The crew over at Baseball America has updated their Top 30 prospect lists for the midseason point across baseball. The Cincinnati Reds list can be found here (Baseball America subscription required).
Given that you do need a subscription to see the updated list I’m not going to just post the list here. But what I do want to do is highlight some of the movers within their list. Nick Senzel has graduated from the list from the start of the year. Assuming that Baseball America hasn’t changed their eligibility criteria from the past, no other player has graduated from the farm system since the start of the year.
The Missing Prospect
This assumes that the above information is correct on what Baseball America has always used for eligibility, which is 130 at-bats or 50-innings pitched, and not the lesser known 45 active, non-September days on the 25 man roster. If that’s correct, the one guy seemingly missing that jumps out is Josh VanMeter. He isn’t eligible if you count active roster days. Given that Jimmy Herget is listed, being on the active roster doesn’t disqualify someone from the list.
This would seem to be a glaring omission. The 24-year-old has hit .348/.429/.669 this season in Triple-A. And while he’s had limited action in the Majors and hit just .222, it’s a tough sell to say he’s not one of the Reds Top 30 prospects given what he’s done in the last calendar year at the plate and all of the position flexibility that he has.
The Big Riser
Jose Garcia looks like the guy who has jumped up the list the most – at least among those players who weren’t drafted this season who showed up on the list. The shortstop really struggled in 2018 with the Dayton Dragons at the plate, but you could see the tools. He was rated as the 14th best Reds prospect on the list when it came out in December, but that included Shed Long, Jeter Downs, and Josiah Gray who were all rated higher than Garcia was.
This season the shortstop has jumped up to the 8th spot at the midseason point. Jose Garcia has hit much better with the Daytona Tortugas this year, making big strides in hitting for power and showing better plate discipline. In 57 fewer games than he had last season he’s already hit more doubles and just one less home run than he had in Dayton during 2018. And he’s done so in a much more pitcher friendly league. His strikeout-to-walk ratio has gone from 5.9 to 3.6, too. Through 68 games he’s hitting .252/.320/.406.
The Rookie League Addition
Not accounting for draft picks that were added to the list, there was only one player from the rookie-level teams that was added to the list. Allan Cerda, a 19-year-old outfielder who made the jump from the Dominican Summer League to the Greeneville Reds rounded out the list at #30. He’s hitting .244/.350/.512 this season with 11 extra-base hits in 24 games played so far this season while playing center field.