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Miami Marlins Minors: One player on Minor League Ball’s midseason Top Prospects list

By Ehsan Kassim |

The Miami Marlins major league team is 13-games under the .500 mark at the All-Star break, something the team did not anticipate would happen when they emptied out whatever was left in their farm to acquire pieces to win in 2015.

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In fact, in the past calendar year, the Miami Marlins have shipped out at least five (depending on which prospect list you look at) prospects in their top 10 to acquire major league talent.

For that reason, and bad drafting habits, the Miami Marlins current farm system is barren. When you combine that with a bad major league roster, you have the recipe for a questionable future, which the Marlins are looking at.

An example of how lowly the Marlins farm system can be easily seen by taking a look at John Sickels of Minor League Balls midseason top 75 prospect list. Only one Marlins, first round pick from 2014 Tyler Kolek, cracks the top 75 list, and he comes in near the bottom of the list, at that as well.

64) Tyler Kolek, RHP, Marlins (46): Blah results are one thing, but reports of velocity declines and lack of secondary pitch progress lowers his stock independently of the stats. Watchful waiting right now.

Kolek, who fell 18 spots from his preseason ranking, was seen as a high-risk, high-reward pick for the Marlins at the draft last season, much like their pick of first baseman Josh Naylor this year. He is expected to be a slow riser through the Marlins system, which made their decision to pass on someone like Carlos Rodon, a Cuban and someone already in the big leagues, a huge question mark.

So far in 2015, Kolek owns a 4.69 ERA and a 4.75 FIP in 71 innings of work at Low-A for the Greensboro Grasshoppers. He’s striking out just 14.2% of the batters he faces and walked 10.1% of them.

As Sickels notes, results at his level and experience are not as important as the stuff.

Kolek’s 100 MPH fastball is what drew the Miami Marlins to him, but if that velocity is diminished, he needs his secondary pitches to develop and help him out. To this point, that has yet to happen.

Tyler Kolek, just 19 years-old, is expected to spend the entire 2015 season in Low-A. If he shows improvement, he could be moved up to High-A Jupiter, but it should not be a surprise if he begins 2016 in Low-A again. The Marlins really need to take their time with him and not rush Kolek to the majors before he’s ready.

Not everyone can be Jose Fernandez.

For what its worth, Sickels had J.T. Realmuto as one of his graduates from the minor league prospect lists, as he’s spent the majority of the 2015 season in a Miami Marlins big league uniform.

Realmuto was Sickels 116th ranked prospect coming into the season.

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