2012 State of the Dodgers Minor League System - Left Field

As we've finished reviewing all the infield positions within the Dodgers minor league system, we will now move to the outfield. As a reminder, I am providing the overall preseason rank that I gave to each player (Pre Overall) and of course their current ranking within the position. You'll notice that some players have an N/A next to their preseason rank. That is because the player is new to the Dodgers or new to the position since my preseason ranking. Like my pre-season rankings, I will only include guys who are under 28 years of age and are considered prospects (less than 130 AB's).

I am including all players that are in the Dodgers minor league system except for the recent international signees who have not yet played in a professional game because there simply isn't any information about them out there. I will also be providing how each player was acquired, their age, height, weight, and current level.

As I mentioned before, I have ranked each player at is the position that I believe is best long term position for the player. It may not be the players current primary position, but it is where I believe each player will ultimately end up should they make the major leagues. Here is the list:

Follow the jump for analysis

Here is the list from last year. Left field was probably the hardest position for me to rank during this series because the group includes so many new draftees, as well as a few injured players. The biggest question mark is the top player on this list as Alfredo Silverio is obviously out for the entire 2012 season. I haven't gotten any new reports on him recently and there's no telling what kind of player he'll be when he gets back, but for now I'm going to keep him as the top rated left fielder. Even before his injury I was never quite as high on Silverio as others, but I still think he's better than the rest of this group.

Brian Cavazos-Galvez was really the only other person I considered for #1, but he is such an up and down player that I just couldn't do it. BCG is definitely tearing it up in his home town of Albuquerque and he's opened up a lot of eyes with this play this year, but it was just a few months ago that he was hitting .167 in the tougher hitting environment of the Southern League. He also continues to avoid walks, and even with his breakout year I still don't think his ceiling is very high.

Speaking of opening up some eyes, Bobby Coyle has done just that despite getting a late start to his 2012 season. Coyle struggled a bit with the Loons last year, but he's killing it with the Quakes and is striking out at a very low rate. It'd be nice to see what he'd be able to do in AA. Theo Alexander is a tough player to rank because he is extremely young and is putting up ugly stats in Arizona, but his scouting reports seem to suggest he has some potential so I gave him a decent ranking. Noel Cuevas has been injured quite a bit this year and hasn't done much when healthy, so he's dropped a bit despite his youth and the fact that he still has big time power potential. It's similar story for Nick Akins, although he's now 24 years old and seems to be fading fast.

2012 16th round pick Josh Henderson was the last player of the draft class to sign, and his professional career has barely begun. He definitely has some questionable tools including his power and throwing arm, but he makes good contact and could turn into something. Finally fellow 2012 draftees Pat Stover and Corey Embree were late round picks, but I've heard good things about both of them and they are doing well so far in the Rookie Leagues so they are worth keeping an eye on.

Overall this group of left fielders has a lot of intriguing names, but I'm just not seeing any potential big league regulars at this point. If Silverio heals probably he could maybe prove me wrong, but everyone else seems to have the ceiling of a bench player. That being said it's extremely difficult to project potential for some of the young guys, so they are the real wild cards.