A Critical Look at the Phillies Organization and Minor League Baseball
Matt Winkelman 
The past week and a half I have been buried in writing the Top 50 and generally neglecting the news around the organization. So lets pack some important things into a single post. Phillies Prospect Program: This week the Phillies are hosting their upper minors prospects in Philadelphia for their Prospect Program. The usual participants are … Read more
The Top 30 seems to be the standard for long prospect lists, and so it becomes the standard of comparison across multiple lists. Given that we started at 50 we can see the transition into the Top 30 is fairly gradual, but as we start to really climb up the list we see real quality … Read more
This group from 31-40 is full of the players I was excited to put in my Top 30, but the Phillies went ahead and, since August, acquired 7 players that are in the Top 30 of this list. This leaves a group of 10 players with some real talent and major league upside. Traditionally, because of the … Read more
The Top 50 starts at the very bottom, where the differences in rankings are very slight compared to the differences between players towards the top of the list. That does not mean it lacks for talent, but these ten players still have a lot growth in front of them before we can consider them among the … Read more
There seems to be no better time to kick off the most ambitious ranking project I have undertaken than the beginning of the year. The whole exercise was both very exhausting and fun, and I am very excited to share the finished product with everyone. Before moving into the actual ranking, I just wanted to … Read more
Vacation is over, so it makes it time to jump into a brand new year of baseball. The only big news over the past two weeks was the Marlon Byrd trade (which I coveredBen Lively from Reds for Marlon Byrd” href=”https://philliesminorthoughts.com/phillies-ben-lively-from-reds-for-marlon-byrd/”> here), so there is not a lot to recap. But lets recap the minor … Read more
The last piece that Amaro had to move this offseason was Marlon Byrd, and given the amount of interest to this point a trade seemed almost certain. The trade ended up being Byrd plus a pile of cash to Cincinnati for RHP Ben Lively. Byrd should slot into LF for a Reds team that seems … Read more
I will be returning back to the Philadelphia area for the holidays, which means family, food, drink, and hopefully relaxation. I will be taking a break from writing, outside of any breaking news and possibly work on the Top 50 (which will begin either the first or second week of January), so as long as … Read more
Rollins Trade: The Jimmy Rollins trade is now official. I posted my thoughts about the deal back when the players were first hinted at, and how Eflin and Windle will fit into the Phillies newly found pitching depth. I will start by saying I like this deal for the Phillies. As Amaro stated “This transaction … Read more
While we wait for the Jimmy Rollins trade to happen, there are still Phillies prospects playing around the world. Here is a quick look at the best and most interesting lines going on in winter ball. Odubel Herrera – 2B/OF – VWL G AB HR SB BB K AVG OBP SLG 48 185 5 7 … Read more