An inside look at the Phillies top prospects.
(MLBPipeline lists the top 30 prospects on each team’s website. While biding time waiting for baseball to resume, Steve Potter will provide his views of these young players. A Clearwater resident, his passion is seeing and following these prospects in person. Normally, Spectrum Field and Carpenter Complex are his second homes. His 4th Annual Phillies Minor League Digest is on sale at www.amazon.com.)
OF Jhailyn Ortiz
Phillies #18 prospect according to MLB.com … 21 years old … signed 7/10/2015 - from Jarabacoa, Dominican Republic
We first saw Jhailyn as a 17 year old on the backfields of Carpenter Complex shortly after he signed. I remember watching as he crushed a baseball well into the trees beyond the left field fence on Roberts Field ... it was one of those “wow” 😳 moments as not many hitters can send a baseball into that area ... tremendous raw power.
In Fall Instructs that year we saw throwing ability that Mr. Salisbury would describe as “hose worthy” ... he plays with great joy and loves to show off his arm ... that day he let one sail from right field attempting to get a runner at third and it landed on the fly about 20 rows deep into the seats along the third base line - again a wow 😳 moment ... certainly reflected excellent arm strength - we’ve seen him since refined to actually hit the fielder’s glove 🤓
Projection : Jhailyn is a very popular teammate, always affable and welcoming to all. He’s a big man but can move quite well, no doubt in this observer’s mind he stays an outfielder - plus arm. We’ve even seen him play center field. The raw power is real, he needs to adjust to and better recognize off speed deliveries, is a very aggressive hitter but if that clicks you’re looking at a player capable of 30 plus homers annually ... Jhailyn has had some vision issues, hopefully corrected with prescription lenses - he wears goggles to play. I like him a lot and see a big league future ahead.
