As we all know by now, the 2021 MLB All-Star Game is coming to Coors Field. The relocation has brought unexpected enthusiasm to baseball fans in Denver and figures to be one of the brightest spots of the season for fans in the Rocky Mountain region.
The game itself is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the event calendar, though. From July 11-14, fans will have the opportunity to check out convention events, the Celebrity All-Star Softball Game and Home Run Derby. This will also mark the first occasion where the MLB First-Year Player Draft will be held during All-Star weekend, giving Colorado the honor of hosting the inaugural format.
April 8th, 2021
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Opening Day rosters featured 17 Top 100 Prospects, yet it s some unheralded rookies who have made the biggest impact during the first week of the big league season. Tigers outfielder Akil Baddoo, Reds second baseman Jonathan India, Dodgers utilityman Zach McKinstry and White Sox catcher Yermín Mercedes have generated plenty of highlights.
There are several prospects who didn t begin the season in the Majors who will make their presence felt later in the year. Below, we highlight one for each club.
AMERICAN LEAGUE EAST
A 20-year-old pitcher reaching the Majors this early? It isn’t out of the realm of possibility. With a September birthdate, Woods Richardson was young for his class and, if not for 2020, would be entering his third full Minor League season. The right-hander sports four above-average pitches and has little issue filling up the zone. The Blue Jays got a good look at that skill set this spring, when he fanned eight over e
April 8, 2021
Tim Anderson is a befuddling player. Over the last two-plus seasons, he has posted a 133 wRC+ despite a minuscule walk rate (3.3%) that is the third lowest among all players with at least 500 plate appearances, ahead of only slap hitters José Iglesias and Hanser Alberto. That puts a lot of pressure on his ability to produce on contact. So far, so good: In that same time frame, he has a .390 BABIP, tops among all hitters and a full eight points above the next closest player (coincidently, his teammate, Yoán Moncada). The normal expectation is that a BABIP figure that high is unsustainable, and the projection systems tend to agree. The FanGraphs Depth Charts pegged Anderson for a .336 BABIP in 2021 and, correspondingly, a batting line just three percent better than league average.
April 7, 2021
This is Carmen’s first piece as a FanGraphs contributor. Carmen is an engineer living in the Bay Area. Born and raised in Connecticut, his inherited Yankees fandom (yes, he can hear all of your grumbles) and curiosity about math and science combined to foster a fascination with how players contribute to run scoring and prevention, as did growing up reading the venerable pages of sabermetric havens such as FanGraphs, Baseball Prospectus, and Beyond the Boxscore. The accessibility of pitch-by-pitch Statcast data has allowed him to dig deeper into player and team tendencies and examine how each approaches the opposition, which he has written about at his own website, Sabermetric Musings. He hopes to use his skills and interests to contribute to the baseball discourse at large, as well as the website that played such a big part in making him the baseball observer he is today.
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Fifty-six prospects made Major League Opening Day rosters this season. Seventeen of those were Top 100 talents. And it hasn t stopped there either, as the D-backs proved by bringing up No. 78 overall prospect Gerardo Perdomo over the weekend.
The fun is going to continue all season long. Some will arrive in The Show early. Some will get called up later than expected. Some will jump in the line, while others will have to wait patiently (or impatiently as the case may be). You can t predict ball, as the saying goes, but let s try anyways.
The following is a month-by-month prediction of when more Top 100 prospects those who are not yet on Major League rosters will reach the bigs themselves in 2021. Within each month, players are listed by prospect rank, not expected time of promotion.