The Red Sox are doing alright down on the farm, to say the least.
Boston saw four players crack Baseball America’s list of Top 100 Prospects for the upcoming MLB season with Marcelo Mayer (No. 15) and Triston Casas (19) ranking among the Top 20 and Nick Yorke (31) and Jarren Duran (91) also making the cut.
All of that hardly is surprising, given Mayer — the team’s No. 4 overall pick in the 2021 MLB Draft — recently garnered high praise from Red Sox minor league coordinator Lance Zawadzki and director of player development Brian Abraham. Casas, the team’s first-round selection in 2018, impressed not only in the minors but also on the international stage, appearing for Team USA at the 2022 Tokyo Olympics.
Yorke packed a powerful offensive punch across Low-A Salem and High-A Greenville, and the Red Sox already got a taste of what Duran has to offer when the speedy outfielder made his MLB debut in 2021.
That’s all good news as far as Boston’s immediate future is concerned, but their long-term prospects got a boost with the latest prospect rankings from MLB Pipeline, which took a different approach to their list. MLB.com’s Jim Callis, Sam Dykstra and Jonathan Mayo selected one prospect they believe will crack the Top 100 list for the 2024 season.
From the Red Sox organization, they selected Blaze Jordan, the team’s third-round pick from the 2020 MLB Draft.
Here’s what they had to say about the third baseman:
“Jordan won his first national home run derby at age 11 and crushed a pair of 500-foot bombs at another when he was 13, and that power landed him a $1.75 million bonus as a Mississippi high schooler selected in the third round after he reclassified to the 2020 Draft. His pop continued to stand out in his pro debut, when he batted .324/.368/.590 with six homers in 28 games between Rookie ball and Low-A.”
Jordan, who is much more valued for his offense rather than his defensive abilities (scouts suggest he will make a move across the diamond to first base later in his career) currently is ranked as the No. 9 overall prospect in the Red Sox system by MLB.com.
