Prospect Risers: Final Spring Training Update

I appreciate the questions I get when I update my rankings about why players moved. Why is that? Well, it means those people are digging in and want more information on a player specifically. I have always said that a players report is far more important than the individual ranking themselves.

I held off until the end of March to do my final pre-season update because, after four months of off-season research, I felt like there was not much more info to update a rankings list until we got Minor League Spring Training going.

Check out the new rankings here:

Biggest Risers in the Top 100 Prospects

George Lombard, SS, New York Yankees

Ranking Movement: 122-32

There had been some talk this offseason that Lombard was poised to break out, and it was on full display during Spring Breakout. Lombard looked physically stronger, and his swing was more balanced. The bat speed also looked much faster than when I saw him last summer.

Lombard sits deep in the box at the plate and has a narrow stance before utilizing a small leg kick and getting pretty wide, creating strong hand-to-hip separation. The swing is smooth and fluid, with little wasted movement. Lombard does not expand the zone often, having one of the better chase rates in Single-A in 2024.

Lombard slashed .231/.338/.334 for the season with five home runs and 32 extra-base hits. Lombard also stole 39 bases on 47 attempts. The underlying metrics steadily improved all season. Lombard posted a 102.7 mph 90th percentile exit velocity and had an average exit velocity of 88.3 mph. The contact rates were not ideal, but they were fine, as he had a 73 percent contact rate and just a 76 percent in-zone contact rate. Lombard does show good plate discipline, having a 21 percent chase rate and a 12 percent walk rate in 2024.

The strides he made in a short time are worthy of vaulting him up rankings. He looks the part.

Connor Prielipp, LHP, Minnesota Twins

Ranking Movement: 222-84

Prielipp made our February pitching prospects we thought could breakout list. Everything that has taken place in Ft. Myers this spring has done nothing but confirm this to be a possibility. He has looked the part this spring, pumping his fastball 96-99 mph and showing a devastating changeup. The upper-80s changeup has nice depth and 15 inches of arm-side fade regularly.

His slider has missed plenty of bats, getting up to 90 mph with a strong gyro shape. It sat between 86 and 88 mph in most outings. Health will be the biggest factor here as injuries have derailed much of his career to this point.

After getting off to an impressive start to his freshman year at Alabama, COVID ended it after four starts and 21 shutout innings. Prielipp made just three starts in 2021 before needing Tommy John surgery. Despite throwing just 28 collegiate innings, the Twins drafted Prielipp in the second round in 2022. Prielipp pitched just 6.2 innings in 2023 before needing UCL surgery again, this time being an internal brace, not full Tommy John.

Chandler Simpson, OF, Tampa Bay Rays

Ranking Movement: 239-92

Simpson really only needed to prove one thing this spring: his defense. It was my biggest question that held him back from being a top 100 prospect. Simpson hit a couple of hard line drives in Spring Breakout and laid down a beautiful bunt. He showcased elite speed, having a 3.58 second home-to-first time.

The contact skills are legit. Simpson made contact on 91 percent of swings overall and 95 percent in the zone in 2024. If looking at contact rates, those are among the best in the minors. In doing so, Simpson posted a .355/.410/.397 slash with just 16 extra-base hits but 104 stolen bases.

The defense looks good and his reads and jumps look substantially better than they did when I saw him last year.

Nolan McLean, RHP, New York Mets

Ranking Movement: 176-98

McLean is just a prospect I was too low on despite putting him in the breakout article in February. After dominating High-A hitters in seven starts in 2024, McLean jumped to Double-A, where the surface numbers of a 4.19 ERA and a 1.32 WHIP look just okay. The good news is, he pitched much better than those numbers suggest. 13 of his 25 starts were one earned run allowed or less, and in four more, he allowed just two earned runs in.

McLean’s fastball sits in the mid-90s with a heavy armside run. He throws from a 5’4” release height, which helps the pitch play at the top of the zone and has a rising effect despite the IVB not being overwhelming. With ten or more inches of horizontal movement regularly, Mclean has shown bat-missing ability with the offering.

The slider has around ten mph of velocity separation from the fastball, sitting in the mid-80s with heavy sweeping action. It has late horizontal movement, which deceives hitters, largely due to its extremely high spin rates, which have been up to 3200 rpm. Watching the pitch, it is easily plus or better, and the metrics back it up.

The biggest concern right now is command and strike-throwing, but those numbers improved all year, and McLean ended the season with a strike rate near 64 percent, which is above average. A breakout seems imminent in 2025, especially with the present stuff and future projections that McLean has.

Grant Taylor, RHP, Chicago White Sox

Ranking Movement: 130-82

Look, everyone loves Grant Taylor at this point. He has become more popular than he probably needs to at this point. Dynasty Dugout has been promoting him since the draft.

Throwing a fastball that reached 101 mph four-seam fastball with 20 inches of IVB will certainly catch the eyes of many, but Taylor’s fastball has been a dominant pitch for a long time.

He gets north of 7 feet of extension, allowing the pitch to play up even more from a flat VAA making, getting tons of swing and miss. The 18-19 inches of IVB is extremely impressive, considering his 5’9” release height. The fastball is easily plus, if not better.

The slider has a hard break and sits in the upper 80s. It generates whiffs at a very high clip, sitting north of 50 percent on that pitch in 2024. It has heavy sweeping action, and Taylor is comfortable throwing it to both lefties and righties.

Taylor added a cutter in the low 90s with a short, hard break, giving him another serviceable pitch in the arsenal. The curveball shows a ton of vertical drop in the low-80s, generating some ugly swings.

Alan Roden, OF, Toronto Blue Jays

Ranking Movement: 143-88

Roden did all the right things this spring, enough to make the Blue Jays roster out of camp. While Roden does not look like a strong athlete, he runs extremely well and gets quick jumps out of the box and in the outfield. He finished the 2024 season hotter than any hitter in baseball. From July 13 forward, Roden posted an impressive .366/.447/.591 slash with just a 13.5 percent strikeout rate while walking nearly 12 percent of the time.

Roden has always been known for his strong hit tool, posting a contact rate near 84 percent overall this year. His zone contact rate of 92 percent stands out, and he picks his spots well, chasing just 26 percent of pitches out of the zone.

Roden pairs those skills with a 90th percentile exit velocity that was just shy of the MLB average at 103 mph. While he consistently gets to the pull side, over 50 percent of those batted balls were on the ground. The overall launch angle on pulled balls was seven degrees.

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