Phillies Minor League Monthly Retrospective – July 2024

Stock Changes

*Rankings are from midseason list

Stock Up

C Eduardo Tait (#5) – June looked like a breakout for Tait as he put up a 1.011 OPS, and then he followed it up with a 1.031 OPS in July, complete with a promotion to Clearwater. The major concern of the month he is walked just twice on the month as he was very swing happy. His strikeout rate (14.9%) didn’t spike and he went the first 6 games of the month without striking out at all. He is going to need to chase less, but he is almost certainly never going to be a patient hitter. Without him showing a great approach improvement in the last month plus of the season, he is probably not going to be more than a fringe top 100 prospect, especially since the defense does need continued work. It is likely that the time in Clearwater won’t always be kind and it may show some areas of improvement heading into the offseason.

RHP Eiberson Castellano (#24) – Now that he has survived the trade deadline and his first few starts in AA it is time to talk about Eiberson. His first game of the month was actually rough, only going 2.2 innings in a relief outing after coming back from the IL, but afterward his next 4 starts – 22 IP 17 H 2.45 ERA 5 BB 27 K. On the season he now has only 24 walks to his 103 strikeouts on the season. He is still getting hit better by lefties than righties, but the gap is starting to close. He is firmly in the mid 90s and his slider is a good pitch now. He will be Rule 5 eligible after this season, and he has enough bullpen upside the Phillies likely will need to protect him. This year has likely bought him more time in the rotation though.

OF Justin Crawford (#4) – Crawford hit .406 on the month split between Jersey Shore and Reading. Much of that has to do with a .491 BABIP on the month, but he should get credit for walking a bit more and striking out a bit less after a two month trend in the wrong direction. His strikeout rate of 20% with Reading after 20.2% with Jersey Shore is a good continuity, but both are too high given they lack of power. He is once again hitting the ball on the ground at an enormous rate (66.7%) with Reading. He did start pulling the ball more in the last week after spending his first series hitting everything the opposite way. His overall stock hasn’t greatly changed for me, and he is still struggling with his swing and approach and vs lefties (though in an almost meaninglessly small sample size) in addition to the ground ball rate. However, he is nearing the levels where he can start to prove his unorthodox output can be sustainable.

Stock Down

SS Aidan Miller (#2) – It has been a really rough go of it for Miller in high-A. He hit just .200/.325/.323 on the month, which was somehow a large improvement on his June. He isn’t striking out more or walking a bunch less, but the impact of his contact has been much less. His BABIP is down from .340 to /258 and his ISO from .208 to .119. His types of contact is not dramatically different, trading some ground balls for fly balls. His 5.3% HR/FB rate hints at some bad luck. It would not be surprised if he is wearing down, now 74 games into this pro season. I don’t think his stock is truly down, but it more has hit a speed bump and there are some doubt creeping in.

Mixed or Stable

RHP Mick Abel (#6) – Abel didn’t have a good month, he walked 15 in 17.1 innings, had a 6.23 ERA, and didn’t make it past the 5th inning. His fastball did average 96 for the month, his highest of the season, and his 5 innings of 1 run ball on July 24 might have been his best start of the season. The month ended on a bit of a down note with Abel ending up on the Development List for a pause of sorts.

2B Devin Saltiban (#15) – You could argue that it has been a stock up for the Threshers’ second baseman who hit .238/.429/.413 on the month. He had identical 21.4% walk and strikeout rates on the month after a 11.1% BB% and 26.7% K% in the previous 3 months. On the season he has some gnarly whiff rates vs secondary pitches and subpar zone contact rates, but some of his other metrics are trending in the right direction, particularly when it comes to damage on swings and selectivity. He has already started off August well, so there might be a strong end to the year for him.

Monthly Stat Leaders

Hitting

Pitching

Mailbag

@ManyFaceG0d: Where do you see the Phillies system overall ranking in MLB. And is their system better than the Braves now?

@Mitch_Rupert: Although the Phillies lost Klassen, Aldegheri and Bergolla, do the additions of Seth Johnson and Moises Chace balance those losses in terms of strength of the system?

@Framed_Ace: Did the Phillies come out ahead or behind in context of Bergolla out and Chace/Johnson in?

@viscof1: How do Johnson and Chace compare to Aldegheri and Klassen in most likely outcomes. Considering Phillies pitching development has been good, the new guys seem like solid replacements for what we lost to improve for this yr.

Just going to combine all of these together since they all sort of hit on the same things. Just to be self referential of the tiers in my midseason rankings, Johnson slots in the middle of the Klassen to Aldegheri tier and Chace comes into the next group, probably near Wen Hui Pan. So that is 3 losses from Tier 4 and gaining back one in Tier 4 and 1 in Tier 5. If you want to say in the Banks in and Soto out trades the Phillies came out ahead in the farm, I would agree. That does mean they are behind overall, and in Klassen they lost the guy with the most upside. Between that and picking at the end of the first round, my guess is the system is in the last teens overall, but they have enough volatility in the views on their top prospects, I don’t know if that will be a universal opinion. They are definitely ahead of the Braves who continue to have a poor farm system due to drafting late, constant trades, and getting guys to the majors. That doesn’t mean they are bad at dev or acquisition though.

@cademcpeak4: What are the odds in your mind that Crawford can make the team when rosters expand. Comparing him to when Rojas got called up, it doesn’t seem as far fetched as it may seem.

There is no chance Crawford will be up when rosters expand. The rosters only expand by two and at this point it feels likely it will be a LH bat like Clemens or another infielder type. Crawford is still two years from needing a 40 man spot and they won’t want to use a spot early. As for the Rojas point, Rojas had made Reading in 2022 and started 2023 in Reading, so at the time of his call up he ahs 136 games in AA and was hitting .306/.361/.484 in that second year when he was called up. He also was called up due to every other center fielder in the org being hurt and his being on the 40 man roster.

@GarySie84201955: What year should we hope to see milller in the bigs and at what position?

Given his struggles with Jersey Shore, I would put his MLB ETA closer to late 2026, early 2027. His position will likely depend on the MLB situation at the time. At some point the Phillies will need to deal with Trea Turner’s long term position and whether they want to commit to Alec Bohm’s next contract. The answer could also be that his call up is due to an injury, and that will determine things.

@PhilliePhacts: Which prospects do you feel have the best chance to be the risers that the Phillies sell high on this offseason/next season?

I am going to reject the sell high premise because it implies a rise and then fall, so instead thinking about guys who could be good chips in a year. I normally start with the Rule 5 class looking for guys that might force that issue, but the list lacks that sort of guy outside of a returning from Tommy John surgery, Alex McFarlane. That then has me looking at the sort of blocked type prospect who could be arrow up, and I think for that it would be guys like Saltiban, TJayy Walton, Aroon Escobar, Guillermo Rosario, and Bryan Rincon.

@jayPB08: With the draft, do you get the sense that their focus with position players is turning to getting solid “innate” tools (exit velocity, speed, defense to an extent), just hoping they’re able to improve their swing decisions, lift, etc in the minors and a couple are able to stick?

Yeah, I think they think they can improve those guys. To this point, I don’t think they have shown that they can actually improve those guys. Really the struggle has been in two areas, getting batters to elevate and approach.

@AjayVerghese: Here’s a blast from the past: what happened with Rodolfo Castro? Thought he could be a superutility lefty-masher and then he just disappeared.

I mention to Ajay on twitter that Castro missed nearly 3 months to an injury and is back with the IronPigs after a brief rehab stint. He had a good series vs Jacksonville this past week and is interestingly actually killing lefties. The Phillies now have an interesting collection of 40 man infielders in AAA now as well. Buddy Kennedy is a right handed hitter who has mostly played third, but is hitting .344/.453/.604 with the IronPigs with 30 walks to 25 strikeouts. He doesn’t have meaningfully different splits. That goes with Kody Clemens and Darick Hall. There is also former major leaguer Cal Stevenson around too.

@TimmyLederman: Which 2024 Phillies draftee makes it to the majors first?

The answer is probably one of the Day 3 pitchers like Titan Hayes, but I am going to go out on a limb and say that 5th round pick Carter Mathison moves quickly as a left handed outfield bat that can play all three outfield positions.

@NicholasPickel2: Seeing what the cost was for relievers on 7/30, do you think value wise the Phillies did well? Are you worried about Kerkering? Do you think Cabrera doesn’t have the value that the other 2 pitchers had or the Phillies covet him more?

I think they paid the cost, plus a small markup to get the guy they wanted. I am not really worried about Kerkering. I think Aldegheri has wider appeal as a lefty and Klassen had more value, I personally like Cabrera more.