Interesting. I had Ismael Ramirez third, but most everyone else seems to have forgotten about him. (He's really not in the Top 10?)

I'm also surprised to see Brandon League as high as he is. I guess this is why we have a poll.

If anyone would have predicted on 4/1/06 that Davis Romero would rank higher than David Purcey I'd be impressed.

I was just checking out our Top 30 prospects review from the end of last season and noticed the following in Jordan's commentary about Josh Banks' 2005 season at AA New Hampshire:

Apr 1-Jun 30  7-6, 4.33, 16 GS, 87 IP, 91 H, 8 BB, 81 K, 13 HR, 23.0% KBF

Jul 1-Sep 30  1-6, 3.24, 11 GS, 75 IP, 68 H, 3 BB, 64 K,  5 HR, 21.8% KBF

Here's hoping he repeats this sort of split this year at Syracuse.

Thanks to all Bauxites who voted in the prospect polls. 

Pitchers are notoriously hard to evaluate and project.  It wouldn't shock me at all if Jesse Litsch is the #1 pitching prospect in June, 2007 or on the other hand if he was off the list entirely. The differences in the evaluations result from differing weights attached to stuff vs. command, tools vs. performance, and injury. There are no right answers.

The pitching prospect list is in my view quite strong.  There are no A prospects, but as far as I am concerned there are 10 B range prospects.  As I have said before, Grade A pitching prospects fail to pan out at a frustrating rate; the rate of success for Grade B pitching prospects is fairly close to it.  From among this top 10 list, one star and two or three other useful contributors can reasonably be expected to emerge.

Another reason for Ramirez not rating as high is his age - he is a 25 year old in AA, part of the reason why I am surprised they have not yet moved him up to AAA to see what he can do at that level.  Perhaps if he hadn't gotten hurt recently he would have been moved when Purcey was demoted.  Similarly, with League, he is still very young (23), and pitching well at AAA.