12.91 ERA (3.75 SIERA), 24.3% K (12.1% SwStr), 5.4% BB in 7.2 IP

Wow! Look at Alex out here offering up a guy who posted a 12.91 ERA. Alternatively: Wow! Look at Alex out here offering up a guy who posted a 3.75 SIERA.

You should know better: neither of those outcomes are trustworthy in a seven-inning sample. That said, over the course of his first 65 innings and change dating back to the start of 2019, Swanny has posted a 4.22 SIERA with a healthy, if not also somewhat pedestrian, 4.36-to-1 strikeout-to-walk rate (K/BB).

Swanson boasts solid control that will keep unwanted free passes at bay. He’s certainly unconventional by today’s standards, throwing just three pitches and featuring his lone fastball nearly 70%(!!!) of the time. The four-seamer ranks in the 92nd percentile of shadow frequency, which is a Statcast-defined “attack zone” that effectively captures the areas just inside and outside the edges of the strike zone, and 79th percentile in whiffs per swing. It’s a good pitch! It does what he needs it to do, not unlike Freddy Peralta.

At least Peralta has a second pitch, though. I’m not sure we can say that about Swanson, although the sample sizes for his change-up and slider are so small that it’s hard to reach conclusions about how those pitches might actually fare in larger samples. This is precisely the kind of situation for which I would use my pitch similarity scores tool, which compares the physical characteristics of whichever pitch the user chooses, identifies similar pitches, and then provides performance metrics for those pitches.

For this, I’ll use Swanson’s 2019 Statcast data. Here are the five most-similar sliders to Swanson’s, among those thrown at least 500 times in a given season since the start of 2017:

And the five most-similar change-ups:

It’d be improper to read too far into these results. However, these pitch comps suggest Swanson might possess a slider that induces above-average whiffs and a change-up that suppresses contact quality at an elite clip. That would give Swanson a well-rounded, if also imbalanced, arsenal. Given the paltry results on these two pitches to date, it’s clear these outcomes above are optimistic, yet it’s exactly why I developed the similarity scores in the first place: to find signals in noise.

At ADP 750.36 — ranked 1,034th overall and drafted in only two leagues of 340 conducted thus far (one of those by me) — Swanson is a legitimate afterthought. That’s fair; he’s not even projected by FanGraphs to be part of their rotation plans. But he could very well be better than Justin Dunn, Logan Gilbert, and Nick Margevicius, making him no worse than the 8th option in a very young six-man rotation that features the oft-injured James Paxton. In other words: there’s a chance, even if it’s a long shot, that Swanson eventually starts and runs with the role. He’ll be on all my draft-and-hold squads.

Week 5: Denyi Reyes | 24 | BOS | SP (AA)

Because Reyes was too young to debut last year, and because the pandemic eradicated the Minor League Baseball season last year, we pick up where we left off with Reyes. Last we saw of him, he posted an 3.99 xFIP as a 22-year-old in Double-A with an 18.4% strikeout rate, 5.9% walk rate, and an 11.3% swinging strike rate.

The whiff proficiency we saw at Single-A in 2018 tapered off at higher levels. Still, Reyes remains young for his age at every level, boasts exceptional command, and continues to compile BABIP and home run-per-fly ball (HR/FB) rates that are significantly better than average. Not all of those skills are guaranteed to age well, but the synthesis of these positive traits suggest Reyes could develop into a legitimate top prospect. I’ll enjoy monitoring his progress in 2021.

Week 7: Josh Naylor | 24 | CLE | OF

2020 stats (MLB): 1 HR, 1 SB, .247/.291/.330 (68 wRC+) in 104 PA

Naylor, like Solak, barely missed the cutoffs that would have prevented him from being a Peripheral Prospect in the first place. San Diego’s 11th-ranked prospect (and FanGraphs’ 124th-ranked prospect overall) heading into 2019, and a former first-round draft pick, FanGraphs slapped a 50-grade future value (FV) on him, citing a 55 hit tool and 70 raw power. That’s nothing to sneeze at.

That synopsis followed a 2018 Double-A campaign during which Naylor went 17-5-.297 in 128 games with nearly as many walks (11.1%) as strikeouts (12.0%) — and preceded a 2019 Triple-A campaign during which he went 10-1-.314 in 54 games with, again, nearly as many walks (11.1%) as strikeouts (12.0%). The carryover in production was uncanny; Naylor didn’t miss a beat with the graduation to a higher level.

Having escaped the Padres’ incredible deep farm system awash with fringy outfield-slash-corner-infield types, Naylor finds himself on a much worse team but in a much better playing time situation. His first two cups of tea have yielded little fruit, but it stands to reason 2021 could be Naylor’s coming-out party.

At ADP 430.67, Naylor is going undrafted in 12-teamers and is nearly an afterthought in 15-teamers. At his best, he’ll provide modest everything — 20 homers, five steals, a .270 average — but that plays when his acquisition cost is basically nil and especially knowing he his path to playing time is largely unobstructed.

Week 7: Eli Morgan | 24 | CLE | SP

Like Reyes, we must pick up Morgan where we left him. Morgan’s minor-league numbers resemble his predecessors in that he boasts above-average command and above-average strikeout numbers. He reminds me very strongly of Corey Kluber, Shane Bieber, Zach Plesac, Aaron Civale — I mean, look at all their minor-league numbers. The Indians have a type, or, if not a type, then a very particular developmental path.

Which leads me to believe, given these similarities, that Morgan could easily lead with his command and add weapons later, much in the way Bieber did. Slapping “Kluber/Bieber upside” on Morgan is foolhardy, but expecting some more Plesac or Civale? Sure, why not?

All of his pitches grade out at roughly average except his change-up, which might be plus-plus (70 FV). The whiffs rates and resulting ERAs, grains of salt included, are excellent. Here are snippets from Eric Longenhagen’s blurb on Morgan heading into 2021:

[…] back in the 88-90 range and aided by some deception, his fastball is a viable big league offering. The impact pitch is Morgan’s changeup, which has disorienting angle and fade. I think he’ll live off of his strike-throwing […] and changeup enough to be a fifth starter.

I checked back in with Longenhagen. He saw my perspective in terms of Cleveland developing a certain type of pitcher but noted that Morgan lacks the velocity of Bieber, Plesac, Civale, etc. So, maybe the command-first, low-velo, strong-change-up profile more closely resembles someone like Zach Davies (although I realize he throws a sinker — think broadly here), certainly a serviceable fantasy and real-life arm.

I am optimistic and will take the over on No.-5 starter. We’ll see!

Week 9: Devin Smeltzer | 25 | MIN | SP

2020 stats (MLB): 6.75 ERA (4.38 SIERA), 20.8% K (10.1% SwStr), 6.9% BB in 16.0 IP

From the “Graduation TLDR” on Smeltzer’s page: “The ultra-funky Smeltzer graduated profiling as a long reliever or fifth starter.” Yep, that just about sums it up.

Another guy with solid command and seemingly good strikeout stuff, it’s apparent (or at least it seems that way) that it’s the kind of stuff that fools lesser-than hitters. Longenhagen slapped average grades on pretty much every pitch, which is interesting enough in its own right. I think Smeltzer might sneak his way into a few starts later this year and even could perform admirably in them.

I won’t go through the trouble of making pitch comp tables for Smeltzer, mostly because they took a long time for Swanson, and I’m tired, y’all. But I can rattle off a few close comps (min. 400 pitches thrown in a season) for Smeltzer’s offerings circa 2019:

• Four-seamer: Matthew Boyd (2018), Jason Vargas (2017), Daniel Norris (2018) — so, mostly bad
• Change-up: Wade Miley (2019), Tyler Anderson (2018), Wade LeBlanc (2019) — honestly, really good!
• Slider: Matthew Boyd (2018), CC Sabathia (2019), Matthew Boyd (2019) — maybe Smeltzer is actually just Matthew Boyd
• Curve: Gio Gonzalez (2017-18), Tyler Skaggs (2017-18), Rich Hill (2017-19) — mostly good

With that in mind, I’d say a version of Smeltzer that prioritizes change-ups and curves could be an effective one. Indeed, he ramped his change-up usage in 2020 and actually featured it just as often as his fastball. There’s a path to modest success here — it’s a narrow path, but it’s a path nonetheless.

Week 12: Ty France | 26 | SEA | 2B

2020 stats (MLB): 4 HR, 0 SB, .305/.368/.468 (132 wRC+) in 155 PA

France’s 2019 Triple-A campaign was the stuff of legend. He slugged 27 homers in 76 games while striking out just 14.7% of the time and racking up an absurd .410 BABIP, resulting in an otherworldly .399/.477/.770 slash line. It’s the kind of performance that, no matter how unsustainable it is, you can’t fake it — or, at least, you can’t fake most of it.

It’s anyone’s guess if France can catch lightning in a bottle again. Even a fraction of that magic would pay dividends at the Keystone where it appears he should have the leg up on Shed Long Jr. for the starting gig. His projections are tepid, all things considered — roughly 17-2-.260 in about 115 games — but you can see why folks like him at ADP 326.37, the 31st second baseman off the board. At that price, you have not a lot to lose and a whole lot to gain.