With multiple prospects called up to Kansas City, Royals’ farm system ranking plummets

This season, the Kansas City Royals have brought several of their top prospects up to the majors. That includes last year’s Minor League Player of the Year in infielder Bobby Witt Jr. and a top 100 prospect in catcher/outfielder MJ Melendez.

Well, the influx of youngsters to the majors has dropped the Royals to the bottom of Baseball America’s latest farm system rankings.

The top three teams in Baseball America’s “Midseason Organization Talent Rankings” posted on Thursday were the Baltimore Orioles, Los Angeles Dodgers and Cleveland Guardians.

Meanwhile, the bottom three teams were the Atlanta Braves, Los Angeles Angels, and Royals.

The defending World Series champion Atlanta Braves garnered a lot of attention recently for moves they’ve made to sign their young core of homegrown players, who are now in the majors, to long-term contracts.

The Royals were ranked fifth in the preseason rankings this year. In recent years they’d made big climbs up the publication’s rankings. They went from a bottom-five ranking in 2017 (26th), 2018 (29th) and 2019 (27th) to 18th in 2020 and 13th in 2021.

Entering this season, Witt (No. 3), Melendez (No. 42) and first baseman/outfielder Nick Pratto (No. 43) were all ranked among the top 100 individual prospects in the minors.

All three are currently in their rookie seasons in majors as are first baseman/designated hitter Vinnie Pasquantino, outfielder Kyle Isbel, outfielder Nate Eaton and infielder Michael Massey.

Pratto, Eaton and Massey still have not played enough games in the majors to lose their prospect status or “graduate” off of those rankings. Baseball America ranked Pratto the No. 65 prospect in the minors in its most-recently updated rankings.

In the brief explanation provided for the Royals’ ranking, Baseball America pointed to the group of top young players coming off of the prospect lists as well as the need for pitching prospects Asa Lacy and Frankie Mozzicato (recent Royals top draft picks) as well as Jonathan Bowlan as needing to get “on track” in order to bolster the Royals system.