6 Detroit Tigers prospects who could land on top 100 lists

The Detroit Tigers are growing a new crop of prospects.

This off-season’s big free-agent deals and trades officially closed the book on the Detroit Tigers rebuild. But that doesn’t mean they aren’t still focusing on the farm system.

Spencer Torkelson will soon graduate off prospect lists, and Riley Greene will likely follow suit once he returns from his foot surgery. But even with those graduations, there’s a decent chance the Detroit Tigers begin 2023 with more top-100 prospects than they started 2022.

For reference, here’s how Detroit’s prospects ranked heading into this season according to Baseball America, MLB Pipeline, FanGraphs, ESPN, Baseball Prospectus, and The Athletic:

So the Detroit Tigers came into the year with approximately 3.5 top-100 prospects. We won’t assume Jackson Jobe and Dillon Dingler remain on lists for next season, but since they’ve already been on a top-100, we’re going to leave them out of this list today.

Instead, we offer six other Detroit Tigers prospects who might sneak on a list in 2023. We did a similar piece last year, with decidedly mixed results. Two prospects make their return this year, but we’ve added four new names.

Here’s the list, presented in alphabetical order:

Detroit Tigers Potential Top-100 Prospect – Wilmer Flores

Of the six players on this list, Wilmer Flores actually might be the least likely to crack a top-100 list. It’s not because he lacks the talent, and even getting consideration here is amazing, considering Flores was an undrafted free agent. Barely 21, Flores owns plus spin rates on a mid-90s fastball and a pair of exciting breaking balls, and he was electric in his season debut with West Michigan last week, striking out seven in three perfect innings.

So what makes Flores unlikely to reach a top-100 list? It’s because he probably ends up as a reliever, and relievers rarely make top prospect lists. Flores almost never throws his changeup, and both his delivery and his physique suggest he could be a player who struggles to hold his command and velocity deep into games. That said, he has already made some pretty huge strides in pro ball, and we don’t want to rule out the possibility of him continuing to improve this year.

Detroit Tigers Potential Top-100 Prospect – Ryan Kreidler

Ryan Kreidler enjoyed one of the biggest breakouts in the Detroit Tigers system last year, and he seemed like a player with an outside chance of cracking a top-100 list this year. He was one of just four primary shortstops to post a 140 wRC+ or better in Triple-A last year (min. 150 plate appearances), joining current or former top-100 prospects José Barrero, Kevin Smith, and Bobby Witt Jr. But Kreidler’s less-impressive time in Double-A (105 wRC+) and injury-shortened stint in the Arizona Fall League seem to have left scouts skeptical of his bat, with concerns about his ability to identify and hit breaking balls.

Perhaps repeating his performance with the Mud Hens over a longer stretch this year will allay some of those worries. Through nine games in Toledo this season Kreidler hasn’t been quite as impressive, but his .268 batting average, 14% walk rate, and .195 Isolated Power still seem pretty strong for a legitimate left-side defender. It may be that Kreidler eventually gets called up to Detroit (or traded) and exhausts his rookie eligibility before he can even make a top-100 list.

Detroit Tigers Potential Top-100 Prospect – Ty Madden

Ty Madden had a dominant career at the University of Texas, amassing a 14-6 record with a 2.59 ERA over 181 innings. He also had the stuff to back up his numbers, with a mid-90s fastball that could touch 100 MPH, and a nasty slider for an out pitch. He spent most of the season viewed as a probable top-ten pick, but as the draft approached rumors spread that teams were worried about the shape of his fastball. For all its velocity, his heater seemed to get punished at the top of the zone, which is where teams want fastballs these days. He slid to the Detroit Tigers with the 32nd pick in the draft because his fastball was viewed as that much of a problem.

Well, problem solved.

It’s not that simple, of course, but the Tigers and Madden have made some small changes to his delivery and arm slot, and it seems to have paid immediate dividends. Baseball America dug into the specifics ($) but anyone who watched him pitch saw a fastball that was dominant up in the zone. The Lansing Lugnuts seemed prepared for it in his second outing, and he did give up one home run, but he got a ton of pop-outs, and they were helpless against his breaking ball. He doesn’t throw his changeup very often, but it looks good too. If Ty Madden can climb up to Double-A and continue to perform well, he has a great chance to be a top-100 prospect in 2023.

Detroit Tigers Potential Top-100 Prospect – Cristian Santana

No Detroit Tigers international free agent has received a larger bonus than the $2.95 million given to Cristian Santana in 2021, and it didn’t take long for him to look like he was worth it. Santana posted a 161 wRC+ in the Dominican Summer League last year, hitting .269 with a 13.9% walk rate and nine home runs in just 54 games. That precocious power and feel for the zone earned him a promotion to Low-A Lakeland this year, where he’s the youngest player in the Florida State League, and the first 18-year-old Tigers position prospect to begin in full season ball since Willy Adames in 2014.

And so far Santana is holding his own. He’s hitting just .207 through eight games, but he has already drawn six walks, and he hit his first home run of the season last week. There’s no confirmation of the distance on his monster blast, but we know it came against a 95.5 MPH fastball, it left his bat at 106.7 MPH, and it had a launch angle of 34 degrees. Similarly batted balls in the big leagues traveled 440 feet on average. That’s remarkable pop for such a young hitter.

And Santana doesn’t have very far to go to land on a top-100 list. MLB Pipeline and FanGraphs already rank him as the 5th best prospect in Detroit’s system, and all four of the Tigers ranked ahead of Santana on the FanGraphs list are in the top 100. Santana probably projects better to second base than shortstop, which could keep him off some lists, but he might hit enough that it won’t matter.

Detroit Tigers Potential Top-100 Prospect – Gage Workman

Gage Workman joined Parker Meadows on this list last year, and he offers the same sort of tantalizing tools and raw upside as his counterpart in center field. Workman was remarkably young for a draft-eligible college junior in 2020 — he’s just nine days older than Meadows. He struggled upon his promotion to the West Michigan Whitecaps last year, but hit .266 with 26 extra-base hits over his final 43 games, and the Tigers challenged him with an assignment to Double-A Erie this year.

Strikeouts have always been a problem for Workman, and his swing-and-miss issues have continued this year. But he also does damage when he makes contact, he’s an excellent baserunner, and he should stick on the left side of the infield. Workman tied for second in minor-league baseball with 37 doubles last year, he has three doubles and two home runs already this season, and he’s a perfect 8/8 on stolen base attempts.

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There’s plenty of risk here, and that may keep him off top-100 lists. But it’s awfully rare to find legitimate left-side defenders with 20-20 potential, even if it comes with a low batting average and low walk totals. Danny Espinosa was that kind of player, and though his star faded quickly, he did make a few top-100 prospect lists, and he produced 8+ WAR in his career.