Which team has the best farm? I am going to attempt to answer this question completely objectively by analyzing who I consider the top 4 farm systems: Braves, White Sox, Yankees, and Brewers. The first step will be to come up with an average rating for the Top 200 prospects for each team. Then, I will assign a monetary value to each prospect. Sum up the values, and declare a winner.
Step 1 - Calculate average ranking of all Top 200 prospects.
This is done by averaging the ranks given by BP, MLPPipeline, BA and Sickels (I will add in FG when it is posted). Any prospect that ranks as a Top 100 by any site, but is not rated by all sites, will be assumed to have "just missed" the other lists and will be assigned a ranking of 110. Any player that only appears on Sickel's list from 101-200 will be assigned his ranking based only on Sickel's list (since that is the only data available).
For example, Gohara is ranked 75 by Sickels, but outside the Top 100 by BP, MLBPipeline, and BA. Therefore, he is assigned a ranking of 110 for the other 3 outlets. Same thing happened for guys like Fried, Adams (Yanks), Chapman (Yanks), and Fulmer (Sox). Acuna was not listed in the MLBPipeline Top 100, so was given a 110 from them as well.
There were a couple oddities for the Brewers: Phillips and Clark. Both were Top 100 guys for BP and MLBPipeline, but didn't show up at all in Sickel's Top 200. I can only assume they were oversights, so I didn't include an entry in their Sickel's column (both were assigned a 110 from BA).
Step 2 - Determine what each ranking slot is worth.
For this, I used the expected surplus values of prospects, here http://www.thepointofpittsburgh.com/...dated-edition/.
Rather than using an imprecise step function, I calculated a linear progression from each known value. For example, we know 1-10 hitters are worth an average of $73.5M, and 11-25 hitters are worth an average of $62M. What this actually means is that a 5.5 ranked hitting prospect is worth $73.5M, and an 18 ranked hitting prospect is worth $62M. I calculated the linear relationship between all these known values to assign a dollar value to each spot, 1-200.
Example results: A #1 hitter is worth $77.33M, #100 hitter worth $19.74M, all the way down to a #200 hitter being worth $12.54M. A #1 pitcher is worth $80.2M, #100 pitcher worth $15.17M, all the way down to a #200 pitcher worth $11.57M.
Results - Here are the tables for all 4 teams (apologies in advance for how bad they will look):
Braves Position BP MLB BA Sickel AVG Value
Swanson 0 2 4 3 3 3.0 $75.42
Acuna 0 31 110 67 68 69.0 $22.11
Albies 0 35 12 11 10 17.0 $62.96
Newcomb 1 44 47 78 58 56.8 $19.69
Soroka 1 64 91 48 57 65.0 $16.50
Allard 1 67 61 37 26 47.8 $24.48
Gohara 1 110 110 110 75 101.3 $15.13
Anderson 1 96 77 66 89 82.0 $15.89
Maitan 0 100 90 77 98 91.3 $20.38
Fried 1 110 110 110 61 97.8 $15.24
Touki 1 123 123.0 $14.34
Riley 0 149 149.0 $16.21
Wentz 1 159 159.0 $13.04
Pache 0 183 183.0 $13.76
Total $345.16
Yankees Position BP MLB BA Sickel AVG Value
Torres 0 15 17 5 7 11.0 $68.71
Frazier 0 16 15 39 34 26.0 $52.48
Rutherford 0 49 51 45 39 46.0 $33.14
Sheffield 1 52 78 91 54 68.8 $16.36
Kaprielian 1 58 110 87 62 79.3 $16.00
Mateo 0 43 18 85 70 54.0 $28.09
Adams 1 110 110 110 78 102.0 $15.10
Chapman 1 110 110 110 79 102.3 $15.10
Abreu 1 82 110 110 101 100.8 $15.13
Judge 0 63 22 90 143 79.5 $21.32
Wade 1 101 110 110 107.0 $14.92
Total $296.33
White Sox Position BP MLB BA Sickel AVG Value
Moncada 0 5 1 2 2 2.5 $75.42
Giolito 1 10 3 25 14 13.0 $51.88
Kopech 1 36 30 31 15 28.0 $34.40
Lopez 1 30 38 32 31 32.8 $32.10
Collins 0 89 80 56 55 70.0 $22.04
Fulmer 1 110 58 110 67 86.3 $15.74
Burdi 1 128 128.0 $14.16
Dunning 1 130 130.0 $14.09
Hansen 1 97 110 110 133 112.5 $14.70
Total $274.52
Brewers Position BP MLB BA Sickel AVG Value
Brinson 0 12 14 27 33 21.5 $57.24
Hader 0 19 34 33 37 30.8 $46.53
Ray 0 41 27 42 48 39.5 $36.94
Diaz 0 59 97 93 90 84.8 $20.96
Dubon 0 118 118.0 $18.44
Ortiz 1 68 52 79 120 79.8 $15.96
Woodruff 1 110 110 82 121 105.8 $14.95
Bickford 1 110 54 124 96.0 $15.31
Diplan 1 181 181.0 $12.25
Erceg 0 200 200.0 $12.54
Phillips* 0 75 63 110 82.7 $21.10
Clark* 0 99 62 110 90.3 $20.46
Total $292.68
Conclusion - Braves win, for now...
At this moment in time, the Braves clearly have the most valuable farm system in the game. About a week into the season, Swanson will lose rookie eligibility, and the Braves will drop below all 3 of these teams listed here. When the ChiSox trade Q, they will add about $50M-$100M and take a commanding lead in these rankings.
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