Over the last three days, Keith Law has been posting his rankings of each team’s farm system around baseball. Friday morning he unveiled the top ten teams and rated the Pittsburgh Pirates as having the fourth best system. The Pirates trail the Atlanta Braves, New York Yankees and San Diego Padres on his list.
Law had the Pirates ranked eighth last year. He noted that their top five prospects from this time last year all returned to the list this year, so they maintained that strength and had some players breakout. I’ll note that he didn’t have Jameson Taillon is his top five going into last year like everyone else, but his own top five of Tyler Glasnow, Austin Meadows, Josh Bell, Kevin Newman and Ke’Bryan Hayes should all ranked close to where they were last year at this time.
Law also noted the rise of Mitch Keller in the rankings, and the positive returns from injuries by Cole Tucker and Nick Kingham. He said the Pirates didn’t have the depth of the teams ahead of them and he was somewhat critical of the 2016 draft. It didn’t help that they couldn’t sign 41st overall pick Nick Lodolo, who turned down a huge offer to attend TCU, but by not signing him, that extra pick (42nd overall) will help the 2017 draft class.
On Monday, Law will start releasing his top 100 prospects list. He is going to post 20 prospects a day through Friday, starting with 81-100 the first day. That’s not the best setup for us, since it will likely mean at least three articles to cover his top 100, but we will post anytime a player from the Pirates shows up on his list. Last year he ranked four Pirates in his top 100, then noted that Ke’Bryan Hayes finished just outside the top 100. Law will post his top ten prospects for the Pirates on the following Tuesday.
