Francisco Alvarez
Ron Chenoy | USA TODAY Sports

Four Mets make FanGraphs’ top 100 list.

While we wait for Major League Baseball and the Players Association to come to an agreement on a new Collective Bargaining Agreement so we can start talking about the 2022 season, there’s still plenty to discuss.

Specifically, the next generation of players.

Prospects are on the field preparing for their minor league seasons (thanks to not being part of the MLBPA and subject to the CBA).

And the folks to spend their time and energy evaluating prospects have been offering their organizational and overall prospect rankings for us to discuss.

We’ve already looked at the differences in how top prospect rankings viewed the Mets’ top prospects at Baseball Prospectus, Baseball America a Keith Law’s list at The Athletic.

On Wednesday, Fangraphs released their preseason Top 100 Prospect rankings for 2022. They actually include 114 names on their list, and four Mets prospects made their list.

It’s the usual suspects, but where did they land in this list?

Here’s where the Mets’ top prospects were located in FanGraphs’ Top 100 list.

  • 7. Francisco Álvarez, C
  • 44. Ronny Mauricio, SS
  • 63. Brett Baty, 3B
  • 64. Mark Vientos, 3B
Francisco Alvarez Mets
Courtesy IG: @franciscoalvarez.13

Eyes on Álvarez

Here’s what they had to say about Álvarez:

“Álvarez has been one of the more hyped prospects in the Mets system since signing out of Venezuela in 2018 for nearly $3 million, and he’s largely lived up to that hype. Considered too advanced for the team’s Dominican complex, he made his stateside pro debut in 2019 and followed that up by posting a .941 OPS across two A-ball levels in ’21 while still a teenager. Álvarez stands out for his offensive upside at a position that doesn’t offers much of it at the big league level. His swing decisions are mature beyond his years and his plus-plus raw power is already frequently seen in games. Álvarez begins in an open set up and then straightens out on swing initiation without taking a big step or needing a timing mechanism. His swing is designed for power; it has a bit of a loop and a steep plane to it, but his hand-eye coordination allows him to make enough contact to hit for a decent average.

Defensively, Álvarez is a bit of a mixed bag. He has plenty of arm strength, but it takes some time for him to get out of his crouch and his accuracy is below average, as he tends to deliver more two- than four-seamers towards the bag. He’s barrel-chested and quite bulky, and will need to maintain his conditioning to be able to block and receive adequately. Álvarez likes playing the position and wants to control the game on the field, so while the profile is that of an offense-first catcher, he’s unlikely to be a true liability back there and has more than enough stick to make up for his defensive deficiencies. Still just 20 years old, Álvarez will hit the upper minors in 2022 and could be ready for a full-time big league job by the following season.”

Tab has written about MLB, the NHL and the NFL for more than a decade for publications including The Fourth Period, Bleacher Report and La Vida Baseball. He is the author of two books about the Chicago Blackhawks and has been credentialed for the MLB All-Star Game and postseason and multiple Stanley Cup Finals. He is the co-host of the Line Drive Radio podcast.