M's minors hitters #1 . . . pitchers #30?

=== HQ Minor League Baseball Analyst ===

BaseballHQ's major league book, Baseball Forecaster, is SSI's fave yearly. This week we got our HQ minor league book in the mail, that being Minor League Baseball Analyst Yearly.

2010 is the fifth edition. Having plowed through an M's farmhand or thirty, we're pretty blown away by their grasp for even the more obscure minor leaguers.

For lurkers ;- ) we'll ignite your instant respect for the periodical by noting that the author of the previous four editions, Deric McKamey, is not writing this year's because McKamey is now doing his thing for the St. Louis Cardinals.

This year's book is authored by Rob Gordon, who has a Ph.D. in history and an obsession with dingy minor-league parks and internet video. Co-author Jeremy Deloney is, as far as I can tell, as good as Gordon. Which is to say close to as good as G and J, times 30 teams. Some'a these guys are pretty scary. And they have families.

Anyway, ML employment, history Ph.D's and pub darts championships aren't SSI's benchmarks for street cred, but we're aware that some readers will want their own reasons for hearing MLBA out on M's 'spects. My own reason is that they're amazingly good. ;- )

Armed with such an interesting new source, February becomes Minors Month at SSI, I guess.

=== #1 Hitting, #30 Pitching ? ===

Had been reading the book for a while before I noticed that they had the Mariners #1, absolutely first in baseball, for minor-league hitting talent ... and absolutely last in pitching talent.

Here's their top-15:

1 Dustin Ackley, 1b/OF
2 Carlos Triunfel, SS (told you they were great)
3 Alex Liddi, 3b (they especially like his ML HR potential)
4 MYSTERY PROSPECT
5 starting pitcher
6 Adam Moore, c
7 Greg Halman, of (an illustration of how good they are even compared to the excellent Sickels)
8 starting pitcher
9 Michael Saunders, of (yeeee-owch)
10 Nick Franklin, ss
11 starting pitcher
12 Ezequiel Carrera, of
13 Jharmidy DeJesus, 3b
14 relief pitcher
15 Dennis Raben, of (SSI had been guilty of forgetting Raben, as we'd accused others of doing on Triunfel)

Going over their explanations on these guys, the more it hit me, they probably have a point -- the M's are loaded with a capital L on bats. And very questionable on the mound. I dunno about you, I knew the M's had more bats than arms, but I hadn't seen this with such clarity.

=== Grading System ===

They also have an interesting, fun ML-style grade attached to every prospect in the book, using these two little key codes:

10 - HOF'er

9 - All-Star

8 - Better than average ML

7 - Average ML

6 - Platoon ML

5 - Fringe / bench ML

4 - Minor league star

3 - Quality minor leaguer

etc. and....

A: 90% chance of reaching grade