What do Jo Adell, Brady Singer, Kris Bubic, Luis Garcia, Andres Gimenez, and Joey Bart have in common? 

 

They made their major league debuts this season – but so did Luis Robert, Evan White, Sixto Sanchez, and many others. This group is different because they’re only in the majors because of the pandemic. Had the season begun under normal circumstances, Garcia would be on the Fresno Grizzlies, Bart the Sacramento River Cats, Singer the Omaha Storm Chasers, and so on. But here’s the other thing:

They’re not the only ones.

Players are debuting in the major leagues more frequently than in years past. Necessity and circumstance (the minor leagues don’t exist!) have driven this subset of rookies to debut sooner than their organizations’ planned. If they succeed, they could shorten the development curves for many young players who come after. That’s a lot of pressure for a group of kids who weren’t expected to play in the majors this season.

Intentionally or not, this season offers a unique look into the process of player development. It’s providing a counterpoint to years of doing things a certain way. Players take three to five years to reach the majors. They spend roughly a year per level developing. At least, they used to.

But again, it’s not the entirety of the 2020 debut class that has the future in their hands. It’s a particular subset that could alter the way we look at player timelines.

Let’s break the debuting class into three categories: prospects, non-prospects, and pandemic rookies.

The Prospects are those players we can reasonably assume would have debuted in 2020 regardless of the situation. These players should also have at least a reasonable chance of turning into regular or better players. Since we’re not looking strictly at rookies, but at debuts, these guys probably played most or all of last season in Triple-A.

Prospect Debuts: Luis Robert, Evan White, Nick Madrigal, Daniel Johnson, Monte Harrison, Nate Pearson, James Kaprielian, Keibert Ruiz, Max Schrock, Ryan Mountcastle, Devin Williams, Sixto Sanchez, and others

Further separating out these this class of debuts, the Non-Prospects are exactly that: non-prospect debuts. These are older debuts or players debuting largely because of a lack of organizational depth. No shade here, it’s not as if these players can’t or won’t become valuable major leaguers. It’s just that we don’t expect it of them. This group also includes some prospects whose star has dimmed over the years.

Non-Prospect Debuts: Tyson Miller, Tyrone Taylor, Thomas Hatch, Taylor Widener, Mauricio Dubon, Chadwick Tromp, Andy Young, Sterling Sharp

Finally, those players making the jump from Double-A or lower are the players that could prompt a major shift in expected development arcs. These players we can reasonably assume were not expected to be in the majors this season (or this early) has the season kicked off as usual.

There’s obviously a ton of subjectivity here. Based on the level a rookie played at last season, their status on top prospect lists, and the amount of buzz around them prior to the season, we can make reasonable projections. Really what we’re driving at here is making educated guesses for what each team planned for this set of rookies, and trying to identify players who had their development fast-tracked because of the pandemic-shortened season. That’s our Pandemic Rookies.

Pandemic Rookies: Brady Singer, Luis Garcia, Andres Gimenez, Kris Bubic, Isaac Paredes, Franklyn Kilome, Seth Romero, Luis Patino, David Peterson, Leody Taveras, Jo Adell, Daulton Varsho, Corbin Martin, Joey Bart

 

The Stakes

 

There’s a potential financial impact to consider. Those players who debut this season and stick on the roster will get credit for a full season of service time. With only a third of a normal schedule, if a player is on the roster for the full season, he’ll get a full year of service time but only 60 games to develop. This freshman class will essentially have their service clocks some 50 games or more ahead of their actual development time. That means becoming arbitration-eligible 50 games early too.

We don’t yet know how arbitration panels are going to handle the facts of this shortened season. Arbitration panels are famously antiquated in their approach to estimating player worth, valuing back-of-the-baseball-card stats like batting average and volume metrics like home runs for hitters and wins for pitchers. They don’t heavily weigh rate statistics like wRC+ or defensive metrics. They like awards, but only a small percentage of the player body will have nabbed the hardware to get that bump.

Starting a player’s service clock as soon as possible tends to get an earlier pay bump, but if they end up being penalized by losing both the development and volume stats of those extra 50-some games, they could lose money in the long run. Each year’s arbitration amount is heavily dependent on the year prior, so if arb1 values for this freshman class are depressed by the speedy service clock, owners will have actually found a way to make players lose money by making their pro debuts early.

The financial impact affects all rookies this season. Except those who have already signed long-term deals. Like Luis Robert of the White Sox. Robert is the mayor of hype city right now, more so than most rookies. Frankly, he deserves it. I mean, just look at him. He’s a charmer.

https://gfycat.com/chillyposhemu

Eloy Jimenez there is playing the part of every rookie not getting the recognition of Robert. Of course, Robert has a 142 wRC+ through his first 26 games as a big leaguer. That’s nuts.

But Robert is the exception to the rule. It’s the success or failure of the middle class that could change the way we view young players. So far, it’s a mixed bag: Adell (50 PA, 50 wRC+), Singer (6 starts, 5.16 ERA/5.62 FIP), Bubic (4 starts, 5.12 ERA/5.43 FIP), Gimenez (62 PA, 76 wRC+), Garcia (25 PA, 107 wRC+).

As ever, there are games within the game of baseball. One to follow the rest of the way is the success or failure of these Pandemic Rookies. About a third of the way through the season, we’re coming to a critical juncture for these young players. Pay attention, because if they can stick in the bigs, we might have to look at young players differently. But only if they’re ready.