Jo Adell, the consensus top-10 prospect

Angels outfield prospect Jo Adell is one of the brightest young talents in baseball. On the cusp of the majors, Adell — who doesn’t even turn 21 until April 8 — is popping up near the top of various national prospect rankings.

The outfielder has appeared in six games so far this spring, going 5-for-17 (.294) with a double and a stolen base. This follows a year that saw him start in the Class-A California League but end in Triple-A Salt Lake as a 20 year old. He’s taking his opportunity this spring in stride.

At some point, maybe even as early as this season, Adell will find his way into the Angels outfield to become a potentially-exciting addition to what figures to be an already improved offense. His ZiPS projection for 2020 — .272/.323/.451, 106 wRC+, 2.7 WAR — is the fourth-highest projected WAR on the team.

Adell’s write-up on MLB Pipeline, which rated him the No. 6 prospect in baseball, described him as: “Big and physical, Adell’s plus speed makes him a five-tool threat.”

With anyone not even old enough to drink yet, there is still room for development, of course. And there are some concerns, as even his rapid rise across three minor league levels in 2019 included 94 strikeouts against only 30 walks, and a 32.8-percent strikeout rate in his first taste (27 games) of Triple-A.

“The concern with Adell is his contact rate,” wrote Kiley McDaniel at ESPN. “He has frequently had strikeout spikes at each new level before settling in and has been tinkering with swing mechanics in the past year or so.”

Even with that concern, McDaniel rated Adell as the 10th-best prospect in baseball, so the upside is obvious. That is Adell’s lowest showing on this year’s various national prospect rankings. Adell is a consensus top-10 prospect.

The only other Angel to appear on all five national top-100 lists is another outfielder, Brandon Marsh, who rates as high as No. 27 (ESPN) and as low as No. 79 (MLB Pipeline). He was a second-round draft pick in 2016, with Adell selected in the first round the following year.

Jordyn Adams, the Angels’ first-round selection in the 2018 draft, is ranked in the top 100 on two of these lists, with yet another outfielder, D’Shawn Knowles, ranked 99th on the Baseball Prospectus list.