Dax Kilby, Dylan Beavers, and other MLB prospects who fell outside Keith Law’s top 100 list
Every year that I produce a top 100 prospect ranking, I go through an iterative process where I start with more than 100 players, circulate the first cut to industry sources, move some guys around, take some names off the list and add others, circulate again, and so on. That process always means some players just miss the list — the decision to stop at 100 is rather arbitrary, just a function of us having 10 fingers and a base-10 number system — and this year I’ve written up a few more of those players.
The following players are all excellent prospects who should not be overlooked simply because they were not on the main list. I do write these comments in a way that I hope describes their abilities while also making it clear why I omitted them from the top 100.
Although I always assert that no one ever reads the introduction, here it is nonetheless: These players are listed alphabetically. This isn’t a further ranking, although someone will inevitably claim that it is. If you’re interested, Dax Kilby, a player for the New York Yankees, was the final player cut from the top 100. Note: Ages are listed as of July 1, 2026. Scouting grades are on the traditional 20-80 scouting scale. EV = exit velocity.
The average exit velocity of a player’s top half of all balls in play, ranked by exit velocity—that is, the top 50% of his batted balls—is referred to as EV50, and the same concept applies to the top 90% of a player’s balls in play is referred to as EV90. Z-swing rates are swings at zone pitches. Dylan Beavers, OF, Baltimore Orioles
Height: 6-5 | Weight: 206 | Bats: L | Throws: R | Age: 24
Beavers has been tinkering with his swing since the Orioles took him with their second pick (pick No. 33) in 2022. This past year was his best yet, as he hit .304/.420/.515 in Triple A, earning his first callup to the majors. He still has a little bit of a hitch in his swing, but it’s much reduced, with his hands higher when he loads and a little further out from his body. He’s very strong, leading to high exit velocities even with just average to slightly above-average bat speed, and he should be a 20-homer guy for a few years in the majors.
The Orioles did finally get him out of center field last year; it looked like he might stay there when they drafted him, but the past few years have shown he’s better off in a corner and could be above-average in either spot. I think he’s a regular and ready to step into a job right now, more capable of playing every day than Colton Cowser as Beavers gets on base against lefties at a solid clip.
I don’t know if his swing shape is going to let him hit for a high average and power at the same time, and given that he’s a corner outfielder he has to do a good bit of both to be an above-average regular.
Roldy Brito, Colorado Rockies’ IF/OF Height: 5-11 | Weight: 183 | Bats: B | Throws: R | Age: 19
Brito led the Arizona Complex League in batting average last year by one point over the Dodgers’ Ching-Hsien Ko, finishing second in OBP and third in slugging. He then played 33 games at Low A and hit.375/.442/.463. Those numbers are a little misleading about his hit tool; he’s at least a 70 runner who legged out some ground-ball hits, and likes to bunt for hits as well, picking up 29 points of average in Low A just from bunt singles.
He is a switch-hitter who can hit from either side, possibly with slightly more bat speed on the right side. Since he signed, he has become much stronger so that he can make an impact on the ball and possibly reach average power. He played mostly second base with some shortstop in the DSL in 2024, after which the Rockies tried him in center field, giving him almost equal time in center and at the keystone in 2025.
He gets mixed reviews at both positions, although he’s 18 and doesn’t have a ton of experience at either spot. He will be in the top 100 in a year if he continues to rake like this in his return to Low A this year and even demonstrates that he can play average defense at one of those two positions. Arizona Diamondbacks OF Slade Caldwell Height: 5-9 | Weight: 182 | Bats: L | Throws: L | Age: 20
Caldwell has a chance to be a pure leadoff hitter in the traditional sense, a player who sees a lot of pitches to try to get on base and show hitters behind him what a pitcher’s arsenal looks like. He will hit for average without a lot of power and add some value on the bases with his legs.
He finished eighth in all of the minors last year with 91 walks, third among teenagers (with Alfredo Duno above him), as he walked over 15 percent of the time at both levels of A-ball in his full-season debut. It’s a combination of factors, including pitch recognition, a small strike zone (he is a legit 5-foot-7, regardless of what the listed height is), and one of the lowest swing rates in baseball.
Caldwell swung at 34 percent of pitches he saw last year, which is lower than any big leaguer in 2025, including a very low chase rate of 15 percent, but also a low 56 percent swing rate at pitches in the zone — only Chase Meidroth and Bryson Stott had lower Z-swing rates among qualifying MLB hitters last year.
He gets on base a lot as a result of all of this, but nearly half of his strikeouts the previous year came on what are called third strikes because he needs to start swinging the bat more. Caldwell is a plus defender already in center with good instincts and has shown improvements already since signing with the Diamondbacks as their first-round pick in 2024.
He is strong for his size — I met him at the Futures Game, and he looks like Michelangelo just carved him out of marble, albeit a very short slab — and should be able to impact the ball enough to hit for average with some gap power. Scouts have expressed concern that he will not hit the ball enough in the seats and is too passive.
I agree with the former, but if his profile is really 60 or better defense with solid batting averages, that’s an everyday player. The Diamondbacks promoted him after he hit .294/.460/.454 in 48 Low-A games, after which he hit .238/.370/.311 in High A as a 19-year-old. We might see him a little differently had he spent more time at the lower level.
Nathan Flewelling, C, Tampa Bay Rays
Height: 6-2 | Weight: 200 | Bats: L | Throws: R | Age: 19
How could a player who played 102 Low-A games and hit.229 with a.336 slugging percentage be on the “just missed the top 100” list? I’m so glad you asked. After being selected by the Rays in the third round in 2024 from a high school in Alberta, Canada, Flewelling played last year at the age of 18. In his first season as a professional, he demonstrated strong game-calling and framing skills and was a plus defensive catcher who threw out 28% of runners, well above the Carolina League median.
He has a compact swing but actually hits the ball pretty hard already, especially given his age, with very high exit velocities that haven’t shown up yet in extra-base power. Between the average and slugging, he had a.393 on-base percentage and was second in minor league baseball with 94 walks and a 14% chase rate. Flewelling came into pro ball with less baseball experience than the typical high school player, and he was young for his class on top of that.
It showed in his propensity to swing and miss, but the rest of his game was surprisingly polished. Despite the underwhelming stat line, he’s a real prospect, with a high floor thanks to the defense and his extreme patience.
Jhostynxon Garcia, OF, Pittsburgh Pirates
Height: 6-0 | Weight: 163 | Bats: R | Throws: R | Age: 23
I had Garcia as a top-100 prospect last winter and during the summer, but over the course of the process of assembling this year’s list, it was clear he was a tier below that — although he remains a good prospect. The majority of 2025 was spent in Triple A, where The Password hit.271/.334/.498 with a lot of power but a strikeout rate of 29.1%. He murders pitches in the zone, but his chase rate at that level was 39 percent, and an outrageous 32 percent on stuff well out of the zone.
It’s not impossible but it is hard to imagine he’ll bring those numbers down to a level where he can post adequate OBPs, so his value is going to primarily come from his power and from defense.
He’s probably not a center fielder, but should be a 55 defender in right, maybe a little better with more time at the position. I wrote at the time of his trade from Boston to Pittsburgh that I saw a 20-homer floor with a sub-.300 OBP, and that still holds. He has the ceiling of an All-Star because of that hard-contact skill, but he needs a major adjustment to his swing decisions to get there.
Trevor Harrison, RHP, Tampa Bay Rays
Bats: R, Throws: R, Height: 6-4, Weight: 225, Age: 20
Harrison plateaued last year when it seemed like he was going to take a step forward, with his stuff intact from 2024 but his results a bit worse with the move up to High A, including a disappointing whiff rate of 28 percent.
He works 93-96 on his four-seamer, with a little ride to it, along with an average slider and an above-average changeup he should probably use a little more, as it’s his best pitch right now and also would enhance his ability to work up top with the heater. He doesn’t get many ground balls and walks too much, walking more than 11% of the time in his stops in Low A and High A, even though he probably can work in the zone at those levels without doing much damage.
He has an easy delivery and has a great build for a starter. The fact that he seems to compete well makes the walk rate even more perplexing—just go after guys! Your stuff is good! He’s still so young, turning 20 last August, that he has plenty of time to improve his control, add a pitch and so on, but I thought he was primed for a breakout last year and it didn’t happen.
Dax Kilby, SS, New York Yankees
Height: 6-2 | Weight: 190 | Bats: L | Throws: R | Age: 19
No player from the most recent draft boosted his standing in the industry since turning pro more than Kilby, the Yankees’ first pick in 2025 with the No. 39 selection. The Georgia high school shortstop went to Low A for 18 games and hit .353/.457/.441 in his pro debut, walking more than he struck out. That’s high school to full-season ball in about 90 days, going from metal bats to wood, Georgia prep pitchers to professionals, and Kilby didn’t miss a beat.
He made extremely hard contact, too, averaging 91.9 mph and peaking at 108.9, while his chase rate of 11.1 percent was … well, Juan Soto had the lowest chase rate in the majors last year, and his was 18.1 percent. Kilby saw 106 pitches that were well out of the zone, meaning they were more than one baseball width away from the strike zone, and swung at seven.
He seems to have a lot more power now than it did before the draft, at least to me. His swing is short and direct. He’s a fringe-average runner whose arm probably moves him away from shortstop, making second base his natural home. He can play any position he wants and still be above-average in the big leagues, as this small pro sample suggests. (He’s prospect No. 101 this year, by the way.)
Johnny King, LHP, Toronto Blue Jays
Height: 6-3 | Weight: 210 | Bats: L | Throws: L | Age: 19
King was selected by the Jays in the third round in 2024 out of a high school in Florida. He made his debut last year in the Florida Complex League, pitching 24 innings and striking out 41 of 98 batters while walking seven. After being promoted to Low A, he had control issues, walking 17.8% of the batters he faced in 37 1/3 innings, which is why he is not in the top 100.
The stuff is there, for sure; he sits 92-94 with a four- and two-seamer, throws a two-plane curveball that got a 61.5 percent whiff rate in Low A, spins an above-average slider and has the rudiments of a changeup, although it’s by far his weakest pitch.
His delivery is wildly inconsistent, leading to the issues with control, and he has a tendency to release the ball too early and too high. He also has a stiff landing where he can spin off his front heel or hop off the ground entirely. (He does come back down eventually.)
Given that he is still only 19 and has a lot of athleticism, it is reasonable to believe that the Jays can assist him in addressing those lower-half issues. His arm swing is fine. He will be in the top 100 in a year if they do that so that he can at least get into the zone more frequently and stop missing shots so frequently.
Los Angeles Dodgers OF Ching-Hsien Ko Height: 6-3 | Weight: 215 | Bats: L | Throws: R | Age: 20
Ko has the tools to be on the top 100, but the consistent response I heard from scouts and execs was that they wanted him to prove the production he showed in the Arizona Complex League, where he hit .367/.487/.539, would hold up when he faces better pitching. He did finish last year in Low A, where he hit .219/.355/.281 in 32 games, getting burned in large part by an overly passive approach where he took too many strikes.
Ko is going to end up hitting for power, though, as he’s 6-foot-3 and already north of his listed 215, with quick hands and good rhythm to the swing. He’s really upright to start out at the plate, and he’s not quick out of the box, showing average speed underway. He’s probably a corner outfielder in the end, with a chance to hit for 25-plus homer power and get on base. His 2025 season was a great start, and the stint in Low A showed he’s a little further away than some of his system-mates like Emil Morales.
JR Ritchie, RHP, Atlanta
Height: 6-2 | Weight: 185 | Bats: R | Throws: R | Age: 23
I’ve always loved Ritchie’s delivery and thought there was plenty of projection there when Atlanta took him with its second pick in 2022, but after Tommy John surgery he’s come back with a big arsenal of mostly average to above-average pitches, without a clear out-pitch to get him past No. 4 starter-ish upside. He will show 98 mph on the four-seamer, preferring the mid-90s sinker, which boosted him to ground-ball rates over 50 percent at both stops after Atlanta promoted him out of High A.
He improved his arsenal over the course of the season, equipping himself with a four- and two-seamer slider, curveball, and changeup. His curveball had the highest whiff rate of all his pitches, at 35%, which is good but doesn’t mean he has a real plus pitch in his repertoire. His path to becoming more than just a decent fourth starter is to become a command-and-control person, which he certainly could accomplish with that simple, consistent delivery.
He walked 10.4 percent of batters he faced in Double A, then 11.1 percent in Triple A with the ABS, both rates being too high for this style of pitcher. I want to buy in, and he is definitely a big leaguer, but the current package isn’t quite enough to get him to the top 100.
Caden Scarborough, RHP, Texas Rangers
Bats: R, Throws: R, Height: 6-5, Weight: 185, Age: 21 As he already has two plus pitches and throws a lot of strikes, Scarborough would have been in the top 100 if he had a clear third pitch. He walked 6.7% of the batters he faced last year in Low A and then briefly in High A. Drafted in the sixth round in 2023 out of a Florida high school, Scarborough is now sitting 94-96 with a plus slider that has late downward break, and he gains some deception thanks to a lower arm slot.
He gets a ton of power from his hip rotation and finishes everything well over his front side. He does have a changeup that he barely uses and only busts out against lefties — Synergy’s data shows him throwing three changeups to righties all year — getting a lot of tumble on the pitch but not that much deception out of his hand.
He moved up to High A in August and reeled off three straight outings where he didn’t allow a run, going 13 innings, striking out 19, walking two and giving up just six hits, before getting hit around a little in his final start of the year. He’s a starter all the way if he develops one more pitch, whether it’s the current changeup or some other change-of-pace pitch to help him maintain his success against left-handed batters, with at least mid-rotation upside and probably more like No. 2 starter ceiling.
Ralphy Velazquez, 1B, Cleveland Guardians
Height: 6-3 | Weight: 240 | Bats: L | Throws: R | Age: 21
Velazquez had a very “meh” season in High A for the majority of 2025, hitting .245/.323/.469, no great shakes for a first baseman. He does have plus bat speed, which showed up in flashes last year, including the 22 homers he hit across two minor-league levels, and he hits fastballs extremely well, while his breaking-ball recognition needs work.
He has a wide stance with only a toe tap, which I believe makes him less flexible when swinging. Once he starts swinging, he is committed to the path of the swing, and he doesn’t adjust well if the ball isn’t where he expected it to be. He loves the ball in, while he’s worse on stuff middle-away.
He does have good ball/strike recognition, though, even with the 9 percent walk rates he posted at each level. After his promotion to Double A in August, he joined the team in Reading, the best hitter’s park in the Eastern League, and went 12-for-22 with four homers, four doubles, a triple (!) and four walks; he hit .278/.350/.400 the rest of the way, respectable, but back to a level that isn’t going to work for a guy who’s first base-only and may not be more than an average defender there. His value is so tied up in his bat that he’s going to have to produce more for me to consider him in the upper echelons of the rankings.
