The Purple Row community ranking of the prospects in the Rockies' minor league system:
Rank | Player | TOT |
1 | Christian Friedrich | 412 |
2 | Jhoulys Chacin | 400 |
3 | Tyler Matzek | 399 |
4 | Esmil Rogers | 360 |
5 | Wilin Rosario | 349 |
6 | Hector Gomez | 323 |
7 | Rex Brothers | 302 |
8 | Tim Wheeler | 298 |
9 | Samuel Deduno | 290 |
10 | Eric Young Jr. | 270 |
11 | Mike McKenry | 249 |
12 | Charlie Blackmon | 241 |
13 | Nolan Arenado | 240 |
14 | Chris Balcom-Miller | 226 |
15 | Juan Nicasio | 215 |
16 | Chris Nelson | 187 |
17 | Casey Weathers | 143 |
18 | Chaz Roe | 140 |
19 | Kiel Roling | 138 |
20 | Delta Cleary | 124 |
21 | Matt Reynolds | 116 |
22 | Jordan Pacheco | 114 |
23 | Cole Garner | 108 |
24 | Eliezer Mesa | 85 |
25 | Ethan Hollingsworth | 63 |
26 | Edgmer Escalona | 56 |
27 | Scott Beerer | 45 |
28 | Darin Holcomb | 43 |
29 | Ben Paulsen | 43 |
30 | Andrew Johnston | 36 |
Fourteen ballots were cast in this edition of the PuRPs poll, with 30 points being granted for a first place vote, 29 for second, etc. The top three, as they were in last fall's edition, were almost always some combination of Friedrich, Chacin, and Matzek (with two outliers ranking Matzek lower that jumped Chacin a point ahead of Matzek for second). Until a player was named on five ballots, his vote totals were modified on a sliding scale to avoid an individual ballot having too much say over the community forecast -- but none of the above players had that problem.
Friedrich had seven first place votes, Matzek had five, and Chacin had the other two. The top ten on this list as well as Chris Balcom-Miller at 14 were named on every ballot, with all the rest missing from at least one ballot. There were 61 players named in all (plus Shane Lindsay), with 44 of them appearing on multiple ballots.
Just missing the PuRPs list were Jared Clark, Matt Miller, Parker Frazier, Craig Baker, and James Cesario.
For a comparison, here's last fall's PuRPs list. EY2 (slipped from 5 to 10) and Weathers (down from 10 to 17) fell in the rankings while players like Tim Wheeler (up from 12 to 8) and Samuel Deduno (14 to 9) rose. Five players fell out of the PuRPs list due to trade (Brandon Hynick), waivers (Lindsay), injury (Parker Frazier), or ineffectiveness (Scott Robinson, Mike Zuanich). Taking their place are Pacheco (tearing the cover off the ball in Modesto), Mesa (off to a hot start in Asheville), Hollingsworth (having a breakout year in Modesto), and Beerer (Disney effect).
UPDATED: Removed Shane Lindsay from the list (claimed off of waivers), added Andrew Johnston.