Prospect Podcast Episode 9: “The Tim Tebow Prospect Podcast”

God really doesn’t want us to have nice things as prospectors, so he’s blessed us with his other begotten son, Tim Tebow! That’s right it’s a Tim Tebow-centric pod today, as we open up this week’s show discussing his immaculate connection with a batting practice fastball in instructional ball. Michael Halpern and I have a much longer discussion of The Tebow’s baseball prospects, then either of us ever hoped to have. The conclusion: I think we may have a superstar brewing in the NL East……and his name is Kevin Maitan. (See what I did there?) We talk about the top international signing, since the last top international signing, and where we’ll be ranking him come February. We then run wild with the theme of this week’s show, the Top 10 Prospect Disappointments of 2016. So we spend most of the hour dumping on players we expected to have big seasons. It’s just the level of negativity I thrive in. Hold on tight y’all it’s the latest episode of the Razzball Prospect Podcast.

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Trade Deadline Collateral Damage: Prospects On the Move

July 27, 2016 | Fantasy Baseball Prospects | 113 Comments

by: Geoff

Oh the deadline, where championships are dreamed about, and futures are mortgaged. Is there ever a time where the worlds of redraft and dynasty collide more? You have your redraft owners hoping their closers don’t lose their jobs, or that their hitters, and pitchers are moved to better surroundings. The dynasty owners are worried about those same things, but also hoping their blocked higher minors prospects get moved to greener pastures with opportunities waiting with a big league club. It’s also a time when veterans are moved out to make way for those potential future stars waiting in the wings. It’s a busy time for your humble Prospector. I have a lot of thoughts about prospects on the move, some got the call, some got the other kind of call, and some are waiting for one or the other. Obviously I’m alluding to a call from their doctors regarding their “tests results”….Actually I might have just had a flashback to that time I wrote for the Des Moines Medical Journal. Corn farm injuries are gruesome people.

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Mid-Season Top 100 Prospects for 2016 Fantasy Baseball

July 3, 2016 | Fantasy Baseball Prospects | 213 Comments

by: Geoff

Tell me this isn’t the most American thing you’ve ever heard. I sit mere miles from Cooperstown, NY, sipping an American made brew, working away on the final stretches of my Mid-Season Top 100 Prospects for Fantasy Baseball, while fireworks crackle overhead. The smell of beer and lawn clippings fill the air, and I just cooked some bacon on the barrel of my rifle. The last sentence was complete bullshizz, but the part before it is fairly accurate. I mean I’m not enough of a tool that I would sit in the yard with my laptop writing. But I am enough of a tool that I was formulating what I would type, once the pack of wild animals I affectionately call my children decide to finally retire to their beds for the evening. Well, the time has come and here I am writing to you, and you alone. Without anymore rambling incoherent non-sense, allow me to introduce the Top 100 Prospects Fantasy Baseball. This list is built with an eye to the future, in other words my goal is for this list to be more reflective of a pre-season 2017 list than the pre-season 2016 lists. I went bold, and I avoided the boring. Meaning I have no use for your Julio Urias’, your Lucas Giolito’s, A.J. Reed’s, Cody Reed’s and the like. You know those guys, they’re playing in the bigs, at this point they’re A. owned in your dynasty or B. owned in your redraft league so C. they’re owned. You thought I was going to say there’s no C right? What do I look like Grey? Nope I’m much taller and my facial hair is more Don Johnson than John Oates.

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2016 Top 100 Prospects for Fantasy Baseball

February 28, 2016 | Fantasy Baseball Prospects | 193 Comments

by: Geoff

Well here it is the post you’ve been hollering for in the comments since November hit. That’s right ladies and gentleman, boys and girls, cats and dogs, pastrami sandwiches and tuna melts, white wall tires and low profile tires, good guys and bad guys, curved brims hats and flat billed caps, and anyone else that reads Razzball; it’s the top 100 live from my garage in suburban Massachusetts. Ahh-huh you’re being magically whisked away to a garage, with flickering lights and an awkwardly handsome gentleman with a laptop. That’s me, and on my computer is a list, it is yours to read, berate, discuss, commit to memory, burn to keep you warm. What you do with it, is really up to you I suppose. This ranking is pretty straightforward, it lists each player, their position, and a link to their team’s minor league preview. Within each preview you’ll find that players blurb. On one final note, all of these ranks take into consideration a variety of factors including ceiling, proximity, and floor. Consider this post interactive, instead of me waxing poetic after each player explaining why I rank so and so where, I leave it to you to call me to the mat and defend my rankings. Without further ado the 2016 Top 100 Prospects for Fantasy Baseball

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2016 Minor League Preview: Kansas City Royals

February 14, 2016 | Fantasy Baseball Prospects | 51 Comments

by: Geoff

It’s been a long time coming for the Kansas City Royals, but they finally tasted the sweet fizz of championship champagne last fall, and it was all due to Jonny Gomes. I’m not sure if you know this, but he’s the kind of guy you want to go to war with. Hacksaw Jonny musings aside, the Royals built a winner the old fashioned way. And by old fashioned I mean good drafting, solid player development, and excellent trading. In the process, they’ve graduated quite a few players onto their major league squad, traded some for established vets, and let others take the time needed to fully develop. The aftermath is there isn’t a ton of sexy fantasy prospects anymore, but the farm’s not barren, and there are some really intriguing players in the low minors. Dayton Moore and his constituents stuck to their philosophy, and in the end they’re the poster children for why prospects matter. Just ask Baseball America!

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Prospect Primer: Week 20

August 17, 2014 | Fantasy Baseball Prospects | 21 Comments

by: Chris

Prospects, prospects, and MORE PROSPECTS!!! Plenty of youngsters making noise as their seasons wind down and players scramble for the chance to get their feet wet when organizations call players up at the end of the month to get a taste of “The Show”. That signals time for Razzball’s Sunday morning look at what’s become the most important commodity in our favorite game – prospects. Our “Prospect Primer” reflects a handful of the prospects I’m keeping a close eye on heading into Week 21 (for both shallow and deep fantasy leagues). Our bi-weekly prospect columns (Sundays and Wednesdays) will continue to focus on the more “well-known” prospects (our Top-50/Top-100) that are likely going to affect shallow to mid-level fantasy teams.

Disclaimer: The bi-weekly lists AREN’T a “re-ranking” of our Top-50/Top-100/Organization Lists. The players mentioned will typically be guys that owners in somewhat regular leagues NEED to be aware of (regardless of their current level) to keep from slipping behind as they want to stay competitive in “keeper leagues”. There may be a sleeper mentioned from time-to-time, but they may be more important to managers in deeper and more long-term leagues. The players listed aren’t in any particular order (you’ll notice they’re listed alphabetically), they’re simply guys you need to keep an eye on and someone you might be interested in targeting when you’re wheeling and dealing.

Now it’s time to refill that cup of coffee or take your lunch break and open your spreadsheets – here’s who I’m tracking over the next few days…

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Mid-Season Top 50 Fantasy Baseball Prospects

July 16, 2014 | Fantasy Baseball Prospects | 180 Comments

by: Chris

Welcome to the All-Star break gang – the unofficial beginning of the second half signals the time to reorganize, revamp, and re-think approaches for us, as well as the folks making the calls for your favorite MLB teams. And, coincidentally, it also marks the time for me to revisit my Prospect Rankings. These are the current top-50 guys on my board that haven’t accumulated the standard minimum 130 AB/50 IP at the MLB level that most fantasy leagues recognize. When compiling my rankings, I try to consider as many variables as possible, but my main focus tilts toward future “difference-makers”… those guys that have the potential to make significant impacts when they reach “The Show”. Some players you’ll find on this list may be further away from making that impact than others, some may be struggling a bit right now (they may have been recently promoted to the next level to challenge them and are adjusting to stiffer competition), some may be on the shelf because of injury, etc., but this list represents the top-50 players I’d pick if you give me the first 50 picks in the MiLB phase of a draft in a newly forming fantasy league. These are the prospects GMs “dream on”, regardless of their current minor league level – the players they plan to build their rosters around at some point in the near future.

So here we go…

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