12/24/2006

Back to the prospects

BrewCrewBall had a link to Baseball Digest Daily and their list of the Top 100 prospects in Minor League baseball.

Numbers 51-100 is HERE. No Mariner prospects in this section of the list. However, Jim Correll had Wladimir Balentien (WI '04) as number 100 on his list, but the ex-Rattler got pushed off the list by others.
I ranked Wladimir Balentien 100th on my personal prospect list, but don’t let that skew your judgment for him. Don’t get me wrong, he’s still a long-shot to be an all-star in the majors, but if you wanted to pick a dark horse to root for, you could do worse than this guy. Blessed with prodigious power and a cannon for an arm, Balentien profiles as a prototypical rightfielder if everything falls right for him. Now the downsides. With his power, Balentien doesn’t have to hit the ball square to get it out of the ballpark, yet he swings at everything as if he’s powering the entire Seattle Sailing Club each time he comes to bat. And it shows in his numbers, driving his strikeout totals to 300 in the last two seasons and a dip in batting average to .230 in the Texas League this summer. If he can learn to be more selective while maintaining his power and modest batting eye (70 walks), he could force himself into Seattle’s big league plans by 2008.

The Top 50 list is HERE.

There are two ex-Rattlers in this section, but no write up on either of them.

#27 -- Adam Jones
#22 -- Jeff Clement

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