Prep work for the short-season teams

Extended Spring Training Roster

Alot of those guys will be on Brooklyn/Kingsport once the shortseason teams get cranking. My general rule is, anyone who is 18, 19 or 20 is someone to really keep an eye on. So therefore, the guys I'll be following are:
Pitchers:
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Gavin Dlouhy
Roger Figueroa
John Holdzkom
Jose Quintana
Jose Rojas
Scott Schafer
Andrus Sifontes

Infielders:
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Jose Jimenez
Valentin Ramos

Outfielders:
Rafael Fernandez

Now, I know I haven't really done this before, but I'm going to explain a bit about my personal philosophy involving the draft (which is upcoming), and prospects in general. I believe in taking high ceiling high school talent over college talent, which generally leads to more of a boom/bust ratio. I do realize you cannot (and really, should not) build, or try to build, a team this way. It's just my personal inclination. I also believe in pushing your talent, much as Omar is doing (with Veloz, Lagares, Pena, Stegall, Stinson, etc...in Savannah, Nando in Binghamton, Guerra, Niese, Evans in St. Lucie, etc...).

As far as prospects, before I took over the minor league reports (first on mets.com, then here), I never even took a cursory glance at any level below St. Lucie. I figured what's the point? They're so far away from the majors below St. Lucie, the flame out factor is too high to take those numbers seriously. And to a large degree, that's my philosophy now. However, having done the MLRs for a couple of years now, the levels below St. Lucie do intrigue me now. I still won't pay close attention to the majority of players in those levels, but I have come to realize that age:level is a very good indicator.

And I have to throw David props here. He's really opened my eyes to the value of following our prospects underneath St. Lucie.

So there you have it. Some names to keep an eye on, and then my personal philosophy. Something to kill a little time.