2041 BBA FARM SYSTEM RANKINGS
Posted: Mon Jan 27, 2020 11:17 pm
NINE/CRAWDADS TAKE CHARGE?
It’s that time of year, again—mid-June, just after pretty much all our draft picks are signed, time to take a look at farm systems around the league and see what we can see. In the original look, I said things were interesting because the number of prospects has dropped. This is still true, but not to the extent noted before. Our raw numbers of prospects are down, and mostly in the upper ranges (overall prospects drop from 1429 last year to 1371 this year). So we've dropped 50 prospects.
To give you an idea of how different things are, here are the number of prospects at each of the top rating scales:
80 – Was 44, Now 21
75 – Was 18, Now 11
70 – Was 32, now 19
65 – Was 47, Now 25
60 – Was 57, Now 46
So, we've lost 74 "top prospects." Given that our overall number is down 50...well, you can do the math.
I still suggest three things are combined to make this true, but obviously at a smaller level than before:
1) Players graduating: Note that this is a minor league scan. If players are in the bigs, they don’t show up. With the glut of young kids coming up, and with weaker drafts in the interim, we’ll see a reduction of prospects in our systems.
2) The development engine is taking its revenge. We’ve often discussed the fact that the increased talent in the past five years or so would result in more players getting struck down by the development engine. I don’t have definitive data to show how much of an impact this is today, but it seems logical that we’re seeing some impact.
3) The “rescout” in the last update. I admit I have no idea what the numbers were right before the update…but I also didn’t hear major bitching, so I’d guess this impact is minimal.
BNN RANKINGS:
Hawaii continues to be strong in the BNN system rankings, with Boise and Phoenix looking strong.
My carry-over blur on this: “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.”
BBA RANKINGS:
Now we come to the work of this post—that being the deeper-dive that “models” a FanGraphs prospect lists, accounts for system depth by providing a linear weight to players of each overall rating on the 80/20 scale. As with last year, I’ve included prospect down into the “40” rating scale. I think the changes I noted above make this even stronger.
Anyway, as we discussed before, there are still problems with this approach—not the least is that an “80” reliever is probably not really and “80” impact. And it doesn’t weight players by age or level (hence it doesn’t account for development risk)—but then again, as far as we can tell, neither does OOTP’s BNN stuff. Bottom line, though, is that this approach clearly gives a deeper cut on overall value, and on the whole, at least to my eyes, tends to pass the eye test much better.
Moving along now, 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.
OVERALL ASSESSMENT:
The BBA/Fangraphs system rates the top five systems as:
1. Yellow Springs
2. New Orleans
3. Calgary
4. Phoenix
5. Twin Cities
Ok, us folks in Yellow Springs and New Orleans like these numbers better than the last. Calgary slides in at #3. Phoenix is at #4. Twin Cities, who was a strong number 1 last year, drops to 5th. Still, at the end of the day this is pretty stable from last year--Louisville dropped out of the top 5 (to #9). Phoenix steps in.
I note (and it's obvious looking at the chart at the bottom) that I'd argue New Orleans is stronger than YS9. We win on points because of the middle-zone. New Orleans has an outstanding top end.
BIG MOVERS:
Teams that have improved their systems the most since the past review are:
Charlotte: Was 26, now 13
Phoenix: Was 13, now 4
Boise: Was 22, now 11
Mexico City: Was 27, Now 16
Atlantic City: Was 15, now 6
Seattle: Was 18, now 9
Long Beach: Was 28, now 21
Portland: Was 25, now 19
Nashville: Was 32, now 37
Charlotte's bump from #26 to #13 is the biggest run. Phoenix is next. Atlantic City and Seattle both are on a three-season runs of solid increased rankings.
FALLERS:
As noted last year, this system is a zero-sum game, meaning that for every riser there has to be a faller. Looking at these shows us:
Brooklyn (was 9, now 28)
Madison (was 14, now 30)
Vancouver (was 12, now 23)
Montreal (was 6, now 15)
Valencia (was 15, now 20)
California (was 17, now 22)
Edmonton (was 19, now 24)
Brooklyn, Vancouver, and Montreal dumped a bunch of players into the bigs, so that's probably a piece of this one.
A GRAPHICAL LOOK AT THE RANKINGS
Since it was fun last year, I again charted each teams scores (wTot, wTop) to get a visual feel for where each system really stands. This gives you a cool visual of the separations, and which teams are more top heavy or bottom heavy in the source of their power ranks.
Note in particular how many teams have now moved to a “0” score in wRnkTop—meaning these teams have no players in their system ranked 60 or above.
Off Topic
OK, the first batch was screwed up pretty much everywhere. It's been updated...should be right. 
To give you an idea of how different things are, here are the number of prospects at each of the top rating scales:
80 – Was 44, Now 21
75 – Was 18, Now 11
70 – Was 32, now 19
65 – Was 47, Now 25
60 – Was 57, Now 46
So, we've lost 74 "top prospects." Given that our overall number is down 50...well, you can do the math.
I still suggest three things are combined to make this true, but obviously at a smaller level than before:
1) Players graduating: Note that this is a minor league scan. If players are in the bigs, they don’t show up. With the glut of young kids coming up, and with weaker drafts in the interim, we’ll see a reduction of prospects in our systems.
2) The development engine is taking its revenge. We’ve often discussed the fact that the increased talent in the past five years or so would result in more players getting struck down by the development engine. I don’t have definitive data to show how much of an impact this is today, but it seems logical that we’re seeing some impact.
3) The “rescout” in the last update. I admit I have no idea what the numbers were right before the update…but I also didn’t hear major bitching, so I’d guess this impact is minimal.
BNN RANKINGS:
Hawaii continues to be strong in the BNN system rankings, with Boise and Phoenix looking strong.
My carry-over blur on this: “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.”
BBA RANKINGS:
Now we come to the work of this post—that being the deeper-dive that “models” a FanGraphs prospect lists, accounts for system depth by providing a linear weight to players of each overall rating on the 80/20 scale. As with last year, I’ve included prospect down into the “40” rating scale. I think the changes I noted above make this even stronger.
Anyway, as we discussed before, there are still problems with this approach—not the least is that an “80” reliever is probably not really and “80” impact. And it doesn’t weight players by age or level (hence it doesn’t account for development risk)—but then again, as far as we can tell, neither does OOTP’s BNN stuff. Bottom line, though, is that this approach clearly gives a deeper cut on overall value, and on the whole, at least to my eyes, tends to pass the eye test much better.
Moving along now, 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.
OVERALL ASSESSMENT:
The BBA/Fangraphs system rates the top five systems as:
1. Yellow Springs
2. New Orleans
3. Calgary
4. Phoenix
5. Twin Cities
Ok, us folks in Yellow Springs and New Orleans like these numbers better than the last. Calgary slides in at #3. Phoenix is at #4. Twin Cities, who was a strong number 1 last year, drops to 5th. Still, at the end of the day this is pretty stable from last year--Louisville dropped out of the top 5 (to #9). Phoenix steps in.
I note (and it's obvious looking at the chart at the bottom) that I'd argue New Orleans is stronger than YS9. We win on points because of the middle-zone. New Orleans has an outstanding top end.
BIG MOVERS:
Teams that have improved their systems the most since the past review are:
Charlotte: Was 26, now 13
Phoenix: Was 13, now 4
Boise: Was 22, now 11
Mexico City: Was 27, Now 16
Atlantic City: Was 15, now 6
Seattle: Was 18, now 9
Long Beach: Was 28, now 21
Portland: Was 25, now 19
Nashville: Was 32, now 37
Charlotte's bump from #26 to #13 is the biggest run. Phoenix is next. Atlantic City and Seattle both are on a three-season runs of solid increased rankings.
FALLERS:
As noted last year, this system is a zero-sum game, meaning that for every riser there has to be a faller. Looking at these shows us:
Brooklyn (was 9, now 28)
Madison (was 14, now 30)
Vancouver (was 12, now 23)
Montreal (was 6, now 15)
Valencia (was 15, now 20)
California (was 17, now 22)
Edmonton (was 19, now 24)
Brooklyn, Vancouver, and Montreal dumped a bunch of players into the bigs, so that's probably a piece of this one.
A GRAPHICAL LOOK AT THE RANKINGS
Since it was fun last year, I again charted each teams scores (wTot, wTop) to get a visual feel for where each system really stands. This gives you a cool visual of the separations, and which teams are more top heavy or bottom heavy in the source of their power ranks.
Note in particular how many teams have now moved to a “0” score in wRnkTop—meaning these teams have no players in their system ranked 60 or above.
