#3 prospect runoff

[Tim]

Our first runoff of the year comes in at the #3 prospect. Choose one of Almora and Happ to be your #3 prospect. We'll assume the loser of this poll gets #4 and I'll get the next poll up and running, as well.

[toonsterwu]

I really could go either way on this. My instinct is that Happ's bat is probably going to play big next year (although not necessarily erasing any worries about how he'll do in the bigs, as I suspect the K rate will still be high). Almora, though, doesn't need the bat to play off the charts to be of value, and I think Almora gets the slight edge here for me.

[CubsWin]

Almora's floor is more clearly defined. He hasn't performed at his peak in the last 2 seasons but we've at least had a chance to see how he handled AA. At this point, Happ is just too unknown for me. If he hadn't struck out as much as he did in Low-A last season, this would've been a tougher choice. Still close though.

[craig]

Almora. Top-tier defense and strong contact make him a good prospect, limited by the power.

 

Happ has a big power advantage, but I'm not sure his scouting has ever projected him as a 25+ mega-power guy. With very high K's and variably below-average defense anywhere but left, he's really going to need to hit a lot of HR's to make it as a big-value guy. Not sure he's ever going to hit THAT many HR's.

 

In a sense, both of these guys have variably limited ceilings, Almora's in terms of power, Happ's due to defense and scary K's.