TNR Nats Prospect Rankings Explanation (#1-15)
A deep dive into the most interesting players on the farm
This deep dive will give you all you need to know about the top 15 players in the Nationals system. Despite the rebuild being nearly completed, the Nationals still have an incredibly top-heavy system and without some player development and drafting success, the farm will return to its prior state once these top five prospects graduate. If you want to see the entire list with short scouting reports you can read that here.
James Wood, OF, age 21 in 2024
Why he’s #1: He proved over half of a Double-A season that he absolutely has major league pop (hitting 18 of his organization-leading 26 home runs after his promotion as one of the youngest players in the Eastern League, while playing excellent defense in center and right and running the bases well enough to leg out 8 triples and swipe 18 bags in 21 tries. He’s an athletic marvel, and he’s proven that his tools translate for just long enough to hold off Dylan Crews and Brady House for this spot.
Case for a lower ranking: The huge frame means a long swing, which means there are holes in it, and thus he struck out in just over a third of his plate appearances in 2023. But on the other hand, Wood is not a free swinger. His sub-20% chase rate is elite…and he couldn’t legally drink this season. In this writer’s humble opinion, the strikeout rate is more of a nit than a bug or a true problem.
Ceiling: Carlos Beltrán in Kawhi Leonard’s body, or Southpaw Aaron Judge.
80th percentile projection: Diet Southpaw Aaron Judge. Good right field defense with 30-35 nukes and an above-average OBP with 170 strikeouts that cut down his batting average into the .240s.
Good 2024 outcome(s): The best outcome is that Wood is in Cincinnati on Opening Day, playing center field and batting, say, sixth as the Nats take a shot at the extra draft pick and bonus money for what should be a stronger 2025 draft class. Any door that leads to Wood debuting in this calendar year and holding his own is good for the 2025 Nats - hopefully he can provide a boost in 2024 as well.
Less good 2024 outcome(s): Wood somehow struggles against all the ex-MLB junk-ballers in the very hitter-friendly International League (if he goes there, I predict that the ABS will help him tremendously - anecdotally the Double-A umps struggled with his unique strike zone) and never makes it home to the DMV before the end of the season.
Dylan Crews, OF, age 22 in 2024
Why he’s #2: Drafted second overall last summer after leading LSU to a College World Series championship with an insane .426/.567/.713 batting line, Crews toyed briefly with three minor league levels before running into some bad batted ball luck in Harrisburg. There’s a non-zero chance he turns enough heads in West Palm Beach to earn a golden ticket north, and he is the rare player with both a high ceiling and a very high floor.
Case for a higher ranking: There are decent odds that he turns out to be a better overall player than Wood; though the latter is the better athlete, the history of 6’6”+ position players is not the healthiest, and if it’s Crews who sticks in center, he will probably provide more value at the end of the day.
Case for a lower ranking: Um, both Wood and House turn into immediate MVP candidates? This is Crews’ floor.
Ceiling: Kirkland Signature Mookie Betts, capable of all-around MVP-level brilliance in his best years and a mere All-Star otherwise, while additionally bringing the noise and the funk as a galvanizing clubhouse leader.
80th percentile projection: Old heads out there might recognize one of the elite nicknames in baseball history. Jim Wynn, the Toy Cannon, toiled in the obscurity of the cavernous Astrodome in its earliest days, hitting .259/.363/.450 and playing terrific defense on the demanding turf. He’s maybe the starting center fielder on the all-time all-underrated team.
Good 2024 outcome(s): Like Wood, Crews is a threat to be a Nat in Cincinnati, although I would expect the Nats to hold him down long enough to take a chance at the PPI pick and money next year. It’s not the end of the world if it takes Crews until September to rock a curly W, but it might be if he doesn’t at least get to Rochester.
Less good 2024 outcome(s): Crews never gets out of the Eastern League, struggling enough with more advanced offspeed stuff than he saw on Tuesdays or Sundays in the SEC that his inexorable march through the minors is delayed a year. I would hold the odds of that happening at less than five percent.
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