Kiley McDaniel from ESPN posted his list of the top 100 prospects on Thursday morning and he has six Pittsburgh Pirates ranked among the best in the game. The previous best this year for the Pirates was four top 100 prospects by both MLB Pipeline and Baseball America. Baseball Prospectus and Keith Law each had two Pirates on their lists. Once we get the top 100 from Fangraphs, we are going to have a list averaging out all of the rankings from the six sources, so we get a better idea, rather than relying solely on one specific list.
McDaniel’s list includes the usual suspects as well as one who hasn’t been mentioned previously this year and was a fringe top 100 player in the past. We start at the top of the system with Ke’Bryan Hayes, who ranks all the way up at the sixth spot, his highest ranking on any list.
He’s followed by Oneil Cruz (pictured above), who ranks 28th for McDaniel. This is easily his highest ranking so far, falling ahead of the 50th place spot by Baseball America.
Next up is 2020 first round pick Nick Gonzales, who ranks 66th on this list. He has made four of the five top 100 lists so far, with a high of 39th place.
The surprise here is Travis Swaggerty in the 79th spot. No one else has had Swaggerty top 100 this year, possibly because the reports coming out of Altoona for him were just mediocre, but more likely because he didn’t put up big numbers in High-A ball in 2019, showing some swing-and-miss to his game, which McDaniel’s notes.
Quinn Priester ranks 87th, fifth among all Pirates. As with everyone else, McDaniel’s notes his summer progress and the chance that Priester moves well up this list in the future.
Liover Peguero ranks 91st, giving the Pirates their sixth top 100 prospect. We just recently mentioned that he just missed MLB Pipeline’s top 100 list, which would have been his first appearance on a top 100 list this preseason.
