Community Prospect List No. 30

Who is the 30th-best prospect on the farm?

Spring Training is right around the corner, which will change our evaluation of some San Francisco Giants prospects. But we’re not waiting until then to rank those prospects, as the 2025 Willie McCovey Memorial Community Prospect List marches on, and with it our quest to rank the top 44 prospects in the organization.

We’re now done with the 20s! In the latest chapter, left-handed starting pitcher Jack Choate rounded out that block, as he was voted the No. 29 prospect in the system. That’s a rise of two spots for Choate over his No. 31 placement in last year’s CPL.

Choate, a tall southpaw who will turn 24 right as the season is getting started, was an underslot ninth-round pick in the 2022 draft who immediately started to turn heads. After a brilliant full-season debut in 2023, Choate began the 2024 season with High-A Eugene, where he was excellent. In 19 games with the Emeralds, he had a 2.90 ERA, a 3.13 FIP, and 10.1 strikeouts against just 2.2 walks per nine innings.

That earned him a midseason promotion to AA Richmond, where Choate ran into some bumps in the road for the first time in his young career. In eight starts with the Flying Squirrels, the Assumption College product had a 5.82 ERA and a 4.41 FIP, and while his strikeout rate rose slightly (10.9 per nine innings), his walk rate more than doubled (4.8 per nine innings).

Choate is an interesting pitcher who probably would have excelled a few decades ago. He has a funky delivery and some highly-effective off-speed pitches, all from the left side — very good things! He also has a fastball that lives almost exclusively in the 80s, and you simply don’t see a lot of MLB success — especially for starters — when that’s the case. 2025 will be a big season for Choate, and we’ll learn a lot about whether he can either increase that velocity, or work around it.

Now let’s move on, and we’ve got a few new names to vote on!

The list so far

1. Bryce Eldridge — 1B
2. Carson Whisenhunt — LHP
3. James Tibbs III — OF
4. Rayner Arias — OF
5. Josuar de Jesus González — SS
6. Jhonny Level — SS
7. Mason Black — RHP
8. Dakota Jordan — OF
9. Joe Whitman — LHP
10. Reggie Crawford — LHP
11. Bo Davidson — OF
12. Aeverson Arteaga — SS
13. Wade Meckler — OF
14. Walker Martin — SS
15. Trevor McDonald — RHP
16. Diego Velasquez — SS/2B
17. Lisbel Diaz — OF
18. Sabin Ceballos — 3B
19. Carson Ragsdale — RHP
20. Trent Harris — RHP
21. Carson Seymour — RHP
22. Jose Ortiz — CF
23. Maui Ahuna — SS
24. Victor Bericoto — OF/1B
25. Robert Hipwell — 3B
26. Jonah Cox — CF
27. Josh Bostick — RHP
28. Argenis Cayama — RHP
29. Jack Choate — LHP

Note: Clicking on the above names will link to the CPL where they were voted onto the list.

No. 30 prospect nominees

Jacob Bresnahan — 19.7-year old LHP — 10.98 ERA/7.32 FIP in Giants Low-A (19.2 IP); 4.50 ERA/6.83 FIP in Guardians Low-A (4 IP); 2.54 ERA/3.57 FIP in ACL (46 IP)

Jakob Christian — 22.4-year old OF — .878 OPS/130 wRC+ in Low-A (37 PA)

Gerelmi Maldonado — 21.1-year old RHP — did not play in 2024 (in 2023, 4.71 ERA/4.83 FIP in 65 Low-A IP)

Onil Perez — 22.4-year old C — .637 OPS/87 wRC+ in High-A (350 PA)

Juan Sánchez — 24.2-year old LHP — 3.93 ERA/5.17 FIP in AAA (34.1 IP)

Adrián Sugastey — 22.3-year old C — .545 OPS/54 wRC+ in AA (191 PA)

Cole Waites — 26.7-year old RHP — Did not play in 2024

Note: Each player’s first name links to their Baseball-Reference page, and their last name links to their Fangraphs page. All stats are from the 2024 season.