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20-year-old Outfielder Mike Trout is ranked #3 in the MLB-to-be. He is neck and neck with Washington Nationals mascara model Bryce Harper and Tampa Bay Rays lefthanded starting pitcher Matt Moore, ranked #1 and #2 respectively. Sickels once worked as the minor league guru for the Bristol Conneticut Sports Network known as ESPN and has been with SBN running the Minor League Ball blog for almost seven years. He is an astute judge of talent. Following Trout is our newest nemesis Yu Darvish.
Ranking #66 is infielder Jean Segura. He saw limited action in 2011 because of a hamstring injury, so expect to catch him in San Berdoo at least to start the season. A few dominoes falling his way could see him hit Anaheim by September.
Ranking #96 is Garrett Richards. He had an inauspicious big league debut last year and will likely be starting at AAA Salt Lake with its disheartening altitude-induced homers but there is a lot of room between his 2011 numbers and his perceived ceiling.
Why don't the Angels have more prospects than these three? There are a few ex-Angels on the national list: the #23 prospect in all of baseball is Tyler Skaggs. He was with the Angels minor leagues just one season before being traded to the Arizona Diamondbacks along with Joe Saunders for Dan Haren.
Another former Halo farmhand, Alexander Torres (#102) was traded along with Sean Rodriguez to Tampa for Scott Kazmir. Win some, lose some, but hey that would make five right there.
Additionally, the Angels minors might be slightly bare going into 2012 because of so many graduations. Players like Mark Trumbo and Tyler Chatwood would not have arrived in 2012 the veterans assumed to hold their positions had done so. Perhaps next year's preseason list will include some members of the impressive 2011 Orem Owlz squad Like Kaleb Cowart and C.J. Cron. Hope springs eternal whenever the subject is the kids!