Midseason Update: Pitchers – Up, Down, and Inbetween

Last part of the series on midseason updates after looking at players off the list on Tuesday and hitters on Wednesday. This time it is pitchers, a position that has become and org focus in the past few years. With quantity comes some quality, but also some players that have dropped off. Up: Ben Lively … Read more

2016 Top 50 Phillies Prospects: 31-40

I like writing a Top 50 because the players in this group don’t get left out.  Almost everyone here is flawed, and many of them will fail.  However, there are real prospects here, and there are players who will see limited major league roles as well.  Most of this list would make the Top 30 … Read more

Forgotten Prospects Surprising in Winter Ball

No one will fault a Phillies fan for losing track of prospects during the rebuild.  There have a lot more arriving than leaving between signings, trades, and the draft.  The most common outcome for any baseball player is failure, so it is not surprising with so many shiny new things coming in, that we lose … Read more

Phillies Showcasing Relievers in Arizona Fall League

Minor league relievers get a bad rap.  They rank on lists behind starting pitchers who will likely end up in the bullpen eventually, leading them to fly under the radar until they show up in a major league bullpen.  Like many spots on minor league teams, bullpens are home to many players who won’t go … Read more

J.P. Crawford Highlights Arizona Fall League Roster

Each year it seems like the talent in the Arizona Fall League gets even more crazy.  This year the Phillies are adding to the very high end talent present by sending the #2 prospect in baseball to the desert.  It wasn’t clear whether the Phillies would push J.P. Crawford’s season to make up for his … Read more

Ben Lively and Phillies Prospect Rotation Depth

Phillies’ top ten prospects Aaron Nola, Zach Eflin and Jesse Biddle are the top starting pitchers with the Reading Fightin Phils. While Reading boasts five potential major league starters, the Fightin Phils final two starters, Ben Lively and Tom Windle, are bigger question marks and lack the upside like Reading’s front three. Lively, 22, was … Read more

The Eye Test – Reading 4/21/15

My son and I made the one hour trek out to Baseballtown for our first Reading Fightins game of the season. We’ve both been looking forward to this since the season started. For my purposes, this roster is loaded with a variety of young talent at all levels of development. For my son (who is … Read more

2015 Fightin Phils Preview/Guide

Team Page Overview: Ever since the Phillies completed the trade of Marlon Byrd to Cincinnati for Ben Lively there has been whispers of a stacked Reading rotation.  It turns out those whispers have become truth and the Fightin Phils will roll out a rotation of Aaron Nola, Zach Eflin, Jesse Biddle, Ben Lively, and Tom … Read more

2015 Top 50 Phillies Prospects: 11-20

As we get closer to the top 10, the players in the system start to separate themselves into specific tiers of talent and profile.  In the last three groups of 10 the players could arguably have been slotted in many different orders.  Here those groups become smaller and the order starts to become more important.  I am making … Read more