Morning Rundown: The Athletic top 100, more Gary Sanchez, ZiPS adjust future WAR
Another top 100 list, Gary Sanchez rumors, ZiPS redos their future WAR projections
Keith Law of The Athletic released his top 100 list on Monday, with four Pirates making the initial list for 2024.
Paul Skenes - 10
Termarr Johnson - 24
Jared Jones - 39
Bubba Chandler - 48
Outside of Skenes, Law seems to be higher on the rest of the Pirates prospects, at least at the top of the list. For the other three on this top 100 list, it’s the highest they’ve sat on an initial top 100 list.
It turns out that Gary Sanchez to the Pirates is an actual thing and may be closer than it initially seemed.
According to Robert Murray, who was a guest on Foul Territory, Sanchez is ‘a very real option for the Pirates’ and it could be up to how far they are willing to go dollar-wise.
Murray believes Sanchez will get around $5/$6 million to sign.
Sanchez hit 19 home runs in 75 games for the San Diego Padres last year while also putting up positive defensive metrics.
FanGraphs had an article on Monday that showed had the biggest movement, in both directions, regarding their ZiPS projections from 2024-2027 and four Pirates were mentioned.
Of the hitters who are now expected to have a better WAR than originally projected, Henry Davis had the 11th-best increase, going from 1.7 to 7.3 (+5.6).
Jack Suwinski also jumped from 6.1 to 10.2 (+4.1), wrapping up the two hitters on the list.
Mitch Keller had the 18th-highest increase on the pitching side of things, going from 5.6 to 8.5 (2.9). Not far behind him, Jared Jones increased from 4.2 to 6.9 (2.7).
This week, our site will release our top 25 prospects in the Pirates system. We will have tie-in articles throughout the week as a build-up along with the rankings.
With the rankings coming out and the start of the season, the site will be running a special on yearly subscriptions (20%). There’s a link in the article that will take you where you can subscribe.
Subscribing gives you complete access to our rankings, which come with complete player write-ups on each prospect and my video breakdowns and on-site features from my trips during the season.
With the discount, your subscription comes out to just $3.33 per month.
We started things off on Monday by looking at the three players who just missed out on our top 25 rankings.
Later today, WTM will look at three players - not on the top 25 - to watch going into the 2024 season. NolaJeffy and I will have three players of our own to watch in the coming days, leading up to the list dropping on Friday.
Pecota projects the Pirates to finish last, 73-89. Obviously wasn’t as impressed with BC’s offseason as Nuttin.
A good defensive catcher that could hit 20 bombs for $6 million…….what’s the hold up?