Farm System Breakdown – #3: Ball Busters

For an explanation on the distinction between the “Exponential” and “Linear” rankings given below, please refer to my earlier post “Farm System Primer”. I know it’s tedious, but I had just enough details that I felt needed to review, that I didn’t want to start off each Farm System Breakdown post with 4 paragraphs of jargon. And of course, any questions, feel free to inquire within.

Top 30 Rank (Exponential/Linear): 3/5
Total Rank (Exp/Lin): 3/5
Average of Total Rank (Exp/Lin): 5/6
Average Prospect Grade/Risk (Exp/Lin): 53.1/High / 46.8/High
Total Prospects: 55

Groups of 15 Rankings

Organization Prospect Rankings

MPTK = “More Players to Know” section of Handbook, DC = Depth Chart of Handbook, 21IFA = IFA signed and drafted in 2021, NL = Not listed in handbook under any sections

Summary

Kid gloves are off. We are officially looking at the top end farm systems in the CPL. The Ball Busters farm is a full 65/High prospect above the Fajita Eaters. And remember, in the exponential system, that’s the equivalent of two 60/High prospects, four 55/High prospects and eight 50/high prospects. So, that’s nothing to sneeze at.

Leading off this org ranking is none other than the Wunderkind himself, Mr. Franco. As a 75/High prospect, he singlehandedly elevates this org from 8th in the CPL to 3rd overall. He is a beast among beasts, and requires no further explanation. After The Wunder you have a relatively steep drop off to Larnach and Schmidt. It’s not like these guys are scrubs or anything, but it’s a little amusing looking at the chasm between the 75 grade of Franco and the 60 grade of Larnach. From here you have a solid 11 players remaining in the higher tier club, featuring the likes of Houck, Balazovic and Brujan. This is followed by 10 “guys” and a crazy 22 fringy/role players. Indeed, this farm is not particularly deep, and kind of by default, is one of the most top heavy farms in the CPL. But, I mean, if you managed to make it so Franco wasn’t disproportionately imbalanced at the top, you would have an insane system by the end of it. Of the 9 scrubs sprinkled in at the end, the liked of Adolis Garcia seems to be another BA oversight, akin to Yermin Mercedes. Not sure a re-evaluation would catapult Garcia into blue chip territory, but he definitely deserves to be listed at this point.

This is the beginnings of a very good farm system. Getting Wander was a very smart, if not fairly obvious, get, and has helped to shape the Ball Buster farm system very quickly. While there are a couple graduations expected in the near future, as long as Wander is a prospect, this farm will likely be towards the top of any evaluation system. That being said, if he graduates in 2021, Ball Busters could very easily tumble into the middle of the pack. While there draft position is sure to be promising, they simply haven’t had enough time to acquire a bulk of high end prospects and are getting by on quality over quantity at the moment. But, their time will come. Just need a little patience.

The road ahead is long and difficult for the Ball Busters, but at the rate they’re going, if they continue on this path, they will have an opportunity to cement themselves as having one of the better farm systems in CPL history. Just in time for Cale to start rebuilding and sell off all of his veterans for a bunch of blue chip prospects.