Prospects to track this spring
Here are nine players who come into spring training with high expectations and high hopes. Plus, MLB execs just don't get the fans.
TOP OF THE FIRST
Baseball is trying harder, but figuring out fans seems beyond the sport’s leadership
I do not watch the NBA draft lottery.
I didn’t realize until recently that the NHL has a draft lottery, and the league shows it on TV. But I don’t watch it either.
And now that baseball has a draft lottery, I will not watch that either.
Not that I have a choice. Unlike the NBA and NHL, MLB doesn’t show its draft lottery.
I was looking at an article in The Athletic on the MLB draft lottery a few weeks ago, and readers commented how they would like to watch the event on TV. They wondered: why did MLB make no effort to show it?
Good question.
Slow learners
Not only will I not watch draft lotteries, but I also have no interest in watching any of the drafts.
I believe watching a draft is like watching someone put together a long list and taking several hours to do it.
But other people will watch drafts. And baseball took forever to figure that out.
The NFL and NBA have been showing their drafts since 1980. The NHL started televising its draft in 1984.
It took MLB until 2009.
Remember, baseball is the same sport whose policy for growing the game between 1965 and 1990 revolved around doing everything possible to limit the amount of MLB games shown on TV outside local markets.
No feel for the fans
The people who run MLB don’t seem to have an instinct for what fans like or would make the sport more attractive.
Other sports executives, such as Pete Rozelle with the NFL, Bill France with NASCAR, and David Stern with the NBA, just seemed to have a sense of how to appeal to fans.
If Pete Rozelle were the MLB commish in 2010, the overshifts would have been banned by June of that season.
If Bill France had run baseball, there would have been a pitch clock in 1972.
David Stern would have created a tiebreaker rule after about the third time he sat through a game that went 15-plus innings and watched fans leave in droves after the 10th inning.
It’s nice they asked
In recent years, I have taken part in MLB surveys during the past couple of years on what I like and don’t like about baseball.
That’s a start.
At least they’re trying to figure out what fans might want.
It’s been better under Rob Manfred. When Bud Selig was the commissioner he seemed mostly focused on revenue streams.
HEART OF THE ORDER
Center stage
For established players, spring training is just about shaking off the rust. But others are trying to show they are ready for prime time.
If Shohei Ohtani hits .180 this spring, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts will be telling reporters something like “We’re not worried. We know Shohei will be ready to go when the bell rings. He’s a professional. Blah. Blah. Blah.”
OK, he wouldn't actually say “Blah. Blah. Blah.” That’s just what most of us would hear.
The point is results don’t matter much in spring training — except when they do.
For a young player looking to make the team or to impress the organization and move up in the farm system, the stakes are high. Those spring performances can have a major impact on their careers.
Here are nine players who are hoping to take an important step in their career development during the next few weeks. None has played in the majors.
The Jackson Three
Jackson Holiday, SS, Orioles
Jackson Holliday is 20 years old, so there’s no need for the Orioles to rush him and promote him to the big club. On the other hand, if he has a good spring, there is one big reason to put him on the opening-day roster: the Prospect Promotion Incentive pick.
If Holiday makes the roster and wins Rookie of the Year, the Orioles get a bonus draft pick. The PPI, as it is known, was put in 2022 as part of the Basic Agreement. It discourages teams from waiting a couple of months to promote a promising rookie. Teams often did this to delay young stars’ eligibility for salary arbitration and free agency.
To be eligible, the player must be ranked in the Top 100 Prospects by two of these three — Baseball America, ESPN, or MLB Pipeline. Holliday, the top overall draft pick in the 2022 draft, is ranked No. 1 on all three lists. In fact, anyone who makes a list of top prospects starts with Holliday.
The hyperbole on this kid is already at a major-league level.
“He is the easy front-runner to win AL Rookie of the Year,” ESPN’s Buster Onley wrote. (Wow! And pitchers and catchers haven’t even reported.)
“He was the most talented player I saw in the Futures Game,” The Athletic’s Jim Bowden wrote. (I’m not sure how you tell that from one game, but then I am not a former GM.)
Holliday played at four levels of the minor leagues, including 18 games at Class AAA Norfolk. He hit .323 overall with a .442 OBP and 12 homers. He could use more pop, but he said he’s been working on getting stronger this winter.
Speaking of pop. He is the son of former MLB All-Star Matt Holliday. Being the son of an MLB player — particularly a star player — is a plus for any prospect. They are less likely to be overwhelmed by the MLB scene.
Jackson Chourio, OF, Brewers
Over three minor league seasons, Jackson Chourio has hit .286 with 47 home runs. Good but not exactly eye-popping.
But last season he stole 44 bases to go with his 22 homers. He became just the fifth teenager in the past 50 years to have a 20/40 season in the minors.
Here is the most eye-popping number of all — $82 million. That is the guaranteed amount the Brewers have agreed to pay Chourio over the next eight seasons. With incentives, he could make north of $140 million.
Why did the Brewers, who traded away ace Corbin Burnes recently and aren’t exactly throwing money around this off-season, make this deal?
Well, they liked how those 47 homers looked. Chourio, who turns 20 on March 11, hits the ball hard and all over the yard. They also like how cut down on his strikeouts last summer at Class AA, whiffing 36 times in the second half after striking out 67 times in the first half. (The ball the Southern League used also changed, and that may have been a factor.)
Chourio can play all three outfield positions, though his arm is only so-so.
Jackson Jobe, Tigers, RHP
A little less than a year ago, Jackson Jobe was looking at possibly the entire 2023 season with back issues.
Now he has, unofficially, received his first invitation to spring training with the Tigers.
Jobe, the No. 3 overall pick in the 2021 draft, suffered some back discomfort at High-A West Michigan in 2022. Last March he was diagnosed with lumbar spine inflammation, and the Tigers said it would be three to six months before he could begin rehabbing.
"It's unfortunate for him because he was looking as impressive as he has as a pro," Tigers manager A.J. Hinch told the Detroit Free Press. "His stuff was really good. His last bullpen was excellent. All the stuff that we hoped he would accomplish coming into minor-league camp, he was doing."
By early June, Jobe was throwing live batting practice. He took the mound for the Tigers’ Florida Complex League team on June 17. He made it to Class AA by the end of the season, compiling a 2-4 record with a 2.81 ER, 84 strikeouts, and six walks in 16 starts.
He followed that up with four starts in the Arizona Fall League, going 3-1 with a 2.87 ERA, with 19 strikeouts and five walks.
Jobe has a fastball in the mid-to-high 90s, two curve balls, and a high spin rate that has scouts excited. His control last summer was superb, and, if he stays healthy, perhaps he will become what the Tigers hoped for with Casey Mize.
The guys from LSU
Paul Skenes, RHP, Pirates
Unlike most prospects, Paul Skenes, who turns 22 in May, looks like a full-grown man. A big, grown man. He is 6-foot-6 with a listed weight of 235 pounds but is almost certainly heavier than that.
Skenes was a two-way player for two seasons at the Air Force Academy before transferring to LSU, where he went 13-2 with a 1.69 ERA, struck out 209 and walked 20.
He was drafted No.1 overall by the Pirates and after he signed with the Pirates, they used him sparingly. He started five games and threw 6 2/3 innings total across three levels. He was unscored upon, except for a rough outing against the Akron Rubber Ducks in an Eastern League game when he gave up four runs and didn’t get out of the first.
Skenes has a plus-fastball — he regularly touches 100 mph — a good slider and hasn’t had to develop his other pitches much. He is expected to start the season where he finished it, with Class AA Altoona. The Pirates are not expected to contend, so they’re in no hurry to rush Skenes to the major leagues.
Last I heard — and I will admit I don’t keep up on this stuff — he was dating LSU gymnast and Instagram star Olivia Dunne. So baseball has an answer to Tarvis Kelce and Taylor Swift . . .
Yea!?
Dylan Crews, OF, Nationals
A week before the 2020 draft, Dylan Crews, who had just finished his senior season at Lake Mary High School in Florida, withdrew his name from consideration and said he was going to LSU.
Crews helped the Tigers win the 2023 College World Series. He and Paul Skene became the first players from one school to go 1-2 in the draft. Garrett Cole (1st) and Trevor Bauer (3) from UCLA, and Bob Horner (1) and Hubie Brooks (3) were the closest previously.
In Crews’ three seasons at LSU, he slashed .380/.498/.689.
“Dylan is the best player in college baseball history, in my opinion,” said coach Jay Johnson, who came to LSU from Arizona in 2022. “Frankly, it was a big reason that I accepted the job. I probably would have looked at LSU anyways, but knowing that I was going to have a once-in-a-lifetime player on my team for two years was a big deal to do that.”
Crews breezed through two levels of the minors until hitting a bump at Class AA Harrisburg. In 20 games with the Senators, he made contact on only 70% of his swings.
He has good speed but doesn’t steal many bases. And he is considered athletic enough for center field.
Catching everyone’s attention
Jeferson Quero, C, Brewers
At 20, Jeferson Quero was the youngest catcher to get 300 plate appearances at Class AA last season. He batted a respectable .262 with an OBP of .339 with 16 homers and an OPS of .779.
But it is Jefferson Quero’s defense that has wowed scouts.
He won a Rawling Gold Glove— the top fielding award for all the minor leagues — at catcher last season.
“A 20-year-old in Double-A, crushing it on both sides of the ball, that kind of says it,” said Walker McKinven, the Brewers’ associate pitching, catching and strategy coach. “One, the confidence to put him at that level, and two, for him to do it. We had him in big league camp for the first time and he more than held his own there.
Quero could unseat William Contreras as the Brewers’ main catcher in the not-too-distant future.
Quero is “considered a much better defensive catcher than Contreras,” former GM Jim Bowden wrote for the Athletic.
Quero burnished his reputation in the Arizona Fall League, throwing out 11 of 24 would-be base stealers.
The Brewers placed Quero on their 40-man roster last fall after he became eligible for the Rule 5 draft.
Quero has some experience in the spotlight. He played for the Cardenales Little League club that represented Latin America in 2015 in the Little League World Series, homering against Japan, which won the tournament.
Ethan Salas, C, Padres
Ethan Salas plays like a man among boys, but he is a boy among men. He won’t turn 18 until June.
“He debuted in Low A on May 30,” The Athletic’s Keith Law wrote, “just two days before he turned 17, which, among other things, makes him the first player I’ve ever scouted who was younger than my daughter is. (This is extremely important information, to me, at least.)”
The Padres signed him for a $5.6 million bonus in January 2022, and he hit .248 with nine homers in 66 games in the minors last season and made it to Class AA. How unusual for a kid that age to get to Class AA? One San Diego media outlet said they called Elias. Elias said it is unusual enough the stats bureau doesn’t even track it.
And what is really important when you’re 17? Outdoing your older brother at something. His brother Jose Salas, 20, plays second and third for the Twins organization and he hasn’t made it above High A.
And it can’t go without mentioning that in Ethan’s Class AA debut, he hit a walk-off double.
Salas was born in Kissimmee, Florida, but grew up in the Dominican Republic and Venezuela. So he was an international signing, not a draft choice.
The guy who got the job
Colt Keith, 2B, Tigers
Colt Keith was expected to have an opportunity this spring to compete for the Tigers’ third base job. But on Jan. 31, A.J. Hinch blew all that up.
In an interview on the NY Post’s podcast with Jon Heyman and Joel Sherman, Hinch said he planned to use Matt Vierling, Andy Ibáñez, and Zach McKinstry at third base.
The plan for Keith? He will be the Tigers’ second baseman.
Keith is coming off a season in which he hit .306 with 27 homers at Class AA Erie and Class AAA Toledo.
Something approaching that kind of production from a middle infielder would be a big boost for the Tigers, whose fans are tired of the team’s anemic attack.
Last season the Tigers ranked 27th in batting average (.236), 28th in runs (661), tied for 24th in homers (165), 26th for on-base percentage (305), and had the ninth-highest strikeout total (1473).
And that was a better offense overall than in 2022 when the Tigers finished last in MLB for runs scored with 557.
The Tigers already demonstrated their faith in Keith, 22, by signing him to a $28.6 million over the next six years. With options, Keith could earn $82 million over nine years.
It’s a bold move for the club to give a player who has never played a major league game that kind of money. It is also a risk for Keith. If he becomes a star, he may have bargained himself out of tens of millions of dollars.
Keith showed a big increase in power after his first season in pro ball. He hit two homers in 65 games and slugged .393 in 2021. He found his power stroke in 2022, blasting nine homers in 48 games. He missed the final three months of the season with shoulder problems.
But he had a strong showing in the Arizona Fall League and was a non-roster invitee to spring training last year.
He was named the Tigers’ Minor League Player of the Year in 2023.
Keith was born in Ohio and lived in Utah and Buckeye, Arizona. He moved to Boloxi, Mississippi before his junior season in 2019 — with great fanfare.
“One of the nation’s top young baseball stars landed in Biloxi and he is ‘off the charts,’ ” the headline on the Sun Herald newspaper’s website read.
Not too much pressure for the new kid.
As a junior Keith hit .527 and won the Gatorade Baseball Player of the Year for the state of Mississippi. He was off to a slow start in his senior year before the season was canceled by the COVID pandemic.
Keith had accepted an offer to play at Arizona State, but when the Tigers picked him in the fifth round, he decided to go pro.
Cinderella story
Cade Horton, RHP, Cubs
On March 29, 2022, Cade Horton made his pitching debut for the University of Oklahoma. He’d missed his freshman year because he needed Tommy John surgery.
Horton played mostly third base for the Sooners until then. At that point, what were the odds that less than two years later he’d enter spring training as a prized pitching prospect for the Chicago Cubs?
Horton wound up making 14 starts in the 2022 season, going 5-2 with a 4.86 ERA. Which doesn’t seem like anything special. You have to understand: On May 20th, Horton’s ERA was almost 8.00.
It’s like your old man used to say, sometimes it’s not how you start but how you finish.
Once the postseason started, Horton was lights out. He made five starts and went 3-0 with a 2.61 ERA. He struck out 49 in 31 innings.
In the College World Series, Horton made two starts and struck out 24 in 13 1/3 innings.
The difference between Cade early in the season and late — he developed a cutter.
Former big leaguer Brett Eibner happened upon Horton during a bullpen session and taught him the pitch.
The Cubs wound up taking Horton seventh overall in the draft shortly after the CWS.
“If you would've asked me two months ago if Cade Horton was going to be a top target,” Dan Kantrovitz, the Cubs’ vice president of scouting, told mlb.com, “I might've been a little skeptical. But then fast forward and just witness the trajectory.”
Last season, Horton pitched at three levels in minor-league baseball, spending the last six weeks of the season with the Tennessee Smokies of Class AA Southern League. Overall, he went 4-4 with a 2.65 ERA and held opponents to a .191 batting average. He struck out 117 and walked 27 in 88 1/3 innings.
Everything I can find indicates that Horton abandoned the cutter and has used his fastball — which occasionally tops out at 98 mph — and his slider. MLB executives rated his slider as one of the best in the game.
The Cubs have been pushing him to improve on his slider and use it more, and he’s been looking for a fourth pitch.
The Cubs don’t expect to break camp with Horton in the rotation. It is likely he’ll start the season at Class AA, but it’s possible he could be in The Show before the end of 2024.
After all, he’s surprised everyone before.