With 6 players ranked in Baseball America's top 100 prospects, Pirates tied for tops in MLB

Baseball America ranks six Pittsburgh Pirates among its top 100 prospects in 2022, tied with the Arizona Diamondbacks for the most among MLB teams.

The Pirates have one prospect in Baseball America’s top 20 in shortstop Oneil Cruz (No. 14) and three in the top 50, with Cruz, catcher Henry Davis (No. 41) and second baseman Nick Gonzales (No. 49). Shortstop Liover Peguero (No. 78) and right-handers Roansy Contreras (No. 80) and Quinn Priester (No. 88) also are ranked in the top 100.

“It’s feedback,” Pirates general manager Ben Cherington said. “There’s no single piece of perfect feedback, but it’s feedback, and it’s a signal of progress, we think. As I’ve said before, we’ve just got to be totally focused and maniacal about getting better and building young player talent all the time in every way we possibly can. It is important from time to time to look at what others are saying, and get hopefully what you’d think would be an objective and unbiased opinion on progress. So that’s one of them. There’s a lot of them, but that’s one of them. We do pay attention to it, because it’s an opinion outside the Pirates, and it’s important that we get feedback outside the Pirates.”

It’s the most top-100 prospects the Pirates have had in their system since 2014, when they had seven and were ranked the top farm system in baseball. Baseball America previously announced each team’s top 10 prospects. Catcher Endy Rodriguez is their No. 7 prospect, followed by right-handers Micahel Burrows, Jared Jones and Carmen Mlodzinski.

The @Pirates and @Dbacks are tied for the most Top 100 Prospects this year with six apiece.

How many top 100 prospects there were from each team. Why this is the year of the catching prospect and more: the Top 100 by the numbers.https://t.co/Fw1ZYiiAfF

— JJ Cooper (@jjcoop36) January 19, 2022

Cruz moves up five spots from Baseball America’s Sept. 20 rankings, Davis three spots and Gonzales 15 spots. Peguero dropped one spot and Priester 38 spots in the rankings. Contreras enters the top 100 for the first time, surpassing Priester as the Pirates’ top pitching prospect after making his major league debut Sept. 29.

Mark Chiarelli, who evaluated the Pirates for Baseball America, discussed the rankings on a podcast with Kyle Glaser.

“It was very close,” Chiarelli said. “Priester actually, based off some of our reporting during the season, entered the offseason as the ‘favorite’ to be the top pitcher in the system. But the more you look at what Contreras did in 2021 and talked to some people who saw both of them, his outlook, if anything, brightened it in our eyes.”

The rankings indicate the drastic improvement of the Pirates’ farm system through trades and the MLB Draft in two years under general manager Ben Cherington. Davis was the No. 1 overall pick in 2021, and Gonzales was selected No. 7 overall in 2020. Peguero was acquired from Arizona in the Starling Marte trade in January 2020, and Contreras from the New York Yankees in the Jameson Taillon trade in January 2021. Rodriguez was acquired from the Mets as part of the three-team trade that sent Joe Musgrove to the San Diego Padres.

The Pirates manipulated their $14,394,000 draft pool last July by signing Davis for $1.9 million under-slot value, which allowed them to go above slot in signing four top-100 prep prospects: left-hander Anthony Solometo, right-hander/shortstop Bubba Chandler and outfielders Lonnie White and Braylon Bishop.

Chiarelli believes the Pirates now have one of the game’s top farm systems. Baseball America ranked them fourth last August, behind the Baltimore Orioles, Seattle Mariners and Miami Marlins.

“I think they have an argument to be in that top tier,” Chiarelli said. “For its money, this is as deep as any system, if not deeper than any system in baseball, especially if you look at 10 (prospects) and beyond.

“The depth really stood out to me. What they did in the draft this past year was a lot of fun. One of the few times we got to write that the Pirates got to flex their financial muscle a little bit.”