Guardians News and Notes: Six Guardians Prospects in MLB Pipeline’s Top 100

Last night, MLB Pipleline released their list of Top 100 prospects, and the Cleveland Guardians landed six players in the list, second only to the Seattle Mariners’ seven prospects:

The players are:
20. Travis Bazzana
46. Chase DeLauter
66. Angel Genao
89. Ralphy Velazquez
95. Parker Messick
99. Cooper Ingle

Impressive! Now, to see if any of these five hitters will actually get an opportunity to and make good on the opportunity to hit major league pitching. We know the Guardians usually get the most out of their pitching prospects, and I think an argument can be legitimately made for both Khal Stephen and Braylon Doughty making this list.

In case you missed it, check out Tommy Pecoraro’s quick write-up of his experience of the Akron Rubber Ducks’ banquet headlined by Guardians President of Baseball Operations’ Chris Antonetti. Antonetti, again, made clear that the company line about not wanting to block young players by adding good major league hitters is going to be the Guardians’ excuse for being set to cut payroll by $20M or so. I guess we will see if they pursue some extensions in the spring to increase that number; they certainly should have the flexibility to do so if they want.

I will write more about this after Tommy gets a chance to write his full piece, but I simply don’t buy that the Guardians wouldn’t have upgraded the middle of their lineup and/or centerfield if they weren’t under some pretty severe payroll restrictions from ownership. It doesn’t pass the smell test for me. Since I can’t change that, and I also can’t even tell you how unfair or fair those restrictions are, here is the main thing I want to see in Spring Training:

-Fully open opportunities for the best Guardians’ young hitters to make the roster regardless of service time considerations. We all know that even if Bazzana comes to Spring Training and looks like a prime Chase Utley clone, he’s not making the roster for AT LEAST the convenient reasoning of missing spring training time with the World Baseball classic. Fine. But, let Juan Brito have a legitimate shot to play second over Gabriel Arias or Daniel Schneemann. Let Chase DeLauter, George Valera and, heck, Petey Halpin and Kahlil Watson have legitimate shots in the land of opportunity that is the Cleveland outfield. Do NOT simply hand centerfield to a Nolan Jones and Angel Martinez platoon for a two-week stretch to try to save a few million down the road on DeLauter. Do NOT attempt to convince us Logan Allen is a better fifth starter option than Parker Messick. If you’re going to lean on the strength of your young core in public comments, do it in private practice also.

Ok, that’s all I have to say for now. I am sure Antonetti is taking notes (where’s my sarcasm font when I need it?).

I am making an attempt as best I can to move away from Twitter links, but I could not find the following content from WEWS reporter Mason Horodyski anywhere else, so here is a clip of Antonetti talking about blocking young players:

And here is Antonetti reminding us that this organization is committed to winning a World Series at all costs (except, clearly, for the ownership group):