In an age where minor league game streams are widely available at every level, the complex leagues feel like the final frontier.
Year after year, unheralded breakouts with true All-Star upside emerge from the complex leagues, both domestic (Arizona and Florida) and abroad (Dominican Republic). Digging deep into the advanced Statcast data gives us the ability to more accurately pinpoint potential future stars based on their combination of skills.
Today, we’ll examine which prospects stand out when looking at the ‘big three’ areas of metric-based evaluation: impact (90th percentile exit velocity, xwOBAcon), contact (in-zone whiff rate, whiff rate) and swing decisions (chase rate). Doing so provides a baseline understanding of a player’s bat-to-ball skills, on-base ability and power.
Alessander De La Cruz, OF, Rockies
De La Cruz was born in Germany but raised in the Dominican Republic and signed there for $650,000 in January 2023. He is a DSL repeater, which has become more commonplace in recent seasons. After a solid showing as a 17-year-old, De La Cruz made an All-Star turn in 2024, hitting .318/.406/.542 with 24 extra base hits while going a perfect 13-for-13 in stolen base attempts. He hits the ball hard with a 106.8 mph 90th percentile EV and a max EV of 109.5 mph. It’s not empty power, either, as De La Cruz shows strong contact metrics with a 17.4% in-zone whiff and a 27.5% whiff rate overall. A 24.8% chase rate suggests there’s on-base ability, as well. De La Cruz will be one of the top names from the Dominican Summer League to come stateside in 2025.
Brailer Guerrero, OF, Rays
The Rays signed Guerrero out of Dominican Republic for $3.7 million, awarding him one of the top five bonuses in the 2023 international class. Limited to just seven games in his professional debut by a shoulder injury that required surgery that year, his 2024 season was also cut short due to lingering impact of the previous season’s shoulder injury. When active, Guerrero showed strong metrics, led by his .368 xwOBAcon. His power on impact is outlier, with a 105.4 mph 90th percentile EV and a max EV of 111.7 mph. Guerrero pairs his plus impact with a low in-zone whiff rate of 15.4% and a chase rate of 18.5%, meaning there’s bat-to-ball skills and on-base ability that will allow him to get to his impact. The fuzziest element of Guerrero’s future projection is his questionable medical history.
Ramon Ramirez, C, Royals
After an All-Star…