Yankees most underrated prospects headed into the 2018 season

Coming into this season, the Yankees’ top prospect list is very much pitcher heavy. This makes it easy for a position player to be overlooked (not named Gleyber Torres).

The Yanks possibly have an entire outfield of major league ready players who are currently blocked from advancing to the next stage in their development. The Triple-A RailRiders could very feasibly field an outfield of Billy McKinney, Clint Frazier and Jake Cave this season. Talk about an abundance of riches!

So none of those players will start for the Yankees in 2018. They aren’t even on the Yankees’ top prospects list (Frazier is no longer considered a prospect). Many other players are getting overlooked in the Yanks’ system, which is possibly the deepest in baseball, even if it isn’t considered the flat-out best.

Nick Solak

Nick Solak started 2017 in High-A Tampa. He hit .301/.397/.460 before being called up to Trenton. In 30 games there, Solak’s offense took a slight hit, as expected, but he still managed a .286/.344/.429 slash line.

Solak also continued in his power development, smacking 12 long balls on the year. While he has yet to crack Baseball America’s top Yankees prospect list, he is ranked as the Yankees’ best hitter for average in the entire system.

While Solak does strikeout a ton, his strong walk rate indicates that he can improve those negative marks. He has speed and hits for extra bases well. However, as a middle infielder, it’s hard to imagine him playing there for the Yankees.

If he can continue to improve, however, he may become trade bait for the Yanks to use as early as this season. Currently, he’s behind Thairo Estrada, Gleybar Torres and Tyler Wade.

Tyler Wade

With seemingly nowhere to put Tyler Wade, the Yankees decided to turn him into a super-utility man, kind of like Ben Zobrist.

After hitting .310 in the minors with 26 stolen bases, the Yankees called him up when second baseman Starlin Castro went on the disabled list.

Unfortunately, Wade struggled in limited playing time and only managed a dismal .155 average in 30 big leagues games.

While this was offputting to many fans, we all know it’s not impossible for a player to struggle in his debut season, then succeed when the calendar flips over. Imagine if we all just wrote off Aaron Judge after his 2016 cup of coffee? That’s how jobs are lost.

The Yankees will likely wait for Torres’ debut until May, as to push back his free agent clock by a full year. This might get Wade a second chance at second base to start the season.

His minor league strikeout rate of 19% is nowhere near the 30% K rate he had in his brief debut. Without the first year nerves of ’17, Wade might succeed in his sophomore season in the bigs. But Wade isn’t the only rookie who might get his shot at starting.