Keith Law from The Athletic released his rankings of the top farm systems in baseball on Thursday. He had some good things to say about the Pittsburgh Pirates after ranking them as the sixth best farm system.
Law does note that he doesn’t believe that the Pirates have a true superstar in his ranks above the complex league. I’ll note that the wording seems odd, since he mentions at the bottom of the article that the system could look better once Termarr Johnson, Anthony Solometo and Bubba Chandler get to full-season ball, so I think he is including them as the complex league players. It certainly appears that way, but I could be wrong. All three played full-season ball for Bradenton this past year.
Law likes the strong depth for the Pirates system, noting that they have numerous players at the upper levels who should become better than replacement level players in the majors. It’s not just depth, it’s quality depth.
The Pirates rank third among National League teams in the rankings behind the Los Angeles Dodgers and Arizona Diamondbacks. The rest of the NL Central ranks eighth (Milwaukee Brewers), ninth (St Louis Cardinals), tenth (Chicago Cubs) and 13th (Cincinnati Reds). That’s not the best news for the Pirates, as the rest of their own division all rank well too.
We will post more farm system rankings once they are released, so we can see a comparison and average out the rankings.
Prospect Podcast
For those who can’t get enough of the prospects talk, Baseball America released a podcast on Wednesday that covers the top ten prospects for the Pirates. I didn’t listen to it yet, but here’s the description of the 42-minute podcast:
Kyle Glaser and Mark Chiarelli break down the Pirates farm system, including where the organization has made strides in player development, status updates on Henry Davis and Nick Gonzales and a realistic timeline for the club’s rebuild to pay off.
