[SPEAKER_00]: everybody, JJ Cooper, Jacob Rudner, another of the baseball America, prospect deep guys.
[SPEAKER_00]: And today we are talking all about the Miami Marlins Jacob Rudner does the Marlins for us.
[SPEAKER_00]: The Marlins top 30, which I think has become the top 35 or the 40 because the Marlins keep making trades.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so players who Jacob has written up, keeps sliding off of the list.
[SPEAKER_00]: because we write up 30 in December and then if we keep happening, players get bumped off.
[SPEAKER_00]: Drake, up great to see you.
[SPEAKER_00]: This was your first time doing this through.
[SPEAKER_00]: You were just in your finishing up your first year at Baseball America.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is not surprising.
[SPEAKER_00]: Your first time doing a top 30 before we dive into the Marlin system.
[SPEAKER_00]: What was it like to do your first top third?
[SPEAKER_01]: it was a lot of fun.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that it was cool to be able to have the amount of conversations that are necessary to put a list like that together.
[SPEAKER_01]: And as somebody who came from the baseball America subscriber pool and then entered the baseball America employee pool, it was cool to get a look behind the scenes as far as what goes into the prospect handbook process and into a top 30 because I can tell you that the amount of work and research and conversations
[SPEAKER_01]: that you all have been having for years and that I got to experience for the first time was really eye-opening.
[SPEAKER_01]: You learn a lot about baseball players in general.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's not just about the marlins in your team.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think it actually helps to educate you as far as the industry goes and where things are trending and how people who are in charge of putting together these farm systems and major league teams are thinking about the game in real time and that was fascinating to me.
[SPEAKER_00]: Waste your time, Marlon's fans, we're gonna dive right in and the first question we've been asking on each and every one of these is how difficult is to generate number of prospect.
[SPEAKER_00]: In this case, Thomas White, I would guess it wasn't that hard, Thomas White is one of the best pitching prospects in the game, but I also would say that this is a team that had organization that had multiple guys who were very plausible number one prospects.
[SPEAKER_00]: You weren't lacking for candidates to be a legitimate number one prospect for a visualization.
[SPEAKER_01]: No, not at all.
[SPEAKER_01]: And Thomas White, I will say it was an easy decision to rank number one, just to answer the question directly.
[SPEAKER_01]: It was pretty clear cut as the process was getting underway that that was the move to make.
[SPEAKER_01]: He has the best stuff in the organization.
[SPEAKER_01]: He has the highest upside arguably in the organization.
[SPEAKER_01]: There were a lot of people throughout the feedback process who said that he had the potential to be in ace.
[SPEAKER_01]: At the major league level, I actually don't think we're that far away from that.
[SPEAKER_01]: There is a widespread expectation that Thomas White will be a major league or very early if not right away in 2026.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that led him to the top of the rankings.
[SPEAKER_01]: Were there other people who you could make an argument for?
[SPEAKER_01]: Sure.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think Robbie Snellings maturity and kind of the
[SPEAKER_01]: move that he made back to the expectations that he generated for himself earlier in his career.
[SPEAKER_01]: We're really encouraging.
[SPEAKER_01]: You could have made a case that he was the number one prospect in the organization loosely.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think I've got our ket after the draft had a case to be the number one prospect overall in the organization.
[SPEAKER_01]: But at the end of the day, the conversations kept going back to Thomas White has multiple plus pitches.
[SPEAKER_01]: There's an argument to be made that he has some double plus pitches in his arsenal.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so it was a pretty easy decision to rank the guy who the Marlins view as a potential number one number one on our list.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is, again, this is one of those things where like you said, you kind of have, if you look at our top hundred, which is up at baseball America right now.
[SPEAKER_00]: Number three prospect on this list would rank number one on a whole lot of you know teams rankings because again this is a team that has close to the majors talent in the case of why and selling and in the case of our cat.
[SPEAKER_00]: A first rounder who was a premium first rounder from last year's draft class, not a guy who was like, okay, it was a first rounder pick 30, pick 29 or whatever, the best the pretty much consensus best in field or college in field or not in field or a college in field or in the 2025 draft class, that leads perfectly into the other thing I wanted to ask you, which is compare the system to last year.
[SPEAKER_00]: How's it better or worse, adding an, you know, adding an arcette really does help.
[SPEAKER_00]: But is this system better than it was at this time last year or has there been enough moves, graduations all that to where maybe it's equivalent a little bit worse?
[SPEAKER_01]: We've written about this at Baseball America and I would encourage you to go check that out because it gets into the depth of how it happened.
[SPEAKER_01]: But the consensus across the industries that the Marlin system is better than it used to be.
[SPEAKER_01]: There is more depth in the organization.
[SPEAKER_01]: They are starting to do a better job of acquiring offensive talent, which you and I are gonna get into here in a little bit.
[SPEAKER_01]: That has been a problem historically, developing that offensive talent has been a problem.
[SPEAKER_01]: And you look at the top 10 right now and you see a lot of hitters.
[SPEAKER_01]: I have our kit was drafted this year.
[SPEAKER_01]: this season.
[SPEAKER_01]: He looked like a really good bat and was very, very, very, very hard.
[SPEAKER_01]: I was going to say, Joe Mack is close to the Major League's Camp.
[SPEAKER_01]: Canterrallo was drafted, Brandon Compton out of Arizona State.
[SPEAKER_01]: All of those guys are top 10 prospects, Starland Kaba, showed some signs of maybe taking up a little bit offensively in the Arizona Fall League, Fenwick Trimble is the breakout prospect.
[SPEAKER_01]: In this organization, there are a lot of people who are very high on him, including
[SPEAKER_01]: Scouts from outside of the organization who have had a chance to see him, that is a pretty decent amount of offensive talent.
[SPEAKER_01]: Then you go down the list and I think what stands out is just how well they're doing in the lower miners.
[SPEAKER_01]: There are...
[SPEAKER_01]: players from the DSL, there are players in low and high A who have started to look like legitimate prospects.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so then you kind of sort it through and 10 to 30 even beyond that now after the trades that they've made, this is a system that has some legitimate potential major league options.
[SPEAKER_01]: These are not just replacement level projected prospects.
[SPEAKER_01]: They may actually make
[SPEAKER_01]: a legitimate impact in the organization.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think the other thing that was important for them is that just the cohesion across the system has been really important for the Marlins this year.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that the Peter Bendick's lead front office has made an effort to streamline the language that they're using
[SPEAKER_01]: on both sides of the ball to be able to get prospects and majorly players to be hearing the same kind of instruction.
[SPEAKER_01]: It helps them to be better when they move up.
[SPEAKER_01]: There isn't as much you know, acclimation time necessary for prospects as they advance throughout the system.
[SPEAKER_01]: Those are the positives.
[SPEAKER_01]: The negatives to me would be
[SPEAKER_01]: Maybe where it's I don't know if it's it's worsen necessarily, but just the question mark I still have is we're talking a lot about hitters They need to go do it JJ like we're there's there's promise on the offensive side They did a really good job in the draft on the offensive side some of the international additions offensively are encouraging have they gone and done it yet?
[SPEAKER_01]: Not quite.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like we need to see what I've our cat is going to do as a pro.
[SPEAKER_01]: Is he a short stop or a third baseman?
[SPEAKER_01]: Is Kemp Alderman going to be able to hit enough as a major league outfielder?
[SPEAKER_01]: Or is it really just a power first replacement level back?
[SPEAKER_01]: I have the same questions about bread and compton.
[SPEAKER_01]: Is Kemp Kendra was power?
[SPEAKER_01]: going to be enough or is he just a defense forward outfielder who's not going to have much of an offensive impact.
[SPEAKER_01]: Those are the questions that remain for me.
[SPEAKER_01]: Is that a bad thing?
[SPEAKER_01]: No.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's just kind of a wait and see at this point.
[SPEAKER_01]: But I think generally speaking, the net is positive.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's also interesting about this is when you talk about the hitters.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is a team that also pushed a lot of guys to the big leagues.
[SPEAKER_00]: A lot of rookie hitters to the big leagues last year of all different types.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it was a rule five pick like Liam Hicks.
[SPEAKER_00]: There was a trade acquisition who
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, we're going to see if a guest in Ramirez can catch.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, maybe not, we should probably think of them more as a bat.
[SPEAKER_00]: We kind of got that a little bit more cleared up.
[SPEAKER_00]: They have, you know, they had Eribarto Hernandez who had long time been a raise prospect who, I don't know if he's part of the long-term plan, but at the same time, he wasn't completely lost out there.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's a useful hitter.
[SPEAKER_00]: Although there are, you know, kind of a little bit of questions, you know, you got a Jacob Barcy.
[SPEAKER_00]: You got a lot of young hitters who,
[SPEAKER_00]: are up in the big leagues at 23, 24, 25.
[SPEAKER_00]: But the other thing that stands out here is, I do kind of feel like you just laid it out.
[SPEAKER_00]: This rookie class for 26 should be better than the rookie class for 25.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because while those guys were like, hey, we've got a great fine two years ago in Xavier Edwards and they basically, I would say that middle and field Xavier, you know, X Edwards and Otto Lopez,
[SPEAKER_00]: Good, good solid.
[SPEAKER_00]: They've been good.
[SPEAKER_00]: Didn't they have the kind of that group from last year?
[SPEAKER_00]: But you just laid it out.
[SPEAKER_00]: You would expect Thomas Y and Robby Stelling and Joe Mack.
[SPEAKER_00]: And you're not even ending there, but that's the top of their list.
[SPEAKER_00]: Those are guys.
[SPEAKER_00]: Joe Mack should, we just talked about, with Augusta and Ramirez, his defense of issues at Ketcher.
[SPEAKER_00]: Liam Hicks being a useful Ketcher, but again, not incredible defense, so he's like that.
[SPEAKER_00]: this team's long-term number one catcher and that probably that time table probably starts this year.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thomas White, you know, they obviously traded at Cabrera away.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thomas White and Robby Snelling are the are two anchors in what should be the rotation for the rest of the 2020s and beyond for this marvelous team.
[SPEAKER_00]: Those guys are all arriving now.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, is from that standpoint, I feel like that if you're a marlins fan,
[SPEAKER_00]: the 2026 season should be a little bit more foundational, even though they won 79 games last year.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is the area like, okay, you see a little bit even more of the payoff than you saw last years far as bringing up guys from down on the farm.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, absolutely.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that doesn't even mention Owen Casey who they just acquired and the Edward Cabaret deal.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's going to come up and instantly
[SPEAKER_01]: seemingly make an impact or at least that's their hope.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that there's kind of two ways to look at 2026 from a foundational level like you just said, yeah, you're bringing up guys who you expect to be impactful for the major league club for the rest of the 2020s and you're hopeful that they're going to be productive.
[SPEAKER_01]: but at the same time, I think that the caliber of talent that's about to hit the major leagues is ready to contribute in a really meaningful way right now, nearly an 80-win team in 2025.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't expect them to take a step back because they're going to get younger.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that this is a team that should really be able to sustain its momentum in 2021.
[SPEAKER_01]: Even though you're going to be bringing up first-time major leaders, I think Thomas White instantly jumps in as the number two or number three starter in that rotation.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think Robby Snelling comes up as somebody who probably has top half of the rotation potential of everything clicks.
[SPEAKER_01]: We haven't talked about Carson Nobrandt who was a top 10 prospect in our prospect handbook.
[SPEAKER_01]: He was one of the biggest risers in the organization period this year.
[SPEAKER_01]: Wasn't ranked in our top 30 at the start of the year was a top 10 prospect to end it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Whether or not he's going to be a reliever or a starter kind of remains to be seen, but regardless,
[SPEAKER_01]: He has shown throughout 2025 that he is somebody ready to be productive at the major league level.
[SPEAKER_01]: There is a lot of talent, really in the top 12 of this system that is close to the majors, ready to contribute in a meaningful way and plugs in some of the holes that are existing.
[SPEAKER_01]: Joe McClick, you said, comes up and is instantly one of the, I mean, I review him is one of the better defensive catching prospects in minor league baseball right now.
[SPEAKER_01]: That doesn't even mention the fact that he's gonna go and do a pretty decent job at the plate too.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's a decent enough hitter, we think that he's going to be able to contribute at a high level.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that you can make that case for a lot of the guys that they have on their roster, plus they drafted a whole bunch of college talent.
[SPEAKER_01]: And if they're going to stick to this, you know, more rapid advancement system that we're seeing across baseball, I think some of the guys who they picked in 2025 are not super far away, even if it's not 2026 for making a major league impact in Miami.
[SPEAKER_00]: So as you just laid out, much of the top of this top five is expected to graduate this year.
[SPEAKER_00]: Not everyone though.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you're looking a year from now, who do you think could be the number one prospector year from now?
[SPEAKER_00]: Again, we're gonna say Thomas White, we expect to graduate.
[SPEAKER_00]: Robby's snowing, we expect to graduate.
[SPEAKER_00]: Joe Mack, we expect to graduate.
[SPEAKER_00]: So taking those out of it, and that's basically, you know, very much a lot of the top of this list.
[SPEAKER_00]: Where, who do you see being the number one prospector year
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, as much as I am a huge fan of the rapid advancement of some of these college draft picks, I struggle to imagine I've our cat not graduating, excuse me, in 2026, I think that he'll get to 2027 with prospects status.
[SPEAKER_01]: I do not think he'll be a major leader.
[SPEAKER_01]: And if that's the case, then he's the surefire number one.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's our number three prospect right now.
[SPEAKER_01]: It would take a reasonably catastrophic first full season as a professional baseball player to move him further down the list.
[SPEAKER_01]: We have a lot of confidence in him.
[SPEAKER_01]: We did in the draft.
[SPEAKER_01]: He should stick it shortstop and if he doesn't, it's a move the third base where he has the arm to be productive as well.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's a good power hitter, but he's not going to sell out for that power.
[SPEAKER_01]: He kind of gets to it naturally.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's he's does a good job hitting.
[SPEAKER_01]: Right now we have him as a
[SPEAKER_01]: If I had to go deeper down the list though, you want to talk about somebody with like a little bit more extreme risk, but we'll see what happens.
[SPEAKER_01]: I have a very hard time ignoring Kevin DeFranck.
[SPEAKER_01]: For those of our readers and Marlin's fans who follow me on Twitter, you know that I love Kevin DeFranck.
[SPEAKER_01]: He is a soon to be 17 year old right-hander who was in the DSL last year, showed a lot of polish for his age.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's up over 100 miles per hour already.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's got a plus slider behind it.
[SPEAKER_01]: There's a really good change up in his arsenal as well, and he's about to make his state side debut.
[SPEAKER_01]: He should be in the FCL to start the year.
[SPEAKER_01]: If not, it's in low A, but he will play state side baseball in 2026 right away.
[SPEAKER_01]: As a 17 year old, he's a six foot six, 250 pound pitcher.
[SPEAKER_01]: And there is a tremendous amount of confidence within the organization that he has some special things brewing.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so if we see that materialized, I think it becomes a real conversation between him and our cat.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's a passing one.
[SPEAKER_00]: So if our cat, you say you don't expect him to graduate this year.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you look at last the 2024 college top of the draft bats, it was kind of a 50, 50 Christian more graduated, Charlie Condon didn't.
[SPEAKER_00]: Nick Kurtz graduated, JJ Weatherhold didn't.
[SPEAKER_00]: Is that because of where like that our cat has more development time ahead of them?
[SPEAKER_00]: Or is that more of kind of where the marlins are right now that they don't really have a reason to
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, I think it's more of the latter.
[SPEAKER_01]: We've seen with the Marlins historically that they aren't one of the organizations that rushes to get their college players, that they draft up to the major leagues.
[SPEAKER_01]: They don't have a historically fast developmental track record period.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that they stick to their guns for the most part on that with our kit.
[SPEAKER_01]: If he listen, if he comes out and he's excellent in 2026, maybe he does move up quickly.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I wouldn't rule out completely him graduating.
[SPEAKER_01]: In 2026, but again, I think that just given what the organization has done, the fact that they're going to want to probably start him back in Abel, see him succeed there for an extended period of time, and then maybe write out the rest of the year in AA with a quick appearance in AAA, that to me seems much more likely than an ascent from.
[SPEAKER_01]: a ball all the way to the major leagues in 2026.
[SPEAKER_01]: Again though, I would say it's not impossible.
[SPEAKER_01]: It just feels unlikely given who he plays for and what they tend to do with their offensive players.
[SPEAKER_00]: So looking a little bit more big picture.
[SPEAKER_00]: You just said, there's been a lot of changes here.
[SPEAKER_00]: We wrote also, I wrote about, I had fun writing yet last year about the Marlin's emphasis and the miners on base stealing and how they steal bases.
[SPEAKER_00]: Not just that a clip, but they steal bases better than anyone else in the miners.
[SPEAKER_00]: They do it more often, but they do it at a success rate.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's really, they're getting real value.
[SPEAKER_00]: And again,
[SPEAKER_00]: They're not doing that just to try to win games in the minors.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're doing that with the idea that it improves base runners in the majors.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love Rachel Balkovich, I quote that she said to me, it's like, how much should anoint her anytime she saw on another team when she was back, which was coaching, and they had a player coaching for space.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because what that means is you're saying that you aren't really focusing on the details of what you could do about getting jumps, because that's what a first base coach could help with things like that.
[SPEAKER_00]: But when you look at bigger picture on that, we don't have to go down the base running rabbit hole.
[SPEAKER_00]: What is this organization good at development?
[SPEAKER_01]: It's hard not to say pictures right now, and you just look at the top of their in in org rankings.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's a lot of arms, Thomas White, Robbie Snelling, Kevin DeFranck, who I mentioned is really looking promising.
[SPEAKER_01]: Carson Millbrant, the development there has been super encouraging.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then in the mid teens range, there are a couple of guys who I think are
[SPEAKER_01]: younger, but exciting, kind of beneath us is in that conversation.
[SPEAKER_01]: Josh White is going to be a big league reliever for them in 2026 and looks like somebody who's going to be able to be productive.
[SPEAKER_01]: They did a great job with William Kemper, who they acquired from the giants.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's looked really good and looks like somebody who's going to be a big league or soon.
[SPEAKER_01]: Elias Ardishmay has made some waves within the organization.
[SPEAKER_01]: There is a lot of pitching talent.
[SPEAKER_01]: Some of it is younger.
[SPEAKER_01]: We have to wait and see how it's going to progress over time.
[SPEAKER_01]: But I do think that their strength right now is putting guys on the mound and extracting maximum value out of them.
[SPEAKER_01]: What are their improving is the bat category and we've already mentioned that a couple of times.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that there is some encouraging evidence so far that they're starting to turn the corner as an organization as far as developing batsgo.
[SPEAKER_01]: They've acquired a couple of bats where I think are impressive.
[SPEAKER_01]: Owen Casey comes from the Cubs.
[SPEAKER_01]: Dylan Lewis is now in the organization from the Yankees.
[SPEAKER_01]: Brendan Jones, and then Santiago Solarte, the shortstop on the international market, who's going to enter the top 15 for us when we do an update of their rankings, it's a really group Christian Hernandez, another guy who I think has majorly potential was enter is entering the system.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's an impressive group.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that they're doing a better job.
[SPEAKER_01]: Again, I still think that it's pitching, but the well-roundedness of their development has started to come into focus for me over the last year and under this organization's leadership now.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, again, this is something I would say from my in watching it, you know, having watched the marvelous for many years now, uh, said to say, I'm old enough that I covered a marvelous playoff series, uh, there aren't many people out there who can say that nowadays.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, not just a recent one.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, like, one of the years that the marlins won a role series.
[SPEAKER_00]: Um, but, uh, but I would say the thing that that stands out here is is, and we've seen this under, I would say, down the peded, the Peter Bendick's, uh, front office is,
[SPEAKER_00]: there is a pretty what seems like a pretty clear cohesive plan here.
[SPEAKER_00]: We'll see kind of the outcome of it, but this is an organization that had a lot of kind of fits and starts and, okay, we're going in this direction, we're going in this direction.
[SPEAKER_00]: Some of it successful, like obviously I would say the the Kimang regime, you know, was there briefly, but the Kimang regime did go to the playoffs and then
[SPEAKER_00]: There was a disconnect of like, okay, I'm basically, I'm leaving.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so you have kind of different...
[SPEAKER_00]: have that they've taken over the last decade.
[SPEAKER_00]: Here does seem like a reasonably cohesive one.
[SPEAKER_00]: And while I would say that this is not our number one farm system in the rankings that last time we updated it, we'll be doing a diving in again a little bit very shortly.
[SPEAKER_00]: And when we do, we'll see kind of where they line up because they have made further moves since the last time we kind of looked at this.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I would say it's hard to find many deeper farm systems
[SPEAKER_00]: Um, what if you're lasting from the video portion, if you're in Marlin's fan and you're watching this in 26, what are something that you should pay attention to?
[SPEAKER_00]: What would be a sign to you that like Vowem Marlin's fan that, okay, the plan is working?
[SPEAKER_01]: All eyes on the lower minors, I mentioned at the top of this video, this is an organization that has started to fill out really nicely.
[SPEAKER_01]: And when we did do the organization rankings, one thing that stuck out to me,
[SPEAKER_01]: in our conversation about the Marlins and where they belonged among the 30 clubs was just how deep and young this organization is.
[SPEAKER_01]: Now, that's risky.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's why I say you have to turn your attention there.
[SPEAKER_01]: Young talent is not guaranteed talent.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's promise, but that's not the same as production.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I do wonder right now what some of these low minors guys turn into
[SPEAKER_01]: In 2026, Luis Aranya is a great example.
[SPEAKER_01]: He was in the DSL, looked like a really promising table setting type, Bat Luis Kova, is somebody who we became higher on this season.
[SPEAKER_01]: He showed a much better well-rounded skill set in his second go around in the DSL.
[SPEAKER_01]: What does it look like when he gets to the United States?
[SPEAKER_01]: I mentioned Kiner Benitez, PJ Morelando, Joe Adnoble Meyer, Leo Marmartina as Grant Shepherdson.
[SPEAKER_01]: I can keep going down the list, but like this 20 to 30, maybe even 30 plus range has a lot of guys who are in their low 20s.
[SPEAKER_01]: who are in high A and low A who have a chance to get to double A this season and are those guys continuing the production that we saw this year.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'll give you a benchmark player somebody to just like lock in on and let's see how it goes with this guy because I think that it'll be indicative of
[SPEAKER_01]: What the organization is doing well, Leomar Martinez this year looked outstanding.
[SPEAKER_01]: He was extremely productive.
[SPEAKER_01]: He developed multiple pitches.
[SPEAKER_01]: We saw him have a lot of success in the surface level stats.
[SPEAKER_01]: Does that continue when you get to the high minors?
[SPEAKER_01]: That to me is a huge indicator.
[SPEAKER_01]: He should probably get to AA at some point in 2026.
[SPEAKER_01]: What is that double A debut look like?
[SPEAKER_01]: Noble Meyer, who is a product of a lot of change within that organization, that has not been a linear development or a smooth one in the slightest.
[SPEAKER_01]: He was a top five prospect in that organization.
[SPEAKER_01]: Now he doesn't crack the top 20 for the marilins after the trades that they've made.
[SPEAKER_01]: So
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that you need to see them avoid some of these hiccup developments like we saw with Meyer.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that you need to see them avoid some of the PJ Morelando type tracks with their hitters.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's not to say that those guys can't, you know, be still be saved.
[SPEAKER_01]: They're both very young, but they aren't where they used to be even a year ago.
[SPEAKER_01]: So
[SPEAKER_01]: I would be looking to see how some of these younger players who have some promise, who have some tools, what does that turn into in terms of 2026 production?
[SPEAKER_01]: Where do they end their year?
[SPEAKER_01]: Are they in the mid-minors, do some of them get to AAA?
[SPEAKER_01]: Who they abuse?
[SPEAKER_01]: Those are the questions that I would be asking and the things that I would be following.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because it's like you just said, it's a lot of depth for this Marlon's organization, but it's a lot of young depth, a lot of unproven depth.
[SPEAKER_01]: And now it's time to see whether that turns into things that are a little bit more tangible and concrete progress.
[SPEAKER_00]: So for the video portion of it, we thank you for joining us.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, but if you want more on the baseball or kapac test feed and for our podcast listeners just stick around, we'll be right back to talk a little bit more about the marlins right after this quick break.
[SPEAKER_00]: And Jacob, now that we're back, let's take a look, I wanna look at a couple of different things that are kind of interesting topics here.
[SPEAKER_00]: The first one is,
[SPEAKER_00]: And I want to ask kind of two ways on this.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would describe, I think it's fair to say that over the last three years, the marlins have very much been an acquisition mode.
[SPEAKER_00]: The marlins, I would say, for most of the last 15 years, have been on prospect acquisition mode.
[SPEAKER_00]: There have been very few years where you look at the marlins and say, they're just shipping prospects out the door to bring in big, you know, big name, major league that's on big contracts.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's not their gentleman approach.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I would say in recent years, the way I would describe it is is that they went for a depth over star approach, or depth over fit approach, even where it's like, we're going to take talent.
[SPEAKER_00]: We feel like that we would rather take talent over a specific fit for us.
[SPEAKER_00]: Is that their approach still now or is the Cabrera trade?
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't feel like Owen Casey kind of maybe fits both ways.
[SPEAKER_00]: He was a little bit surplus.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would say that they've been willing to take surplus guys from other organizations where it's like, hey, we know of these guys.
[SPEAKER_00]: You might be more willing to trade this one, but it also fits for us to take that guy.
[SPEAKER_00]: Owen Casey is a little surplus to the cubs need.
[SPEAKER_00]: They, it's not he's a talented player, but they have a full-out field right now.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it could be that, but it also could be, I feel like Owen Casey also very much fits what the marvelous need.
[SPEAKER_00]: Is the approach changing it all to you or is this still fit within that same approach of, hey, we're going to take, we would rather take the best prospect talent over the best prospect fit for exactly what we need.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think we're seeing a little bit more of a blend between the two styles from the Marlins than maybe we've been used to over the course of the last, let's say, decade.
[SPEAKER_01]: Owen Casey, who you mentioned is an interesting case, because I think to the Cubs, like you said, he's surplus to the Marlins, he fills a need.
[SPEAKER_01]: He also has a lot closer to the majors, and so I view that a little bit differently because that's already to contribute now, a tight piece, more than it is a talented prospect
[SPEAKER_01]: Another organization uses surplus that the marlins are going to get to develop.
[SPEAKER_01]: Now he's going to go be a big legal right now.
[SPEAKER_01]: He should open the year on the Major League roster.
[SPEAKER_01]: The expectation like I said in the video portion of our podcast is that he's going to contribute at a high level.
[SPEAKER_01]: We have him at mild risk in our prospect handbook for a reason.
[SPEAKER_01]: He fits that description perfectly.
[SPEAKER_01]: Dylan Lewis on the other hand, Dylan Lewis is a little bit more interesting.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's a talented player.
[SPEAKER_01]: that he was a surplus type.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's a higher risk player and he fits what the Marlins are generally looking for.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's a younger bat.
[SPEAKER_01]: There is upside there and they're going to just bet on themselves to be able to develop with him.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that that confidence comes from what we talked about a few minutes ago, which is that the Marlins are now streamlining and revamping their process.
[SPEAKER_01]: when it comes to developing haters.
[SPEAKER_01]: The language is the same from the DSL, maybe not English versus Spanish, but the language, the hitting language is the same from the DSL all the way up to the major leagues.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think that that has been fruitful for them.
[SPEAKER_01]: We're seeing guys develop
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, at a better, faster, more consistent rate offensively, and it allows them to do what you just asked about, which is you can go out and go get guys that have tools and are just baseline talents, even if they don't necessarily fit in organizational need, you can carve them into somebody who does that and I also would say this, I think that defensive fit is becoming significantly less important for the marlins, less you are outstanding.
[SPEAKER_01]: Starland Cobb, is an example of somebody who is phenomenal, defensively, where he plays matters.
[SPEAKER_00]: We can agree on that, where I hope so, because if you're just betting on the bat there, then probably not a good prospect.
[SPEAKER_01]: Right, but you have an 80 defender at short stop.
[SPEAKER_01]: So that's somebody who's going to go and and create his value with the glove.
[SPEAKER_01]: Other than that, though, you're going to go bring in the best bats and you're going to develop them to play a position, and you don't need everybody to be a premium defender.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think that we're seeing that trend too,
[SPEAKER_01]: within the Marlins organization right now, both in terms of who's had success within the organization and who they're acquiring as well.
[SPEAKER_01]: So to go back to your question, I really think that they're striking the right balance right now between going to get the guys they just think are talented, but also kind of selectively plugging their needs throughout the organization, and that's all the way down to low and high A, and then these very close to the majors triple A bats like
[SPEAKER_00]: Also, you mentioned the DSL, the same language being used or at least in English and Spanish and being used all the way up now, the same ideas, the same concept being but the DSL is where we've probably had more fun with the marlins and okay, so I'm going to start this by just saying like before we go even further on it.
[SPEAKER_00]: As you've done the Marlins list, and as Josh did the DSL list for us and Josh went down the Dominican Summer League last summer, everyone kept coming, everyone just wants to talk about this Marlins pitching staff that was in the DSL.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I want to just lay this out bigger picture.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you're a Marlins fan listening, this is your wondering, okay, is this something that we talk about with every organization?
[SPEAKER_00]: No, no.
[SPEAKER_00]: The Marlins pitching in the DSL last year,
[SPEAKER_00]: was worthy of comment as in this is outlier compared to every other organization down to DSL.
[SPEAKER_00]: You would if you said who had the most
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't care who had the best pitching staff in the DSL.
[SPEAKER_00]: No one's goal is to win the 55 team or whatever it is now DSL title.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's not the goal.
[SPEAKER_00]: The goal is to develop big leagueers.
[SPEAKER_00]: When it comes to the most promising pitching staff in the DSL, there was basically no debate that it was the Marlins.
[SPEAKER_00]: What?
[SPEAKER_00]: Just give people a little bit of a taste about that Marlins pitching staff before we go in bigger picture about what they're doing in the nation.
[SPEAKER_01]: There has been an outrageous amount of talent that has come out of the Marlins DSL complex on the pitching side.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it is not just at the top of the board.
[SPEAKER_01]: Kevin DeFranck, who we touched on already, is like the shiny flashy object at the top of the conversation.
[SPEAKER_01]: Kevin DeFranck is, in my opinion, an outstanding prospect.
[SPEAKER_01]: And he shined for them in the DSL this year.
[SPEAKER_01]: But some other names who we've already touched on who have come from the DSL, Liam Armartines, came from the DSL, and was super successful.
[SPEAKER_01]: Eli is our dish may, came from the DSL, and has been super successful.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm actually going to save Keith Rady and Karnasio just for a second, because I think that there's a better, bigger conversation to be had.
[SPEAKER_01]: But!
[SPEAKER_01]: you go down the list and there are a number of guys who are pitching really well.
[SPEAKER_01]: I have our most scary.
[SPEAKER_01]: I can go down the list.
[SPEAKER_01]: I can we can do this for a ton of names, teenagers in the DSL who throw the baseball.
[SPEAKER_01]: have been outrageously successful in the DSL.
[SPEAKER_01]: Josh went down and saw them this year and he texted me, I think it was like his second day there and he's like, I have seen more guys touch triple digits in the DSL who are wearing a Marlins cap that I have seen in years of doing this.
[SPEAKER_01]: There are guys with advanced breaking stuff.
[SPEAKER_01]: There are guys with advanced control.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it is because this organization has invested
[SPEAKER_01]: And again, I would encourage you to go over to baseball america.com to read about this, they have invested a tremendous amount in getting better at DSL development because for the marlins, they are the most uniquely and advantageously located club as far as the DSL goes as far as the community that surrounds their organization goes to be successful in the DSL.
[SPEAKER_01]: for young Dominican really Caribbean area prospects.
[SPEAKER_01]: They want them to be marlins, they want them to go and live in Miami, eventually they want them to aspire to go be successful for the marlins.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that has been a factor in their organizational investment in that level of baseball.
[SPEAKER_01]: And we've seen it pay dividends really quickly.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that there's a reason that somebody like Kevin to Frank has shot up the board for us prospect wise.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's only 17 years old and we were already having a conversation.
[SPEAKER_01]: He was in a story, Josh just wrote about 20 prospects who were just off the top 100.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's because they've invested.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's super advanced and huge physically which helps.
[SPEAKER_01]: But like the way that they have been able to mold him into a picture at a very young age,
[SPEAKER_01]: is super encouraging, and I think that you can apply that concept pretty widely.
[SPEAKER_01]: That brings me to this.
[SPEAKER_01]: Keith Frady and Karnasium, a 19-year-old left-hander who was in the DSL, I would be remiss not to talk about the prospect that the entire baseball America staff makes fun of me for loving.
[SPEAKER_00]: He is.
[SPEAKER_00]: We don't make fun of you for loving, because we also have some intrigue, you know, but we make fun of you for how much you talk about,
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm pretty sure for how much I love Keith Radiant Carnacian.
[SPEAKER_01]: We're talking about a 19-year-old left hander who's up to 101.
[SPEAKER_01]: He has shown outstanding stuff.
[SPEAKER_01]: There is not a lick of control within this profile.
[SPEAKER_01]: The stuff is all over the place.
[SPEAKER_01]: He had believe he walked 19 batters and three innings coming off of Tommy John Surgery in 2025.
[SPEAKER_01]: But the marlins have some confidence that this is a guy who has outstanding reliever potential.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like I said, the stuff is great and it's just about honing in the mechanics and getting him in the zone.
[SPEAKER_01]: I will say that, you know, for as funny as the statline looks from 2025, he was coming off a serious injury.
[SPEAKER_01]: He has missed a tremendous amount of time and he barely played in live action in 2025.
[SPEAKER_01]: What does it look like in 2026?
[SPEAKER_01]: It's a big question.
[SPEAKER_01]: But that's somebody who could also explode for them out of the DSL ranks.
[SPEAKER_01]: I believe he'll probably restart the year.
[SPEAKER_01]: in the DSL, but a move to the complex league reasonably shortly after that, if not right away, is definitely in the cards.
[SPEAKER_01]: And again, if they can clean him up the way that we've seen with some of these other Dominican summer league prospects, you're talking about a guy who's got pre-most stuff.
[SPEAKER_01]: So there's a lot of promise for this organization in that part of the world right now.
[SPEAKER_01]: And they've done a lot to make a concerted effort in investing in it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that is kind of one of the things that I think, but you just said, if I'm a Marlon's fan, I would find very interesting and very smart from a standpoint of we've never seen the Marlon's really fully take advantage of this.
[SPEAKER_00]: We know like either on a player or a fan perspective.
[SPEAKER_00]: you are in Miami.
[SPEAKER_00]: We've seen this with the world baseball classic, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: We've seen that it is possible to absolutely pack a stadium in Miami to the gills with people very excited about baseball.
[SPEAKER_00]: But the second part that you hit there is is that it is also very logical that a well-run
[SPEAKER_00]: a destination point for a lot of players because, you know, one place that a lot of players would be happy to live if they were living there with a successful big league team, Miami's going to check that a lot of boxes there.
[SPEAKER_00]: Again, like you said, if you are a Dominican star or, you know, especially that's an easy trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: You are talking about like, you can, you know, again, you have a very large Spanish speaking community that, you know, there are, you are not going to have problems finding great Dominican restaurants in the area, you know, I don't want to say just Dominican, you could take, you know, if you are from Colombia, if you are from Venezuela, there are, but what I'm saying this is.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's 100% true that the Maryland should be one of the teams that is making the biggest push to develop Latin American players because if they succeed, they have not just the opportunity to succeed like other teams, they have an opportunity to be a destination.
[SPEAKER_00]: in a way that it's going to be a little bit of easier cell than if you're say, let's just say the Cleveland Guardians or you know, the same look like a mid an upper Midwest team, the Minnesota twins or something where it's like, it's going to be a little colder there, you know, like we've seen, you know, it's Miami.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's Miami.
[SPEAKER_00]: Miami is a destination place.
[SPEAKER_00]: Do you see, I mean, are you starting to see little hints that again, that this plan could end up coming to fruition down the road?
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, absolutely.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I would go back to this.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that if you're a Marlins fan and you're looking for reasons to feel encouraged right now, you have a leadership group starting with Peter Bendix and working down that is extremely invested in repairing the image of this club from a competitive standpoint, but from a cultural standpoint as well, which encapsulates exactly what we're talking about.
[SPEAKER_01]: They want to be
[SPEAKER_01]: the Destination Club for Latin America as the Dodgers are to Japanese players the Marlins want to be for players from Caribbean island nations They want Latin American players to look at that club and say that's where I want to play and I'll share something and I hope our listeners understand You know out of sensitivity to the people who I'm talking to I can't get fully into the details of this, but I can tell you that
[SPEAKER_01]: There was a major league pitcher who was traded from their roster, who was Latin American, who was sad to go away from an organization that was not trending towards being a playoff team.
[SPEAKER_01]: simply because he loved where the direction was going culturally.
[SPEAKER_01]: He loved being in Miami, where he had family, where he had, you know, a cultural similarities to a massive, as you said, Spanish-speaking community.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think that that's a really great sign for the org.
[SPEAKER_01]: not this to be clear this is not to say that they shouldn't be trading away latin american pictures who are successful this is to say that i think that if you're a marlins fan you should hear this and go that's great that we have major league pictures who are good who want to be there because that has not always been the case for my amy that has been part of the problem in addition to the you know major league spending is an issue for my amy it always has been
[SPEAKER_01]: and they need to rectify that in order to really get over the threshold here and be a competitive club, especially in the NL where you are going to compete annually with the Metz and the Dodgers and some of the Brewers.
[SPEAKER_01]: Bye!
[SPEAKER_01]: The other part of the battle here is developing a culture that players want to be a part of, that players aren't fleeing to go to more competitive markets.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that there's something to be said for A, having the culture, but B, being able to go, you want to come live in sunny South Florida and not pay state income tax, and play for a club where you're surrounded by, you know, culturally similar people, that's huge.
[SPEAKER_01]: And this organization is starting to lean into that.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I think that there's an element of, yes, the player development, the baseball is taking a step forward
[SPEAKER_01]: But I would also say that we're seeing signs of an organization that has real synergy from the top-down and has a clear set of goals in terms of what it wants to be and what it wants its players to think of it as.
[SPEAKER_01]: And we're seeing that payoff.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so, yes, I do believe that part of the success that this team is having is that we're seeing Latin American prospects shoot up in the rankings.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mentioned Luis Kova, Stalin Kaba,
[SPEAKER_01]: kind of beneath us, Leomar Martinez, Elias Artishmay, all of these guys are now a part of an organization that really wants them to be there and kind of be trendsetters for people who are also coming from the Dominican Republic, you know, or Venezuela or Colombia, and I think that that's going to become kind of a cornerstone aspect of what the Marlins are trying to do and how they're trying to build success.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that is an in-depth look, a deep dive, I would say.
[SPEAKER_00]: At the Miami Marlins organization, thank you, Jacob, for joining us.
[SPEAKER_00]: We hope you enjoyed this latest edition of the baseball America Prospect podcast.
[SPEAKER_00]: Deep dives, we are doing one of these for each and every organization.
[SPEAKER_00]: So if we haven't done yours, I think we're coming up on a,
[SPEAKER_00]: third of the way through all 30 organizations our plan is to get all of these done hopefully by the time that we are seeing nature league spring training games starting to play so we're working on it we're working on get these done fast and furious we did take a little break to get some pop 100 content to you though which we hope you enjoyed that as well but we hope you enjoyed this please like and subscribe baseball america podcast we appreciate leave a review if you could somewhere and also do check out
[SPEAKER_00]: So long, everybody.