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Top Perspectives Series
Below is an analysis of prospects in the San Francisco Giants farm system. Scouting reports have been compiled using information from industry sources as well as our own observations. This is the third year we’ve differentiated between two expected replacement roles. See the Position column below for the abbreviations for these roles: MIRP for multi-inning relief players and SIRP for single-inning relief players. The ETAs listed generally correspond to the year a player must be added to the 40-man roster in order to not qualify for the Rule 5 draft. Manual adjustments are made where deemed appropriate, but we’ll use this as a rule of thumb.
A brief overview of what FV (Future Value) means can be found here. A much deeper overview can be found here.
All prospects listed below also appear on The Board, a resource that provides the site with sortable scouting information for each organization. It provides more detail (and updated TrackMan data from various sources) than this article and integrates each team’s roster so readers can compare prospects across different farm systems. It can be found here.
Other notable prospects
Grouped by type and listed in order of preference within each category.
Young, varied types
Alix Hernandez, RHP
Jose Ramos, USEFUL
Guillermo Williamson, 1B
Durwin Laya, 3B
Manuel Mercedes, RHP
Hernandez is a spin-rate darling at the complex, whose fastball crept into the mid-90s for some scouts, but by Eric’s looks it was more in the low-90s. Ramos is an undersized multi-position contender with a well-rounded tool set. Williamson hits the ball very hard on the field, but he also hits often. Because of his physique and racquet speed, it looks like he should hit the ball hard, but the hitting tool is light. Mercedes looked like a potential starter mid-rotation at the complex two years ago, but he’s stepped up in recent years and is now a sinkerballer who struggles to miss at-bats.
helper
Carson Ragsdale, RHP
Will Bednar, RHP
Hunter Dula, RHP
Mat Olsen, RHP
Seth Lonsway, LHP
Nick Avila, RHP
Sam Delaplane, RHP
Luis Moreno, RHP
Julio Rodriguez, RHP
Nick Swiney, LHP
Ragsdale is in his mid-90s when the stakes begin and has tremendous breaking ball, but unfortunately he’s badly injured. Bednar hasn’t thrown hard or hit shots in a few years, but his breakball is still good. Things are looking pretty tough at the top of the Giants’ 2021 draft class between him and Matt Mikulski. Lonsway, Olsen and Dula ride fastballs and break balls that flash; Dula throws a little harder than the other two, but Lonsway’s curveball is the group’s best shot. Avila was a White Sox Rule 5 pick sent back to the Giants. He is a helper for the kitchen sink. Delaplane had one of the most dominant sliders in the Minors before a TJ cost him several seasons. He’s back now, but his top speed hasn’t returned yet. He’s a low-90s relief player with a big slider and subpar control. Moreno sits at 95 but throws back from his changeup and slider. He has worked in the lower levels for several years. Rodriguez has elite break ball spin rates and a fastball that his form and poor control downplays. Swiney has switched to the bullpen and sits at number 89.
starter depth
Nick Zwack, LHP
Nick Sinacola, RHP
Carson Seymour, RHP
Kai-Wei Teng, RHP
Ryan Murphy, RHP
Most of this group have a sneaky, low 90’s stoker (Zwack, Sinacola, Murphy) that they’ve mastered, as well as a good breaking ball, but not really the third pitch needed to get them a fifth starter to bind. Seymour has a 93-94 record and has good, rough breaking stuff that he downplays due to poor command. Teng has started taking a slider-first approach and sits at 91-93.
Can you play in midfield?
Tyler Fitzgerald, 2B/3B
Hayden Cantrelle, 2B
Dalton Guthrie, CF
This entire group has seen a bit of midfield time lately. Each of them is a good top-level organization player who needs a prime position on their scout card to claim a big role in the league. Cantrelle and Fitzgerald are briefly missing their arms. Guthrie used to play 2B/3B but has recently focused exclusively on the outfield.
System overview
Are the Giants good at developing weapons or not? On the one hand, they seem to have a steady stream of people appearing almost out of nowhere. On the other hand, many of their top draft picks and exciting young pitching prospects are trending down. San Francisco’s penchant for low-release arms is evident throughout the system, often pitchers with forearm slots rather than drop-and-drive types that create backspin axis on their fastballs. The Giants’ recent drafts have been very pitcher-heavy, after their 2019 draft really spread the risk across many different player types. A lot of the guys from 2019 didn’t make it, but this draft felt like the Giants were staying open and taking opportunistic shots at several over-slot players, while the last few seemed like whether San Francisco would have gone in with a willful pitching-heavy agenda. This is of course all speculation.
The international scouting department continues to achieve great success. Aside from Ryan Reckley, the Giants’ track record of scouting international bats has been pretty good lately. Rayner Arias made a very, very good impression in Arizona before returning to the Dominican Republic for the DSL season, and among the non-top 100 contenders currently on the list, he’s certainly the one with the best chances of overtaking the next year or so. Hopefully he gets back to the states for training (if the Giants participate — they didn’t last year) and get a chance against more advanced players than he saw in the spring A-ball minor league games.
Overall, this is an above-average number of young talent. Much of this is being driven by the bats at the top who are ready (or almost) for the big league. Even if the guys below Luis Matos/Patrick Bailey/Marco Luciano only become role players, they all have a first-class tool (Casey Schmitt’s defence, Vaun Brown’s speed, Wade Meckler’s contact) and therefore clear opportunities to make a big one in the league to achieve influence. The system is deep on pitch, too, despite the speed limitations experienced by some of the higher-profile arms. There are 28 pitchers on that list. A lot of them have warts, even Kyle Harrison, but even if the real starters (mostly the names at the top of the 40 FV tier) aren’t enough, they all probably have a bullpen utility.
Players in this group are better suited to supporting a competing team with internal strength (especially overall pitching) than being able to be relieved by them at deadline. The prospects in FV level 45 to 40+ are all good players, but we don’t think any of them will hit a mega deal. The Giants are in the middle of the NL West race, and some of the other clubs in the division have more ammunition to pull off a big trade without sacrificing anyone from the big league roster.
