As a companion to Monday’s update of the top 50 prospects in the minors, I put together some notes on five prospects who’ve clearly fallen down the board this year, two of whom were top-50 prospects in February but didn’t make the cut this time around.
Termarr Johnson, 2B, Pittsburgh Pirates
Preseason rank: 24
Johnson was the No. 4 pick in 2022 out of an Atlanta-area high school because of his hit tool more than everything else about him put together, and he just hasn’t hit since turning pro. He returned to High-A Greensboro, a good hitter’s park, and he’s hitting just .203/.384/.342 with really nothing in the stat line to give you hope beyond the high walk rate and modest strikeout rate (22 percent). He’s getting beaten in the zone way too much, including on fastballs, for someone whose best skill as an amateur was supposed to be his ability to square up the ball.
Advertisement
Johnson is also playing well below-average defense at second and short, with scouts suggesting he might have to go to left field. He turns 20 next week, so he’s young for High A and has a ton of time to turn this around, but this is nowhere close to what I expected from him.
Dylan Lesko, RHP, San Diego Padres
Preseason rank: 35
Lesko’s 2024 season has been mostly disastrous, other than that he’s been healthy enough to take every turn in the rotation and reach 90 pitches twice so far. He’s walked 32 batters in 34 innings, 20 percent of the total batters he’s faced, and he’s barely using either breaking ball at this point because he’s having so much trouble throwing strikes.
In his last outing, on June 1, he threw more changeups than fastballs, only threw five breaking balls the whole game, and only about a third of his pitches ended up in the zone. His delivery looks fine — actually, it looks great, and it’s baffling that he’s missing spots by as much as he is when he seems to repeat his arm swing so consistently.
He does still have that out-pitch changeup, and it has helped him miss more bats with the fastball as well, but he hasn’t had a single strong outing where he punched out a bunch of guys without many walks.
Robby Snelling, LHP, San Diego Padres
Preseason rank: 70
I’m not trying to pick on the Padres but the facts are what they are — Lesko is not getting outs and Snelling’s stuff has backed way up. Snelling’s fastball is down to 90-92 mph now with much less carry on the pitch than he had last year, and his slider and changeup have gone from 55s (above average) to 50s (average).
All three pitches have whiff rates of 19-21 percent in High A, so there’s really no out-pitch here, and as a former high school football star, he doesn’t have a lot of physical projection left. Velocity isn’t everything, but it helps, and it matters a lot more when your stuff doesn’t have outstanding movement.
Advertisement
The reason to still hope is that Snelling is indeed a former football star who’s athletic and very competitive, so if you were ever to bet on a pitcher making adjustments, he’d be the guy.
Adael Amador, 2B, Colorado Rockies
Preseason rank: Just missed/Rockies No. 4
The Rockies’ top hitting prospects are all in Double-A Hartford, and only Zac Veen, who’s repeating the level, has gotten off to a good start. Of that group, Amador might have seen his stock fall the most as he’s hitting .178/.330/.270, with a ground-ball rate over 50 percent and a lot of softly pulled balls to the right side.
He’s playing second base now, as expected, and the lack of any offensive upside here is making it hard to see him becoming a regular. There’s at least some bat-to-ball ability to work with if he can at least get stronger to create some more extra-base power.
Parker Meadows, OF, Detroit Tigers
Preseason rank: 97
The Tigers pulled the plug on Meadows really quickly this spring, demoting him from the big leagues after 85 atrocious plate appearances where he struck out 37.6 percent of the time and struggled in every imaginable way, failing to hit fastballs and off-speed stuff alike. He’s returned to Triple A and resumed hitting well as he did there last year and in a brief stint in the majors in 2023, still playing elite defense in center everywhere he goes.
Was he just not ready for the big leagues, or was it a small sample size fluke? He’s hitting well enough in Triple A, including hitting fastballs, that I still think he can be someone’s regular in center, but he clearly was not ready to do so right out of the gate as I thought he was.
(Lead image of Robby Snelling (left) and Termarr Johnson (right): Norm Hall / Getty Images and Charlie Neibergall / Associated Press)