This week’s mailbag goes into the top five success rates, the Rangers’ bad offense, Byron Buxton‘s willingness to accept trade, and it is possible CJ Abrams they don’t ask.
Don asks:
Of the top Mariners drafted-or-traded for hitting prospects, three have been complete failures (Dustin Ackley, Jarred KelenicJésus Montero) and only two (A-Rod and Junior) lived up to expectations. Is M’s experience typical of other groups, or do M’s just have bad vibes?
I guess what I’m asking is what is the track record of, say, the top five prospects each year?
Let’s check out Baseball America’s preseason top five success odds! In this small study, I decided to finish in 2019. In that way, we capture many players who had the opportunity to make a Major League impact, especially during their six-year control period.
There is subjectivity in this process, but a sample of about 50 different players sounds reasonable. To arrive at that number, I had to look at the 2007-19 period, as many players ranked in the top five in multiple years. Accordingly, Ackley was left out of this sample because he came in at #11, and Kelenic was not included because his highest ranking was in 2021 at #4.
Jesus Montero it’s here, while Alex Rodriguez again Ken Griffey Jr. it’s not because I didn’t extend the lesson so far back.
My way of evaluating this is to look at a player’s FanGraphs WAR for his first six years in team management. Finding that window for each player requires manual work, which is why I didn’t make the sample larger. Check out my data here!
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