Luis Heredia not only makes Kevin's list but does so by a healthy margin. The entire Top 101 is available to view here (whether you're a subscriber or a nonsubscriber):

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=16020

Gerrit Cole and Jameson Taillon both rank about where you might except them to, however take a look at who precedes Cole on the list by three spots.

If you live on the West Coast or just up late you can hop over to twitter and throw questions you might have about the list his way:

twitter.com/kevin_goldstein

I was looking at Baseball America League Top 20s recently, and opened the 2003 Carolina League list. I had completely forgotten how prospects of the Bucs completely dominated the list. Five of the 20 were on the Lynchburg Hillcats, and all five played in the majors. Ryan Doumit had the second highest fWAR of the players on the list, but BA should get props for putting Greinke at the top of the list.

For each player I've included career fWAR through last year (NA means they have not played in the majors) and some illuminating quotes. The ones for Ryan Doumit and Chris Shelton are right on, but the one for John Van Benschoten is sad (knowing his subsequent injury history). And apparently Ian Snell (Oquendo in this list) lost sight of the strike zone when he changed his name.

I'm beginning to think it's hard to predict major league success.

1. Zack Greinke, rhp, Wilmington Blue Rocks (Royals) fWAR = 30.7

2. Jeremy Reed, of, Winston-Salem Warthogs (White Sox), fWAR = 2.3

3. Andy Marte, 3b, Myrtle Beach Pelicans (Braves), fWAR = -2.0

4. John Van Benschoten, rhp, Lynchburg Hillcats (Pirates), fWAR = -0.8

Van Benscoten cruised through the Carolina League, needing just just nine starts to warrant promotion to AA.

"He creates a very easy arm angle," Massarelli said. "I like to say he has an effortless fastball. With everything I had read about him, I was expecting him to be kind of raw. But what I saw was an extremely polished pitcher for being at this level. He definitely has big league presence out there."

Unfortunately, JVB had extensive shoulder surgeries in 2005, including labrum repair, rotator cuff debridement and thermal shrinkage. Van Benschoten holds the record for most career innings pitched with more runs allowed than innings pitched. He pitched 90 innings, allowing 92 earned runs.

5. Kris Honel, rhp, Winston-Salem Warthogs (White Sox), fWAR = NA

6. Edwin Encarnacion, 3b, Potomac Cannons (Reds), fWAR = 8.9

7. John Maine, rhp, Frederick Keys (Orioles), fWAR = 4.5

8. Dan Meyer, lhp, Myrtle Beach Pelicans (Braves), fWAR = -0.1

9. Ian Oquendo, rhp, Lynchburg Hillcats (Pirates), fWAR = 7.0

Oquendo's top pitch is a curveball that managers rated the best in the league. He has a second plus pitch in his low-90s fastball, and he has no problem finding the strike zone.

As a major leaguer, oddly, Snell rarely threw a curve. He threw his slider far more often. He also had a lot of trouble finding the strike zone, walking 4.17 per nine innings.

10. Bryan Bullington, rhp, Lynchburg Hillcats (Pirates), fWAR = 0.0

Some scouts weren't impressed with Bullington's fastball, which was clocked in the 95 mph range in college but dropped to 89-91 late in his first pro season. His slider also wasn't as devastating as it was at Ball State. "Everything I had on him led me to believe that he was a lot better than what I saw," one scout said. "But when I saw it, I was kind of disappointed."

Bullington actually pitched quite well in AAA in 2010, showing a 2.82 ERA with 6.4 K/9 and 2.5 BB/9. He pitched a bit for the Royals and then went to Japan. With the Carp he had 30 starts with an ERA of 2.42 and was named an All-Star. Maybe we should try to bring him back.

11. Macay McBride, lhp, Myrtle Beach Pelicans (Braves), fWAR = 1.0

12. Ryan Doumit, c, Lynchburg Hillcats (Pirates), fWAR = 9.6

"I like his bat a lot, but you give something up with him behind the plate," one manager said. "I have no problem with his arm strength. It's his ability to receive, call games and handle a staff that I question."

13. Ryan Wing, lhp, Winston-Salem Warthogs (White Sox), fWAR = NA

14. Rommie Lewis, lhp, Frederick Keys (Orioles), fWAR = -0.2

15. Ty Howington, lhp, Potomac Cannons (Reds), fWAR = NA

16. Hector Gimenez, c, Salem Avalanche (Astros), fWAR = -0.1

17. Chris Shelton, 1b/c, Lynchburg Hillcats (Pirates), fWAR = 3.5

"The trouble is going to be finding a spot for him," one manager said. "I know this much, it definitely isn't behind the plate. "

18. Jared Gothreaux, rhp, Salem Avalanche (Astros), fWAR = NA

19. Willy Taveras, of, Kinston Indians, fWAR = 7.3

20. Andres Blanco, ss, Wilmington Blue Rocks (Royals), fWAR = -0.4

I came home from a thoroughly entertaining goal scoring bonanza victory of the Penguins to check out Bucs Dugout. Obviously very little activity until probably spring training. I hope this posting is not a colossal lemon(Best and worst free agent signings). Hopefully, more open to debate(McCutchen and NH bashing). I saw this on ESPN. All six divisions are broken down into a point system. There are rankings of all 8 position players, 5 man pitching staffs, bullpens, closers, and intangibles produce 16 rankings and a total point system. Without reading, where are the Pirates in the NL Central?

Pirates position rankings going by an official scorecard 5 4 3 4 3 3 1 4(Easy choice for number 1). The 2011 Pirates stellar pitching rotation rankings are 6 6 6 5 6(List your 2012 rotation including AJ Burnett).

Going by statistics, I believe the rankings are mostly solid. My Changes: Alfonzo Soriano number 3 in left fielders. Jay Bruce number 1 in right fielders. Every teams starting rotation. Comments: Agree, Disagree, Biggest Travesties. Please list your 2012 Pirate starting rotation with AJ Burnett. http://espn.go.com/blog/sweetspot/post/_/id/20589/nl-central-showdown-position-rankings

I wrote this during the season, but never posted it. I don't remember why. Since we are all bored waiting for Pitchers and catchers, or at least AJ Burnett, I thought I would toss it in now. During the season the Pirate Wives and Pirates Charities had an auction where fans could bid on baskets put together by the players. More or less to my surprise, I was the winner for the Joel Hanrahan basket.

When I say basket, I suppose I am taking some artistic license, since in fact it was not a basket but a large soft-sided camoflage tackle box. It was filled with, um, stuff. There was a Slipknot {Sic}nesses T shirt. Three of my four sons are older than Joel..I had no idea whether Slipknot {Sic}nesses was an upcoming movie, a band, or a religious cult. There was a Matchbox type Ford Crown Vic police car. There was the complete first season of Dexter. There was a game called Electronic CatchPhrase. You get the idea. There was also a lot of slightly more normal stuff, peanut M&Ms, gift cards for Moe's and Dunkin Donuts, things like that. It was a ton of fun opening everything, and seeing what a rising young baseball player thinks is good to put in a charity basket.

Wrapped around the handles of the tackle box were a pair of pitcher's spikes. There is melted rubber along the front, top and side of the right big toe area, so that the shoes don't wear so fast when his foot is dragging pitch after pitch. Hanrahan is stitched along both tongues. They are extremely cool, and I have been unable to avoid showing them off to various friends and family, some of whom have attempted to appropriate them when I am not looking.

The best part of the whole deal however, was that the winning bid included a chance to meet Joel just before a game.

That whole experience was beyond my expectations, not least because I was keeping my expectations low. If I were an All Star, one of the best closers of 2011, I don't think I would be all that excited about meeting some (almost) elderly couple five minutes before the National Anthem. Which shows that I am probably not as nice a human being as Joel Hanrahan. He was very pleasant, and came across as one of the world's good guys. He wanted to know if we enjoyed the basket, I had any use for the tackle box. He was somewhat nonplussed when my wife said, and I quote, "Don't you want those shoes back? We hate to take your shoes. You might need them." When he got his face rearrainged, he very politely said, "No, thanks , but I have plenty of shoes."

The whole experience was excellent from start to finish. The Pirates Community Relations people were stellar, I got in a brief conversation with Bob Nutting, and I got my Joel Hanrahan autograph. On a hammer. I now have a genuine Joel Hanrahan #52 hammer, currently sitting on my mantle. It is pretty fine.

Anyway, this post has nothing at all to with the off season, or trades, or when we will start to hit. But I thought the BD posters might like to know that, in addition to being able to throw a consistent 97 mph strike, that Joel is a fine human being: funny, unassuming, and willing to let me keep the shoes.

The Pirates have not had a very good track record in terms of developing talent. I can attribute this to several possible factors:

1. There has been no talent to develop
2. They’ve been unfortunate with injuries
3. Their player development philosophy is poor
4. They don’t coaches and staff that excel in teaching and motivating young talent

Assign blame wherever you like, the fact of the matter remains that it seems like we don’t do much with the little talent we have. Furthermore, no organization bats 1.000 with their top prospects. If you take Keith Law’s top 100 prospect list you can be sure that a minority of them will have significant impacts on their organizations. It’s foolhardy to presume that we’ll have significantly different results in developing talent than the rest of the league. It’s foolhardy to think that we’ll have significantly different success rates than we have in the past.

We get so excited about the success of Jeff Karstens’ success. His breakout campaign (arguably unsustainable) gave him a WAR of 3.0. Which for a low-paid pitcher is okay, but considering he’s at best a 4/5 starter this is hardly reason to start making october playoff reservations.

On offense we have one player that is significantly above average (WAR) from last year, Andrew McCutcheon (5.5). After that we have Neil Walker at (2.5 WAR) who is just marginally better than league average – at least he didn’t have the precipitous dropoff of Karstens and we can assign some confidence that he’ll continue to be a league average player. Everyone else was well below league average.

Now these three players are all performing above their contracts and therefore this would give just about any organization some flexibility to invest in free agents to improve the quality of roster. But we’re not going to bring in ANY difference makers via free agency because: a. we don’t try to bring in players that would make a difference at PNC; and b. they don’t want to come here anyhow.

Now I agree that Prince Fielder isn’t going to work for PBC because we can’t afford his salary and also, we need to invest all we can into amateur talent. But players like Oswalt and Jackson would serve the bucs immeasurably. First by bringing out baseball fans that on occasion deserve a little better than a AAAA ballclub. Second by bringing guys that have succeeded before that can teach the rest of the team how to do it (Oswalt in particular). And most importantly by growing the farm system – because come July Oswalt will look VERY attractive to several teams vying for contention or experiencing an injury to a SP. At that point in time, we’d be able to pick one or two high-grade prospects to add to our stable of cheap talent that hints at the potential future of multiple all-stars and post-season glory (dovetails nicely with PBCs “plan”).

And that brings me to AJ Burnett, he of dynamite stuff and dolomite brain. He’ll challenge Morton and McDonald for the guy with the most electric stuff that can’t seem to keep it together for 3 consecutive starts. Or most 5 inning 110 pitch outings. Burnett is certainly a decent ML pitcher but carries a prohibitive pricetag. According to the latest reports, Pittsburgh could be a destination for Burnett (exciting tattoo parlors on the southside) with the NY Yankees eating significant portion of his cumbersome salary. The sticky wicket in the deal is the Pirates reluctance to include Garrett Jones in the deal. Now I like Garrett Jones and he fits the mold of Pirates 1b/RF combo talent with guys that can certainly hit the long ball (chicks dig the long ball) if and when they connect. GFJ is serviceable in either position but he’s never going to be confused with Keith Hernandez at 1b (I’m Keith Hernandez) or Roberto Clemente in right – wow that sounds blasphemous. In any event, Jones is a 1.2 WAR and not someone that appears to have the skillset to become much more than a league average player. I mean when have the bucs ever given up on a player and he turned into a great player (besides one of the most feared sluggers in the American League Jose Buatista). Seriously, how can they hold the deal up for GFJ?

I don’t enjoy it, but this all points to the continued and long term futility of the PBC. And before anyone can reply, yes, sale the team.

The bulk of information is behind a pay wall but the highlights, including the Pirates 10, Pittsburgh's prospects who made the Top 100, and the Pirates prospect who just missed the Top 100 are summarized nicely over at Pirates Prospects.

I thought I'd throw up a FanPost over here for additional discussion. There are certainly a few surprised on the list relative the general perceptions of Keith's feeling about the Pirates system.

I saw this sport column on the Los Angeles Times. It details the best and worst free-agent signings based on infield positions. Quick segue, I strongly suggest fans of all four major sports to read the Los Angeles Times every day.

Player I would love to have is Carlos Pena(best) at $7.5 million as our first baseman. Also, no platoon. Anyone agree? José Reyes(worst) for $116 million with the big pressure to fill the seats at Florida's new fish tank park. Anyone agree? The worst catcher got chopped off in the column. I did research and found our new catcher Rod Barajas as the worst free-agent signing. Hardly a surprise.

Please comment on any player signing not listed you would have as best and/or worst.

BA lists Austin Kubitza as one of the top 50 sophomores. Seventh to be precise. In terms of scouting, the Bucs seem to have been right on. He was the Rice Friday night starter last year and has won all sorts of awards. None of these guys are draft-eligible,

In contrast, Kent Emanuel did nothing at UNC last year. (Unless you consider a four-hit complete-game shutout against Texas in the college world series worthy of note.) Dale Carey hit 0.271 for Miami, and Zack Weiss made 22 appearances, including nine midweek starts for UCLA. He went 5-3 with a 2.86 ERA, with 53 strikeouts and 22 walks in 66.0 innings.

This is my first fan post. I seldom comment, but I have been reading almost all the comments daily for some time now.

Ever year around this time I look for something in the upcoming season to really root for. A bench mark of sorts that if it happens then things could be going pretty well for the Pirates. For instance, in 2010 I told my friends that if Clement sticks at 1st then we could start to expect some good things. Imagine if Clement had become an Ike Davis. Last year it was Pedro breaking out. Could still happen. This year I started considering my hopes for the season while exploring Pirates Prospects articles on the 2013, 14', and 15' payrolls. Really good reading.

I like most dream of the Pirates developing a minor league system that is continuously providing talent to the major league club. All this recent talk about the state of the system and what it should be expected to produce has led me to this years hopes. If form all the starting pitchers that the Pirates draft each year the system was able to push one into the majors yearly a rotation of bringing a guy with 6yrs of control and trading a guy with 2yrs could run endlessly.

Erik Bedard, one year of control. Correia, one year of control. Karstens, two years of control. Morton, three years. McDonald, four years. Lincoln, five years. If Rudy Owens pushes his way onto the major league squad early, the guys at top end of the rotation become the depth that we all have been begging for. Imagine Bedard being trade bate before he breaks down. Correia pushed into a bull pen that is suddenly much deeper then it already is. A rotation of Karstens, Morton, McDonald, Lincoln, and Owens. Karstens and Correia become trade bate at the deadline when Locke is brought up.

The success of Owens and Locke is my wish for the upcoming season. They could be the last chance for the Pirates to add LH starting pitchers from within for a while. Let the infusion begin, Karstens, Morton, McDonald, Lincoln, Owens clock starts in 12', Locke in 13', Cole in 14', Taillon in 15', Holmes, Heredia. I know I'm projecting pretty far out, but that was the beauty of the PP articles. It shows us the road map for future Pirates teams and the potential of filling holes internally.

I'm interested in your feed back and what you may think are some keys to the upcoming season in respect to the long term outlook of the club. Thanks.

As Tim Williams noted

As of the end of the 2011 season, only eight players from the entire 2008 draft class have produced a career 2.0 WAR or better, according to Baseball-Reference. That just shows that it’s too early to be expecting any team to have a player in the majors at this point, especially guys after the first round

Still, we keep expecting that our players will speed through the minors. Unlikely to happen. To make this a bit more concrete, here are the current outcomes for players drafted in the first ten rounds by NL Central teams. As the headline suggests, Pedro Alvarez has the most at-bats, and Josh Harrison (who was drafted by the Cubs) is second (to Brett Lawrie) in fWAR through 2011. Only 15 of the 67 draftees have had any playing time in the majors. There is also the interpretation question: Does ML playing time signal a good draft or a bad ML team? Based on fWAR, Milwaukee has had the best draft so far. Of course, with seven choices in the first three rounds, Milwaukee should have. Of course it's all due to Lawrie.

Here are the complete results