It’s that time of the year again. The amateur draft is done, and most of the players are signed or likely not going to. So let’s take a look at systems around the league.
BNN RANKINGS:
First, of course, we look at the BNN system rankings that are always available, but also somewhat…er…shall we say…suspect in certain circles. Still, they are something, right? And something’s better than nothing. A check here shows Louisville and Des Moines standing proud at the top, Calgary, Charm City, and Valencia close behind.
The BNN rankings are suspect for several reasons, not the least of which is because they focus exclusively on what that system considers the top 100 prospects, and because that system’s methodology for determining those top 100 are hidden and often things to be boggled at. Still, it’s hard to complain about ranking systems that feature James Browning and Don Smith as #1 and #2, and that Haney kid in Valencia sure looks sweet, Lee—or, as they would say in Louisville, “shame if something happened to him.”
On the bottom end, you’ve got Long Beach as the worst system in baseball, with Jacksonville only a #76 prospect away.
BBA RANKINGS:
Of course, the purpose of the BBA ranking system is to explore much deeper. This system, a method generated while scanning FanGraphs prospect lists, accounts for system depth by providing a linear weight to players of each overall rating on the 80/20 scale.
Yes, it’s rudimentary in that it doesn’t weight players by age or level—but then again, as far as we can tell, neither does OOTP’s BNN stuff. Or, if it does, those weights seem weird at times. Who can tell? Bottom line, though, is that this approach will give us a different cut on farm system value, and on the whole I think tends to pass the eye test much better (See Long Beach and Jacksonville for just a few of the more obvious examples).
ALGORITHM CHANGE: Note, given the adjustments made to the overall rankings in the last release of OOTP (which seemed to move plyers up the relative scale we use), this system has dropped scores for players rated 40 and 45 overall. This will affect the results some, but I think it’s negligible.
So, let’s get to looking at things, all right?
Here’s the raw data:
READING THE CHART:
As with before, the data is sorted by division and weighted Total System Score (wTot). Each team’s total number of prospects are displayed per rating, then the wTot and the system’s overall ranking. The next two columns (wTop, wTopRk) are the same calculations, but count only prospects rated 60 and higher.
The blue headers are the team’s OOTP/BNN rank and points.
After that are each team’s overall rankings across time—so you can track how a team has moved over the past two years.
OVERALL ASSESSMENT:
The BBA/Fangraphs system rates the top five systems as:
1. Yellow Springs
2. New Orleans
3. Louisville
4. Calgary
5. Brooklyn
Looking at the breakout, New Orleans is clearly strongest at the top, with eight players rated 75 or 80. Of interest is that Phoenix … as Sean’s latest trade block says…has seven such players, but their overall rating falls a few slots to #9 because they are relatively empty beyond these. Indeed, New Orleans, with no prospects in the 60 and 65 categories, actually slips a notch when we count only players in the 60+ category.
Regardless, Yellow Springs, Calgary, and New Orleans have traditionally scored well in this metric, and they continue doing so. Brooklyn has also been strong here in the past. The newcomer is Louisville, who, under Stephen Shaw’s direction his one of the biggest movers on the board when it comes to strengthening their kiddie korps. The Sluggers went from #21 last September to #3 this year.
Off Topic
As an aside, I note that Charm City, who is rated 3rd by OOTP, finishes in 6th here. Jacksonville, rated 29th by OOTP is 7th overall by these BBA/FanGraphs tables. Brooklyn is a case similar to Jacksonville, ranking 5th here based on depth, but 22nd at OOTP/BNN. San Fernando, ranked 13th by BNN, but 28th by this method, is the biggest mis-match in the other direction. The Bears have only four players rated 60 or higher.
BIG MOVERS:
Teams that have improved their systems the most since the past review are:
Louisville: Was 21, now 3
Jacksonville: Was 19, now 7
Des Moines: Was 22, now 12
Hawaii: Was 17, now 11
Valencia: Was 13, now 8
As noted before, Louisville jumped an amazing 18 positions in these ranks. This is mostly the result of a flurry of trades in the off-season as the club repositioned themselves for the future, and a solid draft.
Jacksonville is of note here because of the way their system looks so woeful in OOTP’s BNN structure. The system is well positioned for where they are as a franchise, too. As always, it’s fun to watch Tyler quietly go about doing his work.
Des Moines, buoyed by a trade or two and another good draft, has risen from the bottom third to nearly a top third club. It’s been a very long haul to get this far, but things are starting to look of for fans in Iowa. Their ten-position jump is noteworthy.
Hawaii and Valencia also show as movers this year, Hawaii being a touch more top heavy.
FALLERS:
Of course, this is a zero sum game. For some teams to “win” others have to lose. Looking at teams whose systems are on the downslide gives us:
1) Rockville (was 5, now 15)
2) Nashville (was 14, now 23)
3) Atlantic City (was 16, now 23)
4) Mexico City (was 18, now 25)
5) California (was 11, now 17)
6) Huntsville (was 7, now 13)
7) San Antonio (was 10, now 16)
Probably the most surprising on this list is Nashville, who has generally been drafting in advantageous slots. Rockville’s slide has been fairly precipitous, which doesn’t bode well—especially since they also slide another couple notches when only 60+ players are counted. Mexico City and California have been drafting in less advantageous positions for awhile, and maybe this is showing?
In addition, I’d guess bad development hits have been an issue for at least some of these teams—though I haven’t done the searching to see.
A GRAPHICAL LOOK AT THE RANKINGS
Just for fun, again, I charted each teams scores (wTot, wTop) to get a visual feel for where each system really stands.
