Fangraphs Top 100 Prospect list includes four Cincinnati Reds
This morning over at Fangraphs, Eric Longenhagen released his post-spring training Top 100 Prospects in baseball. His list actually went 114 players deep, as he rated all prospects who were at least 50 FV or higher (FV stands for Future Value, and a “50” is considered an average big league starting caliber player or a very good relief pitcher). Longenhagen has four Cincinnati Reds prospects in the Top 100, but a fifth player is just outside of the there with a 50 FV rating.
Two players for Cincinnati were rated 55’s. The range for players who were rated 55 is between the #11 prospect and the #29 prospect. The Reds who got that rating were right-handed pitcher Chase Burns and catcher Alfredo Duno. They were two of the last three players to be ranked in that range.
Burns, the #2 overall draft pick and Cincinnati’s 1st rounder in 2024, pitched in one game in big league camp. He walked a batter and struck out the other three he faced in a hitless inning of work. The now 22-year-old did not pitch in any games after the draft last season, so when he takes the mound in the next two weeks when the minor league season opens up he’ll be making his first regular season appearance as a professional. We don’t know what level he will begin at other than it’s not Triple-A, who has already begun their season and we know what their roster looks like.
Alfredo Duno is well regarded as a catching prospect. The 19-year-old, though, is someone that Longenhagen has been higher on than other national publications. He got into two games with the big league club in spring training, but went 0-3 with three strikeouts. Last season he played in 32 games with Daytona. He hit .267/.367/.422 for the Single-A team as one of the youngest players in the league, but a broken rib wound up costing him the final four months of the season.
Right-handed pitcher Chase Petty (who is pictured above) also found himself inside the Top 50 on the Fangraphs list. The 21-year-old pitched in four games for the Reds in spring training, giving up two runs and allowing six hits in 10.0 innings. Last year he spent most of his season in Double-A Chattanooga, but finished out the year in Triple-A with two starts. In total he threw a farm system best 137.0 innings while going 11-5 with 130 strikeouts.
Currently injured starting pitcher Rhett Lowder was the next prospect from Cincinnati on the list. After having some struggled in the first half with Double-A Chattanooga, Lowder was incredible after the All-Star break. He pitched in 12 games in the second half between Chattanooga, Louisville, and Cincinnati, and posted a 0.82 ERA in 65.2 innings while giving up just one home run. Lowder didn’t pitch this spring, but he’s back to throwing off of a mound as he recovers from some elbow issues he was dealing with.
Just outside of the top 100 is right-handed reliever Luis Mey at #103. His pure stuff is undeniable and earlier today at RedsMinorLeagues.com I looked at just how rare his velocity is over the last two decades of pitch tracking in professional baseball. His struggles with throwing strikes, though, are well documented. This spring he threw 4.2 innings for the Reds and had five walks and hit another batter. In his 2024 season he split time between Dayton and Chattanooga and walked 43 batters in 55.0 innings. When guys make contact against him they don’t do much with it, but his inability to throw strikes with any sort of consistency must be improved upon if he’s going to find success in the big leagues. He’s in Triple-A with Louisville to start the 2025 season.
