I don't know if you've noticed, but prospect call-ups have been kind of a drag so far.
It dates back to last year, actually, when Ian Anderson and Ke'Bryan Hayes were about the only ones to arrive with worthwhile numbers. (OK, so Sixto Sanchez did as well, but who remembers him, right?) Flash forward to this year, and Jarred Kelenic is batting .096 through 23 games. He seemed like as sure a bet as you could find.
Chris Towers wrote about this phenomenon a couple weeks back, and we could all come up with theories for why it's the case. But the bottom line is I'm more reluctant now to make a big play for a prospect the moment I learn he's coming up, which is why I can only offer a tepid endorsement of Royals right-hander Jackson Kowar even though he's been darn near untouchable at Triple-A, putting together a 0.85 ERA, 0.88 WHIP and 11.7 K/9 across six starts.
He's set to make his major-league debut Monday at the Angels, and sure, I guess it's exciting. I dutifully put in a claim for him in every league where he was still available. He was already stashed in several, which tells you that some people have been eagerly awaiting this moment. I myself included Kowar among my top five prospects to stash the past couple weeks.
But does that mean I'm confident in the way he'll perform? How could I be?
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I don't know exactly when it began -- maybe about the time Carlos Correa and Francisco Lindor came up in 2015, maybe a little earlier -- but for several years, prospects were like easy money in Fantasy Baseball. Sure, a number of them flopped in their first chance in the majors, but as long as they were of a certain stature, the chances were good that they'd deliver on their full potential right away.
Now, though, the "lottery ticket" analogy feels more appropriate than ever. You want to give yourself a chance at a big score, but you've been reminded over and over again that the odds are against it.
Maybe Kowar will be different. Of the four pitchers the Royals selected in the first round of 2018 -- Brady Singer, Daniel Lynch (more on him in a bit) and Kris Bubic being the others -- Kowar was thought to be the most natural bat-misser, buoyed by a changeup that just drops off a cliff. He worked to shore up his delivery at the alternate training site last year, hoping to command his fastball better, and his numbers this year would suggest those efforts paid off. Indeed, at 24, it seems like there isn't much left for him to learn in the minors.
"His fastball command has been outstanding," assistant GM J.J. Picollo recently said. "And that's really where it starts for every pitcher. His changeup has been dominating at times, like we've always known, that's his go-to pitch. But I think the difference is, there's been nights where he didn't have the dominating changeup, but he had a really good curveball."
But wasn't the Royals brass saying the same sorts of things about Lynch just a couple weeks ago? You see how that turned out.
I don't want to be a downer. Kowar doesn't deserve it. Other prospects' failures have nothing to do with him, really. So yeah, take your shot and see how it goes. But blow half your FAB on him? Let's just say there are other targets from this weekend who are deserving of bigger bids.
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Fantasy Baseball Waiver Wire: Jackson Kowar gets his shot; Patrick Wisdom keeps hitting home runs - CBS Sports
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