The Realities of Minor League Baseball

We’ve spent most of the week posting the Burning River Baseball top 50 prospect rankings, but before we move on to more to more Major League points of discussion, I thought it was important to provide a little perspective. While the headline may be easily misconstrued, I’m not talking about the daily struggle minor league players have to deal with like the bus trips, long periods away from home and little pay. I’m exclusively talking about how nearly impossible it is to make it to the Major Leagues.

This year’s rankings were extremely bottom heavy. This means the vast majority of Indians prospects with high expectations are currently located below AA. In particular, number one prospect Triston McKenzie most recently played in Lake County (A), Francisco Mejia and Bobby Bradley in Lynchburg (A+) while Brady Aiken just barely made it to Mahoning Valley (SS). A little deeper on the list, there are players who have yet to play a game as high as A ball, like Nolan Jones, Will Benson, Luke Wakamatsu, Ulysses Cantu, Shane Bieber, Aaron Civale, Logan Ice, Todd Isaacs and Conner Capel. While all have great potential and are highly considered prospects, very few are likely to actually make it to the Major Leagues.

This is not an indictment on their abilities (any of those would be mentioned in the rankings), but just the reality of minor league baseball. The vast majority of minor league players never make it to AAA, let alone the Major Leagues. For an example, let’s look at the last ever Gulf Coast League team for Cleveland back in 2008. Since it’s been eight years, most of these guys should be a couple years deep into their Major League teams or just about to break through at least.

This is just a snapshot of one season at the Indians lowest level in the US, but it’s pretty indicative. Salazar was by far the best player on this team and he continued to be as he advanced. However, Abreu was one of the best rookie level hitter the Indians have ever had and he flamed out very quickly. For those who don’t remember, Adam Abraham was the Jesus Aguilar of 2012 after hitting 13 home runs in Lake County, 17 in Kinston and 13 more in Akron in consecutive years, but he didn’t even get the minimal MLB testing that Aguilar received. Unsurprisingly, no other teams jumped at the chance to sign Abraham once he was released.

This is not to say none of these players were never thought well of. Delvi Cid actually looked like he would make a splash after a 28 double, 32 steal season for the Mudcats in 2012 in Advanced A, but he was released after just nine games with the Aeros in 2013. He signed with Baltimore, went back to Advanced A, but struggled and was released there as well.

Chun Chen was also a promising player late into his minor league career and he looked like a solid catching option in a system otherwise devoid of catching talent, but it wasn’t enough and was cut in 2013 after great two great seasons in Akron. The next year, he failed out of Independent ball.

Having one player make it to the Majors from the rookie level isn’t out of the ordinary for the Indians. Since moving to Arizona, this is the complete list of those who began their careers as regulars in Goodyear and made it to the Majors:

Of course, the percentage of players to make it pro increases greatly at each level with AAA being a near guarantee for at least a game or two in the Majors when someone gets hurt. The logistics of making big, however, are something that aren’t spoken of enough.

At any given time, the Indians have about 175 active minor leaguers between their seven teams and that doesn’t include those out on injury or those who have signed, but are not eligible to play yet. If Major League Baseball were like college, where you have a completely different team every four years with the majority of starters leaving every year, you could expect the majority of those 175 players to ultimately reach the Majors in some capacity. That, however, is far from reality.

While MLB’s arbitration and free agency rules essentially guarantee a team six years of control over a player once they reach the Majors, but for the Indians it’s usually a much different situation. Great players get marked early on for extensions and poor players usually don’t stick around for more than a year or two. Because of this, positions filled by great players are essentially eliminated from minor league relevance for near decades at a time.

For example, Jason Kipnis came up in 2011 as one of the Indians top prospects, took the second base job quickly and never gave it up. This has forced some players to make career changes (such as Tony Wolters, who is now a pretty good catcher for Colorado) and others out of the system. Since he has signed through 2020 and Francisco Lindor is under team control even longer, players who would be looking to break through as a middle infielder about right now, like Todd Hankins, Ronny Rodriguez and Eric Stamets on our rankings and Erik Gonzalez from last year’s list have had to try different positions and hope at best for a utility job some day.

There is always the chance for random injury, like the one to Michael Brantley that helped Tyler Naquin become a starter instead of a fourth outfielder, or a decline in skill, those are rare. The other side of this coin is that the players listed in the previous category aren’t particularly highly considered. None is likely to ever be the kind of player Kipnis or Lindor is right now, so holding them back doesn’t really hurt. If a player is really a stand out, you can guarantee that the Indians will make room (or at least trade them to return maximum value).

What this really effects are the Adam Abraham, Jesus Aguilar and Nellie Rodriguez‘s of the world. From 2009 to 2012, the Indians played Matt LaPorta 291 times before finally giving up on him. That will never happen on this team. Marginal prospects will have to prove themselves quickly as they will not get that kind of prolonged opportunity to struggle into mediocrity. I won’t say it will never happen again, but a team doesn’t go from nearly winning the World Series to starting Jesus Aguilar at first base.

For the current group of prospects that we ranked, it means that many will never make the Majors and even fewer will be a regular player. Relief pitchers and outfielders have the best chance as those positions are the most variable (especially right now), but should Bradley Zimmer turn into the player he is expected to and Greg Allen the player he could, many of the others following them could be looking at another blockade in a few years.

In the end, you never really know who will make it and who won’t. That’s why they need so many minor leaguers and so many minor league teams. It’s why they will continue to draft 40 players each season even though almost every single pick beyond the 10th round is doomed to fail and even top picks are far from guarantees. Following the Indians best draft pick since at least C.C. Sabathia, Lindor in 2011, were 12 players who are well on their way to not making it to the Majors.

Not including recent drafts, in Indians history, only about 11% of draft picks have made it to the Majors in any capacity. Even first round picks have made it less than 40% of the time. We ranked these minor leaguers based on potential. Potential of making the Majors and potential of greatness once there, but there isn’t a single player who is guaranteed to do anything. When I made my personal rankings, I saw them fall into smaller groups. The first three I felt extremely sure they would become MLB regulars (McKenzie, Mejia and Zimmer). The next six I felt pretty confident they’d at least make it there and could break out. The next 13 had great potential, but a great risk of not getting anywhere near the Majors as well. After that, they all have a chance, but a declining one as the list goes on.

When you watch a lot of minor league baseball or even read a lot on it, you can have a tendency to overvalue players. Many players high on our rankings are still years away. Many low will never make it. I stand by the list as an accurate depiction of the Indians current minor league system, but it is not an accurate depiction of the Cleveland Indians roster over the next decade.