11 Hitting Prospects Outside the Top 100 to Target - May 2024
I went over 10 Hitting Prospects to Target outside the Top 100 in the offseason and several are already Top 100 prospects without doubt, while several have shown to have fizzled out and have ruined my chances of batting 1.000. I’ll be happy batting between .400 - .500, though. The names I went over were:
Gabriel Rincones Jr.
Agustin Ramirez
Mac Horvath
Yorfran Medina
Luke Keaschall
Dylan Beavers
Blake Dunn
Andrew Cossetti
Alexander Albertus
Felnin Celesten
Today, I’ll go over 11 Hitting Prospects outside the Top 100 on most lists. Some of these names are a bit deeper and probably wouldn’t even see a top 250 list, let alone a top 400 (for a handful). Let’s start with a few who are closing in, though, and then we’ll get to deeper names:
Matthew Lugo (BOS) - AA:
Lugo has solidified himself as being an impact bat this season as he has over .6700 Total Bases/At Bat. That’s more than Emmanuel Rodriguez, James Wood, and Carson Williams — 3 prospects who have seen their stock soar with great starts to the 2024 minor league season.
Lugo’s chase rate has gone down while his 90th percentile EV is up a few ticks from last year and is over 104.5 mph. He’s slashing .312/.407/.672 with 10 homers and 9 stolen bases while he’s added 9 doubles and 3 triples. He’s been an extra-base machine and the early returns have been promising.
The K rate is down 5 points from last year — 27.6% to 22.6% this year. The Walk rate is up over 7 points — from 5.9% to 13% this year. He’s getting on base at a higher clip and he’s running more. The power metrics are promising and translating to higher in-game production. The swing looks fluid and explosive early on and I don’t think Lugo is getting his fair share of credit for what he’s doing. He is second on the HitTilt+ Leaderboard, just a hair shy of Emmanuel Rodriguez, for all minor league hitters with at least 80 PA. The arrow is firmly pointing up on Lugo and he may be within striking distance on several prominent top 100 lists in the coming months if this type of production continues. Production aside — the versatility and swing look to be real, and the Red Sox look like they have another homegrown bat that is being overlooked in their system.
Alex Freeland (LAD) - AA:
I mentioned Alex Freeland as a bat to monitor on April 17th:
From April 17th and on, Freeland is slashing: .315/.475/.548 with a 185 wRC+ and a .234 ISO. When I initially posted about Freeland as a name to keep an eye on, he had no homers but was showing a tremendous approach at the plate. The batted ball gains have translated to some in-game pop as he has hit 6 homers and 9 doubles in the 35 games since I blasted his name. He’s also chipped in 9 stolen bases in that span. Freeland is showing a true power/speed blend and he’s shown to cut his whiff rate in half from 2023.
In the 35 games since April 17th, Freeland has an 18.5% BB rate and a 14.2% K rate. He was someone to watch on April 17th and hopefully, you guys got in early while the price was still low. At this point, he is on full breakout watch — as the gains and production are super promising.
Deyvison De Los Santos (ARI) - AAA:
In Spring Training, De Los Santos was in contention to earn a spot on the Guardians Major League roster as a Rule 5 guy. He’s now back in the D-backs system and is one of the hottest hitters in the minor leagues. I guess you could say he’s a borderline Top 100 guy already depending on the evaluator. He didn’t make the cut for me in my initial top 100 Hitting Prospect ranks and I think after evaluating it some more I made an egregious omission here.
We’ve already seen him hit for power at the AA level as he belted 20 homers last year while having a K rate hovering around 26%. This year he’s hit 14 homers in just 38 games while seeing modest gains in his walk rate and K rate. The difference is he hit .254 while he hit .372 this year at AA. Despite the decent power production last year, he posted an 88 wRC+, however this year, the mark was at an all-world 198.
This earned him a promotion to AAA which is where we’ll need to see De Los Santos produce even further.
So far the metrics look promising and I don’t think they were ever in much doubt for someone with Deyvison’s reputation for power. He’s running a 93.2 Average EV, 109.8 90th% EV, and a 112.8 Max EV so far at AAA (6 games). The Barrel rate and the Contact rate in the zone both look promising, as well, and this actually puts him on the cusp of being a top-100 prospect — while I wasn’t completely sold on this type of profile in the offseason, I think it warrants recognition for the production he’s putting up to go along with the underlying metrics. He’s someone who can contribute soon and is worth an add or acquisition if he’s not already priced out because of his production so far this season.