Minor League Ball ranks three Red Sox prospects in top 50

New prospect ranking, same old story. On Monday afternoon, the great John Sickels of Minor League Ball released his top prospect list and the usual three Red Sox were on the list around the same spots. The unique part of this list is that Sickels listed 200 players rather than the typical 100. We’ll get to that bit in a minute, though.

First, we’ll start with the normal three guys. Andrew Benintendi’s reign atop the prospect world took a minor hit with BP’s list, but he’s back at number one on this list. Then, there’s Rafael Devers with his best showing yet, coming in at number nine. It’s not a huge leap above where other evaluators have put him, but it’s the first time we’ve seen his ranking come in the form of a single digit. Finally, Jason Groome came in at 45. Contrary to Devers, this is his lowest ranking, although again it’s not a far cry from some of his other rankings.

Like I said, though, this isn’t new. Other than Keith Law ranking Sam Travis at number 98, no other list has added any other names and the Big Three (very original name, I know) have mostly been in the same range.

There was a bit of excitement on my part when I saw that Sickels went up to 200 on this list, since I figured it could give some other names a chance to shine. On his Red Sox team list, he ranked Bobby Dalbec as the fourth best prospect in the system, so he would’ve been the name to keep an eye out for. Alas, his name did not appear. For what it’s worth, Dalbec, Travis, Marco Hernandez and Roniel Raudes were seemingly close to making the list. Sickels uses a letter grade system when ranking his prospects, and the bottom of the top-200 were B-’s. The four prospects listed above held the same grade.

In the end, we all knew this was a top-heavy system that boasted three elite talents. That could change when the games start, but for now it is what it is. Below, you can see where the three have ranked on the major lists as well as an average ranking. I’ll update this if/when more major lists are released.