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Five Marlins prospects land on one outlet’s top 100 list. Plus international signing chatter

Courtesy of MiLB

Baseball America has released the latest edition of its top 100 prospects list, and the Miami Marlins once again are well represented.

Five Marlins prospects — four pitchers and one infielder — made the cut with all of them checking between No. 48 and No. 74 on the list.

The five, with Baseball America’s scouting report on each:

Right-handed pitcher Eury Perez (No. 48): “The 6-foot-8 Perez entered the year as the youngest player in the full-season minor leagues but still used a high-octane fastball and outstanding athleticism to slice through Low-A and reach High-A as an 18-year-old. There are plenty of variables in his profile, but Perez’s upside is tremendous.”

Perez had a combined 1.96 ERA through 20 starts last season in the lower minors, striking out 108 and walking just 26 through 78 innings.

Eury Perez’s ‘big splash’ in minors another example of Miami Marlins’ pitching depth

Shortstop Kahlil Watson (No. 60): “Watson is blessed with five above-average or better tools and has the ability to impact the game in a variety of ways. His elite twitch, bat speed and defensive range make him one of the most exciting young players in the Marlins system.”

Watson only played in nine games at the Florida Complex League while dealing with an injury shortly after making his professional debut, but still hit .394 with a 1.130 on-base-plus-slugging over 42 plate appearances.

What Marlins first-round pick Kahlil Watson took away from his first year of pro ball

Right-handed pitcher Sixto Sanchez (No. 64): “After taking the baseball world by storm during his 2020 major-league debut, Sanchez missed all of 2021 due to a shoulder injury that required surgery in July. When healthy, he possesses a high-octane three-pitch mix led by a triple-digit fastball and uncommon control for a power pitcher.”

Right-handed pitcher Edward Cabrera (No. 69): “The tall right-hander debuted in the majors in 2021 and made seven starts for the Marlins over the final six weeks of the season. He has plenty of raw stuff with a plus-plus, upper-90s fastball and a trio of average or better secondaries, but he’s still learning how best to sequence them together.”

Right-handed pitcher Max Meyer: “The third overall pick in the 2020 draft, Meyer jumped straight to Double-A in 2021, showcasing a plus fastball/slider combination. The quality of his stuff wasn’t always consistent, but at his best, Meyer shows the stuff and pitchability to pitch in the middle of a rotation.”

Meyer posted a 2.27 ERA in 111 innings over 22 starts, striking out 130 batters against 42 walks and a .221 batting average against.

Left-handed pitcher Jake Eder, outfielder Peyton Burdick, shortstop Jose Salas, second baseman Ian Lewis and outfielder JJ Bleday round out Baseball America’s top-10 Marlins prospects.

International signing chatter

New Marlins senior director of international operations Adrian Lorenzo on shortstop Yoffry Solano, the No. 44 overall prospect in this international signing class and the highest-ranked prospect the Marlins took this cycle: “Solano is a guy that we’ve had our eye on for quite a bit of time, an up-the-middle profile player, really, really strong pound-for-pound, really twitchy with switch-hit ability. [He] really performed for us in a lot of our evaluations, especially offensively. [He] profiles up the middle. Checks a lot of the boxes that we like in terms of up-the-middle athletes with athletic twitchy actions and the chance to hit.”

With an international signing class that will eventually exceed 40 players, Lorenzo was initially hesitant to single out other players from the class to watch but did point out outfielder Antony Peguero, outfielder Danny Gonzalez, shortstop Lisandro Bonifacio and right-handed pitcher Jhon Cabral from the Dominican Republic, Venezuelan right-handed pitcher Santiago Suarez, outfielder Toby Simmons and shortstop Cherif Neymour out of the Bahamas as players to watch.

“I’m really excited about quite a few of them, if not all of them,” Lorenzo said, “but I guess those would be the names that you might hear about here in short order.”

Lorenzo on the possibility of the international signing period transitioning to a draft format: “It’s the elephant in every room when we talk about international scouting. it’s there and everything we do here is with the draft in mind, so all the processes, all the staff members that we’re adding, all the ways in which we’re trying to grow our organization is with with the intention of — or at least with the acceptance that — the draft could come. Not to get into specifics of when that might be, but I would say that we are attacking the future very much with any sort of draft system in mind. This has been a discussion since before I was even with the Marlins, and so it was discussed quite a bit as to how the international landscape could change with the implementation of a draft and it will change fundamentally. I want to be clear about that, but at the same time, I think the scouting will still be relatively similar. Just the acquisition philosophies and how we prioritize certain players and value them from a dollar standpoint might alter a little bit, but what I’d say to that is that our processes moving forward here, and over the course of the last six to eight months or so have been very much with the draft in mind.”