Baseball America's Prospect List is out

It's a new year and we finally get the skinny on what Baseball America's Bill Ballew thinks of our farm system. He admits it's not as stocked as it once was, but that it is still very strong. He took the safe choice of selecting Jarrod Saltalamacchia as the number one prospect followed by the also safe and popular choice of Elvis Andrus at number two. Here is the rest of the list:

1. Jarrod Saltalamacchia, c
   
2. Elvis Andrus, ss
   
3. Matt Harrison, lhp
   
4. Brandon Jones, of
   
5. Van Pope, 3b
   
6. Eric Campbell, 3b
   
7. Scott Thorman, 1b/of
   
8. Jo-Jo Reyes, lhp
   
9. Joey Devine, rhp
   
10. Yunel Escobar, ss

It is interesting to see Van Pope that high, but we've seen him up there in other lists. Still it is surprising to see him higher than Eric Campbell. This list certainly didn't take any chances like Kevin Goldstein did in listing Neftali Feliz or John Sickels did in listing Jamie Richmond in the top ten.

This list also contains almost every player that the combined Talking Chop prospect list does. Of the top 11 prospects in the TC list, all but Kala Ka'aihue is represented in the BA list. With that in mind there's really not too much to argue with here other than placement, but even there only the listing of Pope above Campbell is surprising.