ESPN ranks 10 Dodgers prospects in top 200 in MLB

Prospect season continues. ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel unveiled his top 20 prospects for every team on Wednesday, and Keith Law at The Athletic will unveil his Dodgers list later in the week.

McDaniel’s top-100 list last week included five Dodgers, so the team’s top five was already known. But his team-specific lists went into greater detail, including expanding his MLB-wide ranking to 200.

The Dodgers ranked from six to 10 by McDaniel are all in his top 200:

6) Michael Busch (126th overall)

7) Nick Frasso (139th)

8) Andy Pages (143th)

9) Nick Nastrini (188th)

10) Emmet Sheehan (191st)

Busch, as was noted in last week’s top-100 list, has a rating of 50 future value, while seven through 10 are listed with a future value of 45+.

Links

• Speaking of prospects, catcher Dalton Rushing — the Dodgers’ first draft pick in 2022 — was one of 10 players listed by MLB Pipeline as just missing their top-100 list. Jim Callis compared Rushing to his former Louisville catching teammate Henry Davis, who was drafted first overall by the Pirates in 2021. “I think the industry slept on him a little bit,” Callis said. “Area scouts who covered both guys believe he’s a better receiver than Davis.”
• Dodgers vice president of player performance Brandon McDaniel, who is entering his 11th year with the franchise, was a guest on The People Behind The Tech podcast, discussing in essence, “How can we put our athletes in positions to be successful?”
• Old friend DJ Peters, the former Dodgers draft pick who played in 18 games for them before getting traded to Texas in 2021, signed a minor league deal with the Tigers. Last year, Peters hit .228/.299/.402 with 13 home runs in 85 games for Lotte in the Korean Baseball Organization before joining the Nationals to play in Triple-A in September.
• Baseball Prospectus overhauled their defensive statistics on the site, on Wednesday introducing Range Defense Added. Jonathan Judge details the intricacies of the new metric.