There are a couple more prospect rankings of sorts to share with you. The interesting thing about both of these rankings is that neither picked Jarrod Saltalamacchia as the Braves top prospect.
D.A. Humber's Baseball Central has two writers who both chose one of the rising stars in the Braves organization instead of Salty. Here is some of what Humber had to say about the top prospects in the Braves organization:
D.A. Humber: Jarrod Saltalamacchia remains one of the most highly debated prospects in major league baseball...Is he as good as his biggest proponents say he is? Probably not. Is he as bad as his biggest detractors say he is? Judging by his numbers last year. Possibly. Personally, I don't like him. But take that with a grain of salt, because I don't really like most catching prospects. Unfortunately for the Braves, their only other big time prospect is Elvis Andrus, who also doesn't excite me that much. Andrus is young, and projects as a speedy middle infielder with little pop in the bat. Yeehaw. He hit 3 home runs in 111 games last year. Yuck. Looking further in their system, I tried to find perhaps a diamond in the rough, and noticed a buzz on a guy called Beau Jones. He had an ERA near six in Low A Ball. Jesus! I can't possibly do the same to Atlanta that I did to Washington, that would be unfair. I can not possibly pick Uncle Salty. Fortunately, the Braves actually do have a player that is better than Salty. Eric Campbell is still a considerable development project but he has power, and can be taught to play the corner infield well, as he has plus athletic skills. My Choice: Eric Campbell
The other blogger over there chose Campbell as well. By the way, what Humber did to Washington was to pick nobody as their top prospect - that's how bleak he thinks their system is, and apparently he is close to thinking that about the Braves organization. I, of course, do not share his views about our system being bleak. In my mind Beau Jones is not even one the top five pitchers in the organization right now, and even with off-years, Salty and Elvis are still considered top-100 prospects. He does share some of my opinion about Andrus not being too exciting...yet.
Over at Project Prospect they chose the top three players from each system, and selected Elvis Andrus as their pick to be number one, with Salty coming in second and Campbell coming in third. Money quote regarding Andrus:
This season Andrus spent the year with Low-A Rome and struggled a bit, putting up .265/.324/.362 vitals and stealing just 23 bases out of 38 attempts (60.5%). But considering his age relative to his competition, "The King" continued to impress the Braves front office with his maturity - especially defensively. Andrus may repeat Low-A to start the season, but if he progresses well and develops the kind of power that the club sees in him, the 6-foot-0, 185-pound righty could be Atlanta's next home-grown hero by 2009.
These guys also picked Saltalamacchia as the number two catching prospect in baseball. They still have more positional ranking to come, so we'll check back in with them from time to time. We'll have to wait until January 2nd for the Baseball America top prospects for the Braves.
