Every year Baseball America rates each team's top 10 prospects based on "projections of a player's long term worth after discussions with scouting and player-development personnel."  How do these professionals project a player's long term worth?  Probably some combo of qualitative and quantitative observations, but no one knows the exact science (assuming there is one). 

We are going to try to put some numbers with these rankings for the pitchers.  Seven of the 10 Mets prospects are pitchers.  6 Starters and 1 Reliever.  They are Mike Pelfrey, Philip Humber, Joe Smith, Kevin Mulvey, Deolis Guerra and Jon Neise.  Alay Soler was released from the Mets last Tuesday, so we are going to leave him out of our review.  We have gathered these players’ minor league stats (and college stats if they were scholars) and added a few calculations of our own to see just how promising these players are.  Sure, some scouts can say Deolis Guerra has the Best Changeup, but what else is going on down in the farm?  Below is a ranking of the 7 pitchers and are comments about each of them.

In our review we looked at the Players experience (college and minors), their age, ERA, IP, HR/9, BB/9, K/9, WHIP and DICE (Defense Independent Component ERA).  For those who need a refresher, DICE was invented by Clay Dreslough in 2001 and covered in this SaberMETrics article.  DICE is a formula that takes the effect of Defense out of a pitcher's ERA.

Our #1 Met's pitching prospect, to no one's surprise, is Mike Pelfrey.  His AA numbers last year were very good.  His 10.5 K/9, 3.5 BB/9, and 0.3 HR/9 were outstanding.  His DICE was 2.24, lower then his ERA, which is a nice sign.  Pelfrey did give up 60 hits in 66 innings, which is why his WHIP is at 1.30.  For such a high prospect you would like to see the WHIP be lower.  

We love Pelfrey's ability to keep the ball in the park his high K/BB ratio.  He should be the 5th starter this year and he has been projected to be a #2 starter or even a #1. 

Mike Pelfrey
Year	Team	Age	Level	ERA	IP	HR9	BB9	K9	WHIP	DICE
2003	Wichita St	19	NCAA	2.49	104	0.8	1.3	8.4	0.91	2.67
2004	Wichita St	20	NCAA	2.18	115	0.2	1.9	9.8	0.95	1.68
2005	Wichita St	21	NCAA	1.93	139	0.3	1.9	9.2	0.90	1.97
2006	St. Lucie	22	A+	1.64	22	0.4	0.8	10.6	0.86	1.50
	Binghamton	22	AA	2.71	66.1	0.3	3.5	10.5	1.30	2.24
	Norfolk	22	AAA	2.25	8	1.1	5.6	6.8	1.13	5.00
	NY Mets	22	MLB	5.48	21.1	0.4	5.1	5.5	1.73	4.09
Majors: 1 Season				5.48	21.1	0.42	5.1	5.5	1.73	4.09
Minors: 1 Season				2.43	96.1	0.37	3.1	10	1.19	2.30

Our #2 Mets pitching prospect is Philip Humber.  Humber did a very good job last year in High A and AA.  The 9 K/9 to 2 BB/9 ratios are impressive.  WHIPs of 0.87 in A and 1.02 in AA are outstanding.  The only knock we have on Humber is he is giving up 1 HR/9.  While in the majors this is a decent number, in A and AA a lot of players are still developing there power, so there are not as many HRs hit at those levels.  The higher ratio of homeruns is why the DICE is higher then his actual ERA.  If Humber can keep the ball in the yard he should do very well.  Some scouts project him as a #3 starter, and we think he could top out as a number 2.

Philip Humber
Year	Team	Age	Level	ERA	IP	HR9	BB9	K9	WHIP	DICE
2002	Rice	19	NCAA	2.78	110	0.7	3.5	10.6	1.21	2.75
2003	Rice	20	NCAA	3.3	128	0.8	2.7	9.7	1.10	2.98
2004	Rice	21	NCAA	2.27	115	0.6	2.9	12.1	1.08	2.08
2005	St. Lucie	22	A+	4.99	70.1	0.8	2.3	8.3	1.31	3.03
	Binghamton	22	AA	6.75	4	0.0	4.5	4.5	1.50	3.50
2006	GC Mets	23	Rk	6.75	4	0.0	2.3	15.8	2.00	0.25
	St. Lucie	23	A+	2.37	38	1.0	2.1	8.5	0.87	3.18
	Binghamton	23	AA	2.88	34.1	1.1	2.6	9.4	1.02	3.29
	NY Mets	23	MLB	0	2	0	4.5	9	0.5	2.50
Majors: 1 Season				0	2	0	4.5	9	0.5	2.50
Minors: 2 Seasons				3.95	150	0.84	2.4	8.8	1.16	3.07

Joe Smith is our #3 pitching prospect.  Joe is a sidearm reliever out of Wright State.  The Mets hope he will be able to fill Chad Bradford's role in the bullpen.  Smith was drafted in 2006 and only pitched 12 innings in AA.  His college numbers were impressive and his spring training stats have been very good so far (6.1 IP, 2 hits, 2 walks, 7 Ks and 0 runs).  Smith's last season in college produced a 0.98 ERA and he didn't give up any HRs in 55 IP.  We like Smith to be in the bullpen this year and contributing meaningfully.

Joe Smith
Year	Team	Age	Level	ERA	IP	HR9	BB9	K9	WHIP	DICE
2004	Wright St	19	NCAA	2.75	36	0.25	2.8	10	1.31	2.06
2005	Wright St	20	NCAA	1.1	32.2	0.28	3.3	12	0.92	1.91
2006	Wright St	21	NCAA	0.98	55	0	2.6	10	0.91	1.58
	Binghamton	21	AA	5.68	12.2	0.71	7.8	8.5	1.82	4.80
Minors: 1 Season				5.9	12.2	0.74	8.1	8.9	1.89	4.80

Kevin Mulvey is our #4 prospect.  Mulvey gives up a low number of HRs, has good control, and pitched well in his short stint in AA last season.  While some of his college numbers are high, he has a low DICE, high Ks and low BBs.  Perhaps the Villanova quality of fielding and the ball parks they played in contributed to his higher WHIP and ERA.

Kevin Mulvey
Year	Team	Age	Level	ERA	IP	HR9	BB9	K9	WHIP	DICE
2004	Villanova	20	NCAA	5.29	80	0.23	5.1	6.9	1.59	3.49
2005	Villanova	21	NCAA	4.65	71.2	0.25	3.5	9.2	1.44	2.49
2006	Villanova	22	NCAA	3.61	92.1	0.39	2.2	8.6	1.23	2.40
	GC Mets	22	Rk	0	2	0	0	4.5	0.5	2.00
	Binghamton	22	AA	1.35	13.1	0.68	3.4	6.8	1.13	3.61
Minors: 1 Season				1.19	15.1	0.6	3	6.6	1.06	3.40

Deolis Guerra is our #5 prospect.  He was 17 last season pitching in A Hagerstown.  in 81.2 innings he have a 7 to 4 K/9 to BB/9 ratio, only gave up .33 HR/9, had an ERA of 2.2 and a DICE of 3.27.  That is terrific numbers for a 17 year old.  Who knows if he will make the long journey to the majors some day, but he has pitched well enough in A ball to get noticed.

Deolis Guerra
Year	Team	Age	Level	ERA	IP	HR9	BB9	K9	WHIP	DICE
2006	Hagerstown	17	A	2.2	81.2	0.33	4.1	7.1	1.18	3.27
	St. Lucie	17	A+	6.14	7.1	1.23	7.4	6.1	2.05	5.96
Minors: 1 Season				2.53	89	0.4	4.4	7	1.25	3.48

Jon Niese rounds out the list at #6.   Jon is another young pitcher in the Mets farm system.  At age 19 Jon had a solid season in A ball.  In 123 innings he had a 9.6 K/9, 4.5 BB/9, 3.93 ERA, 3.11 DICE and only gave up .51 HR/9.  His WHIP was high at 1.48, but at 19 years old this kid has time to mature and improve in the minor leagues

Jon Niese
Year	Team	Age	Level	ERA	IP	HR9	BB9	K9	WHIP	DICE
2005	GC Mets	18	Rk	3.65	24.2	0.36	3.7	8.8	1.34	2.79
2006	Hagerstown	19	A	3.93	123	0.51	4.5	9.6	1.48	3.11
	St. Lucie	19	A+	4.5	10	0	4.5	9	1.3	2.50
Minors: 2 Season				3.93	158	0.46	4.4	9.5	1.45	3.02