Win projections, farm system ranking thoughts, prospect news flood, coaching staffs, more

Eduardo Quintero (Photo: Cody Bashore)

Hello and welcome back to your assigned reading material, where we’ll look at win projections for the Dodgers, talk about the farm system rankings, read the continuing flood of prospect reports, and more.

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Dodger Insider: Dodgers recently announced their 2026 minor league managers and coaching staffs, which seems to have a surprising amount of continuity aside from Fumi Ishibashi being promoted.

The Dodgers farm system returns six of their seven managers from last season, with Ishibashi taking over as the head man for the Arizona Complex League Dodgers. Ishibashi has been with the Dodger organization since 2008, appearing in three games in his Minor League career and serving as a bullpen catcher for the Inland Empire 66ers. He joined the coaching ranks full-time in 2011 with the AZL Dodgers and served as the Dodgers bullpen catcher from May 2012 through the 2013 season. He has coached various positions in the organization, and this will be his second stint as a minor league manager as he served as the DSL 2 Manager in 2019, going 35–34 and finishing in third place in DSL.

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FanGraphs: It’s time for projection systems to spit out their wisdom for the season, and their Depth Charts has the Dodgers at a massive 99.5 wins. That’s good for 99.1% odds of making the playoffs, 94.1% of winning the NL West, and 27.5% of three-peating in the World Series.

FanGraphs: Meanwhile, ZiPS has the Dodgers pegged at a still-elite-but-more-modest 96 wins, which comes with a 91.7% chance of getting into the playoffs, 68.9% chance of winning the division, and 18.2% chance of winning the World Series. I’ll go with the more optimistic option for the sake of my sanity (and social media interactions).

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The last Dodgers Roundup revolved around Top 100 lists being released, and this one has a bunch of farm system rankings, where the Dodgers predictably also excel … mostly.

ESPN: The minor-league cohort of the Dodgers checks in at #4 here, and projects for $308 million of value.

For Dodgers haters, this is cold comfort. They aren’t the No. 1 farm system in the sport anymore, but they are tied for first with the Rays in “quality depth,” which is just the total number of prospects they have graded above 40 FV. The idea is that literally every farm system in the history of baseball has a bunch of 40 FV prospects (roughly a third- to fifth-round talent), so they can be considered “commons” in baseball card parlance. Thus, any prospect above that level is the kind of prospect not every team has more than a few of in the system; some have as few as five or six this year.The Dodgers have 18 such prospects, one more than the Brewers. I would guess four or five of those 18 will play in the big leagues this season, and I don’t think any of those players are future stars. So, this might be a light year for the Dodgers introducing impact rookies, but that should start up again in 2027. I think the big league team should do fine in 2026 without the extra help.

The Athletic: Over here they come in at #2 and rank in the Tier 1 of systems.

The Dodgers are the paragon of hitter development, with a clear idea of who they believe they can help and processes that make it happen once they acquire the player, whether it’s via the draft, a trade or international signing. Kendall George is not a top 100 prospect, but they took George, an 80 runner (on the 20-80 scouting scale) with an awful swing and no power, and fixed the swing to the point where he is now a viable prospect — maybe a Chandler Simpson type (it’s the obvious comparison), maybe even a little better. This seemed like such an unlikely proposition a year ago, but the Dodgers are the best at what they do. Fans of other teams can complain all day about the money the team spends on the major-league roster, but the Dodgers do back it up with the old-school stuff that you should respect, even if you don’t like it: They scout, heavily, and they do individual development work with their players — especially hitters — that is the best in the sport.

CBS Sports: You want #1? You get #1.

Because the Dodgers needed to be the best at something else, right? Realistically, they might have the most impressive player development machine in the sport’s history. They never make “sell” trades or pick high in the draft — their luxury tax status often means their first pick is 10 spots lower than it would be otherwise — and yet they reliably turn out good players. Executives with other teams have pointed to the Dodgers’ staff size and their ability to individualize development plans for each player (as opposed to relying on a one-for-all approach) as keys to their success in this area. Anyway, their current crop includes both high-end quality (outfielders Josue De Paula, Eduardo Quintero, and Zyhir Hope) and an impressive amount of depth. There’s no reason to think they’re going away.

Baseball Prospectus: Last but certainly not least, they also have the Dodgers at #1.

It seems unfair to have the best system in baseball when you are coming off two World Series titles—not to mention a decade-plus of regular season success and high spending that means you always pick very late in the draft. And if you are the kind of person whose knees shake every time you see a hitting prospect’s z-contact drop below 83% in the minors, this is not going to be the system for you. But just about every prospect here hits the ball very hard, and enough of them will keep doing it that the decade-plus of success might just stretch into two.

In basically every one of these, it’s the depth of the system that stands out more than anything. The assumption is essentially that the Dodgers have compiled so many talented prospects that the odds are a bunch of them will at least be quality regulars or more, even if they aren’t elite. Should make for interesting internal evaluations, and thus trade decisions, as well.

Baseball America: Of course, mostly having a lot of depth could be seen as a negative as well, and the Dodgers rank #13 here. It’s an outlier among their peers, but also for Baseball America historically, as it’s the first time the Dodgers are out of their Top 10 since 2014.

The front of the Dodgers’ system is led by a quartet of high-upside outfielders with contrasting skill sets. From there, a lot of the group’s more intriguing prospects dealt with injuries in 2025. The system’s pitching talent could use a boost, too.

Basically, they seem to feel like a lot of their best hitters are unproven or have flaws, the pitching in the system has fallen off, and injuries have stagnated a bunch of other potentially impactful prospects.

Honestly? I see it. 2026 will be a big year for a ton of guys in the system.

The Athletic: Back to individual prospect rankings, here’s the Top 20 prospects in the Dodgers system, including seven others of note. Aside from the general optimism about the system, the order itself is relatively similar to the consensus. Also, Maddux Bruns is listed as a fallen prospect, while Charles Davalan and Christian Zazueta are named as sleepers.

ESPN: Meanwhile, their Top 10 for the Dodgers includes Zach Ehrhard at #7, which stands out.

Baseball Prospectus: Going back to Top 100 Top 101 lists, the Dodgers land five here: De Paula at #14, Hope at #18, Quintero at #27, Mike Sirota at #34, and Emil Morales at #56. All of them are somewhat notably high up there.

Baseball Prospectus: Within their next 10 ranked prospects was Alex Freeland, who missed out due to a low ceiling and mostly looking lost during his call-up.

Baseball Prospectus: Who could be in their Top 101 next year? Davalan again gets a mention, notable for being an outlier in the system.

Davalan is a bit of an outlier among the group. He was an elite contact hitter in college and continued to get plenty of lumber on the ball in his brief Cal League stint. His swing decisions are very passive—which the Dodgers don’t tend to mind—but he doesn’t chase and has at least average power potential. If he can swing a little less defensively with two strikes, and with more intent overall, Davalan could quickly look like a poor man’s Kevin McGonigle in a corner outfield spot, which is something like the 85th-best prospect in baseball.

MLB Pipeline: A pair of international Dodgers signings in Ricardo Pulles and Tom Apfebaum were named among the most interesting of the 2026 class.

The age-old adage goes, “If you can play, scouts will find you.” But … Russia? Pulles, who represented Spain at the 2024 U18 Euro Championship, was born to a Russian mother and a Cuban father in Moscow and has developed into a switch-hitting catcher with some pop from the left side of the dish. Just five players born in Russia have ever made it to the Major Leagues, although none were raised in the country. Lyle Miller-Green, who was born in Tomsk, Russia, and has been dubbed the “Siberian Sultan of Swat,” is currently in the White Sox system and reached High-A this past year.

Just 22 natives of Germany have taken a Major League mound (who could forget Pretzels Getzien, the nation’s winningest pitcher), and while the developmental leash will be long, Apfelbaum has a strong base to work with. At 6-foot-4, he’s able to dial his heater up into the mid 90s. Working with a slight crossfire delivery and lower-three-quarters arm slot, he can sell his changeup well out of his hand. His father, Georg, is the former chairman of the European Baseball Coaches Association, and Tom has been a longtime standout on the international baseball scene, most recently representing the country at the U18 World Cup in Japan in September.

Yeah, their backgrounds immediately stood out to me as well. The Dodgers are scouting seemingly everywhere.

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