How Does the Pirates Farm System Match Up in the NL Central?

As the Pittsburgh Pirates

are beginning to work towards a top ten farm system, we started to wonder how it matches up with the rest of the NL Central.

We headed over to Seedlings to Stars and checked out their new Top 100 Prospects list. It became apparent that several teams have solid farm systems.  Based on how your beliefs surrounding prospects, some rankings show that the Bucs might not even have the best farm system in the NL Central.

The Pirates have two players within the Seedlings to Stars Top 15 as Jameson Taillon checked in at number nine and Gerritt Cole ranked number fifteen.  Robbie Grossman and Josh Bell also cracked the top 75 for the Pirates.

The first team we will look at is the hated top dog in the division, the Milwaukee Brewers. The Brew Crew has used several talented young players to make a run for a title.

Despite the trades, the Brewers still have three prospects within the S2S top 100. Each of them are found within the top 50 to 100 prospects. Here is a look at each of the Brewers top young guns.

Number 50 Wily Peralta is a right handed pitcher ready to jump into the Brewers rotation in 2012 after playing well at each level in the minors.  He could become a number two or three in the Brewers rotation.

Number 78 Tyler Thornburg is a 23 year old coming off his first pro season after being the Brewers third round pick in 2010.  His numbers were nice with a 2.57 ERA, 3.06 FIP, but 61 walks in 136.2 innings is scary.  But the 160 K’s more than offset that in our eyes.  Some say he will be a reliever in the bigs which is where he pitched in the Arizona Fall League this year.  He could become a mid rotation starter if the Brewers show patience and Thornburg is able to reduce his walks in the upper minors this season.

Number 96 Taylor Green is 25 years old and is a shining example of the Brewers development in their farm system.  He is a 25th round pick who has played both third base and second base.  He has shown the ability to flash the leather as seen on YouTube, but also does well with the bat and knows his strike zone.  He put up 59 extra base hits with 22 bombs and 36 doubles in AAA last season.

The Brewers system has been useful for the team over the recent years.  They have used it to make a run and climb into contender status in the NL Central while trading prospects for impact talent.  The system also seems poised to graduate a few players onto the major league roster this spring leaving a void for a while.

Here is the complete list:

Be sure to check out Pirates secondbaseman Neil Walker on our latest podcast by clicking the story below: