Tigers Minor League Baseball Blog

Kevin Goldstein recently put out his list of who he things the Tigers top eleven prospects are.  It’s an interesting list because like last year, you have two top players then a steep drop off.  Cameron Maybin checks in at number one for the second straight season and that’s not a surprise.  Yeah Maybin fell flat last year once he made it to the bigs but his minor league advancement was very solid.  He’s still considered a future star and the Tigers felt good enough about him to trade away Gorkys Hernandez, another top outfield prospect.

The Tigers 2007 first round draft pick, Rick Porcello, checks in at number two and like Maybin, he was given a five star tag.  Porcello signed too late to play in the Tiger’s system but he should start out with the White Caps.  I doubt if he’ll stay there long and I expect to see some pretty high strikeout numbers while he’s there.

After that, things thin out.  Casey Crosby, the Tigers fifth round pick in 2007, is the the third best prospect.  Like Porcello, Crosby fell further down because of signability issues and he was a big reason many though the Tigers had one of the best drafts this year. 

Cale Iorg and Brandon Hamilton (another first round, 2007 draft pick) round out the top five. Jeff Larish is sixth after a solid season at Double A last year and you also have a pair of pitchers in Yorman Bazardo and Eulogio De La Cruz who made the list despite having stints in the big leagues last year.

The Tigers announced that Larry Parrish will return as the Mud Hens manager in 2008 after missing the 2007 season after he had ankle surgery.  Mike Rojas took over the team in 2007 and for his efforts in guiding the Mud Hens to the playoffs in 2007, he was made the Tigers Minor League field coordinator.  It was also announced that A.J. Sager will be the Hens new pitching coach while Ray Burris will take over the vacancy left by Sager as the Seawolves pitching coach.  Anyway, it’s a nice column by Jason Beck going through who will be coaching where through the Tigers’ farm system.