Eric Longenhagen Prospects Chat – 2026 Regional Edition
May 29, 2026
896 views
| 12:04 |
: Good morning from Tempe on a gorgeous Friday, I’m excited to overeat baseball today. I’ve got Squeeze Play on but the Kentucky/Wake game is the big one starting shortly, so if you have to pick one I suggest that.
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| 12:05 |
: Hey Eric, do you have a prediction for who makes it to Omaha?
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| 12:09 |
: Last week I mentioned Georgia Tech, UCLA, Auburn. Auburn’s path was made easier by the way the brackets shook out. If I’m looking for a deeper seed to sneak in it’s coming from the Chapel Hill and Lincoln regionals.
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| 12:10 |
: Have you seen Luis Hernandez in person this year or heard anything from scouts to lend context (good or bad) to what hes done so far this year?
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| 12:12 |
: Yeah, like six times. I like him, I don’t think he has the enormous physical tools of a guy who we eventually rank 3rd or anything like that. He’s a skilled, smaller player who gets a lot out of his body because of how well he rotates.
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| 12:13 |
: Do they not have velos in Morgantown? Lemme crack the trackman real quick…
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| 12:14 |
: How real is Justin Lamkin? He pushing for a 50FV?
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| 12:16 |
: My chest hair is so voluminous that people would jus yell “Ahhhhh Kelly Clarkson” at me in high school and college….
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| 12:19 |
: Lamkin sitting 92-94, maxed 94.7 this year, playing like a plus pitch, gyro slider 79-84, playing like a 70, has only thrown 40 changeups. Doesn’t look like a 70 slider to me visually. Think juicing him into the 50s is a little rich for me off hand.
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| 12:19 |
: Did you catch Jump’s debut? Any thoughts?
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| 12:20 |
: looked like Jump: big velo early, average velo late, scattered command for stretches, really nasty mix of breakers and a decent enough cambio. Mid rotation look on stuff, five and dive style likely due to walks
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| 12:22 |
: Jaxon Jelkin sitting 94-95 right now for Kentucky, 19 inches horizontal break. Really interesting physical package at a lanky 6-foot-6 or so, more a dev project than a finished one right now.
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| 12:22 |
: Were we a year early on Austin Overn? Looks like he’s getting to the pop more this year. Are the Ks going to compromise the profile though?
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| 12:23 |
: (not a great start for Kentucky)
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| 12:26 |
: Overn still looking like a 30 hit tool and the underlying power data isn’t all that different than last year. Dangerous hitter middle-in, not so much when you locate away from him. Like the tools and thought he had more physical projection than most college hitters but I don’t think he’s big arrow up this year or anything.
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| 12:26 |
: not off hand, anyway
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| 12:28 |
: Liam Peterson of Florida … I’ve seen some draft rankings and mocks that have him solidly in the top 10 and at least one other where he wasn’t in the top 30. Why so much variance? If he makes the bigs will it be as a starter?
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| 12:31 |
: Reasonable people could conclude he’s going to be a reliever (due to delivery and command inconsistency) and therefore have him buried. Others might see one of the better four-pitch mixes in the draft and consider his issues at least semi-fixable with the right lower body conditioning. I’m more inclined toward the latter, give me the guy with monster stuff. First rounder.
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| 12:33 |
: Surprise! Two run homer for UIC, a guy with 4 homers entering the postseason lol.
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| 12:33 |
: Chris Levonas sitting 97 in Morgantown btw.
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| 12:33 |
: You referenced Elly the other week not necessarily as a direct comp, but I think as a body comp for Darrell Morel. With that kind of lanky athlete, is this a guy we should expect to develop kind of slowly as he figures out how to control all of those arms and legs?
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| 12:34 |
: Yes. Scary contact rate, pretty amazing defensive ability for a guy his size. Sitting here with a 40+ on him as I work the Pirates system.
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| 12:34 |
: Is there anything left for Kade Anderson to prove/work on in the minors or is he ready to just be up in the majors
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| 12:34 |
: I bet he’d be good if he got called up tomorrow.
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| 12:34 |
: What tools/traits do you prioritize more/less than other evaluators? Saw Keith Law put out an updated top 50 list and made me think about why his list might differ from yours and others.
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| 12:35 |
: I like the good baseball players.
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| 12:35 |
: (I keed I keed)
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| 12:37 |
: For pitchers I care about durability and proximity a lot. For hitters I care about freaks. I don’t necessarily think that’s different than anyone else but those are things I care about. Sometimes that plays out nicely and I’m earlier on Elly, Basallo, Wood but also surfacing Bleis and Canario and Luciano too soon and dont care enough about Sal Stewart. Sometimes I’m properly positioned on Parker Messick a year early but too heavy on Curet.
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| 12:37 |
: Are surprised that Enddy Azocar was promoted to HiA already? Off to a good start (just a few games), but what would you be looking for to affirm the promotion and continue to grow his player eval?
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| 12:37 |
: We stuffed him. Wanna see him hit stuff on the outer third. Grooved swing guy.
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| 12:37 |
: Robert Arias went down with a scary looking leg injury yesterday. Any word on the specific injury / severity?
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| 12:37 |
: I’ve go nothing a the moment and that’s a tight lipped org. Once he goes on the IL there will need to be a listed reason and I can access it through sources more easily.
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| 12:38 |
: Josh Kuroda-Grauer hasn’t slowed down a bit since getting bumped to AAA (though I guess that shouldn’t be a surprise considering the environment). Not sure if you have any EV data for him, but does he have the raw pop to make this new approach (which seems to be more lift / pull oriented) work in the majors?
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| 12:38 |
: Fwiw, basically everyone’s EV data is up. Lemme peek real quick.
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| 12:43 |
: His stuff is up some: hard hit rate up 7% points, which is a bigger gap than the minor league wide baseline (which is to be up 3 points), but his peak exits are not really up. there’s way more pull/lift than last year which he hitting environment in Vegas/PCL will highlight a ton. Without going super deep to see if the swing is different, i looks on the spreadsheet like it might be. Great contact hitter, obvs.
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| 12:43 |
: Joshua Baez is a hot name in social media prospect circles. Is the defense good enough to stick in CF? Any alleviation of concerns around higher zone velocity?
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| 12:43 |
: I dont think he’s going to hit
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| 12:44 |
: Which prospects are likely to make the biggest jumps on (or into) the top 100 at mid season?
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| 12:44 |
: River Ryan looks healthy and awesome and will leap into the top twenty or so
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| 12:45 |
: This is more of a general question than a prospect-specific one. But looking at a guy like Braylin Tavera for example. He’s 21 (and will be for the whole season) and basically the age of any college 2026 draftee. While his stats aren’t crazy, he is hitting for a decent average, decent power, good defense. And he’s not worthy of a mention from nearly any prospect writer. Do international/high school guys sort of pay a ranking/status tax because their developmental years are in the pros rather than college? I have to imagine that nearly any 2026 draft pick who put up numbers like Tavera would be referred to as either “holding his own” or “seamless transition” despite the K numbers.
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| 12:46 |
: He has a 61% contact rate, which is simply too low to be a big leaguer unless you have Joey Gallo or Jose Siri‘s physical tools.
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| 12:47 |
: How has your opinion changed on Murakami relative to before the season? Still a lot of whiff. How long can he keep this up?
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| 12:48 |
: Last year he had zero chance against well-executed locations. This year he’s dangerous all over. hat homer off of Soriano from earlier this year? He wasn’t doing anything like that the last two seasons, the part of the zone was just a hole for him. Body looks leaner, he’s getting to the power. Obviously let’s see how this plays ou over a long period of time, but I’ve seen enough to say this is a different/better player than the guy I put a 50 on during the offseason.
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| 12:48 |
: Squeeze Play, the early 80’s movie that was the early days of Cinemax or Showtime, watched for the possibility of seeing a female boob?
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| 12:49 |
: I had no idea there was a post-11pm Squeeze play
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| 12:49 |
: Georgia Tech offense starting to do Georgia Tech things
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| 12:50 |
: We’re ten minutes away from several more games starting.
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| 12:50 |
: Seems like Tampa has settled on a part time MI role for Carson Williams right now. Can he fix his approach problems on a part time basis? Obviously Tampa is doing great so they can’t really let him work through it
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| 12:50 |
: I think he can, but it’ll take longer his way. I agree this is simply what must be done, they’re too good to let him K 40% of the time while they’re winning like this.
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| 12:51 |
: You all were pretty in on Yilver De Paula coming into the year. Thoughts so far? Seems to be hitting well, but I expected the Ks to be a smidge lower. Maybe not surprising based on the lack of reps last year.
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| 12:51 |
: Were we? 40+ is a big grade for a DSL guy. Sub 70% contact rate right now… feels appropriate.
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| 12:52 |
: In previous chats you have mentioned that Africa is sort of the next big place for baseball in terms of scouting etc. Can you expand on that a bit? Why Africa?
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| 12:53 |
: There’s space there for baseball fields and cricket only has a hold on a fraction of the continent, neither of which is true for europe.
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| 12:54 |
: Wei-En Lin arrow up?
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| 12:56 |
: I’m glad the strikes have been where they have been, but he was a 45 and pick to click, and I think this is him tracking exactly like that. Between him, Jump, and Kade Morris, I think they have the best starter prospect depth in that division and it’s why I picked them to win the division
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| 12:56 |
: Have you seen any EV data for Jordan Yost? Reports during spring sounded like he’d added some strength.
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| 12:57 |
: 103 max, that’s like a 35
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| 12:57 |
: Which, honestly, is a little better than I thought he’d be based on how skinny he was at draft time
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| 12:57 |
: Of the crop of FV50 shortstops, are any differentiating themselves? It seems like they’re almost all hitting right now.
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| 12:58 |
: solo shot for the Vols
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| 1:01 |
: Honestly, I think the only thing I’d tweak about the shortstop on the hondo would be to side the injured guys somewhat and maybe have a Bruce Rainer reckoning. Brendan and I have been super happy with how the preseason hondo looks right now
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| 1:02 |
: Huge Vahn Lackey homer, 80-grade Mike Ferrin call
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| 1:03 |
: Hi Eric, excited for the tournament starting right now. I enjoyed Brendan’s article on the Big 12 tournament. Do you have any initial thoughts to share on the conference tournaments you saw in person?
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| 1:09 |
: I sat on the tourneys in the East Valley and my targets mostly got creamed. Guys with 50% slider miss rates on the season who couldn’t make it out of the second inning. The USF center fielder made several incredible plays but is hitting .190. St. Mary’s has a well-rounded baseball team and a nice underclass transfer portal target or two, Parker Dilhoff not a bad senior sign, Rohan Lettow (local kid, ASU initially, SDst now) has a sneaky fastball.
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| 1:09 |
: I just submitted several questions about power breakouts and promptly remembered Brendan mentioning it’s tough to tell cus of the ball. Oops 
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| 1:13 |
: IDK for sure if it’s the baseball itself but it’s our best guess. I do think there’s more being done with bat weight optimization across the minors, but that doesn’t sufficiently explain why hard hit rates are up 5 percentage points, minors wide, why ev90 average across the minors are up two ticks…
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| 1:14 |
: Regarding Steele Hall, this is from his blurb in the Reds updated 2026 list: “He has a realistic low-end regular shortstop floor, with more ceiling than that if it turns out Hall can shorten his swing enough to catch pro velocity.” Obviously too early to conclude much, but are you encouraged?
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| 1:14 |
: I’d say he’s holding serve. Sub 70% contact rate isn’t great…
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| 1:14 |
: Keith Law’s recent write up seems to attribute the resurgence of Felnin Celesten to effort and attitude. Have you had a closer look this year? Are you back in the Celesten train? Were you ever on/off?
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| 1:14 |
: He’s been on the hondo for two years, we like him.
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| 1:15 |
: The Brewers have continued to mesh their needs with their resources by using Patrick out of the pen for what seems like the rest of 2026. Along with Drohan, Hall and Ashby (though usually a 1-2 inning guy), they can navigate the middle late innings without evaporating their short-inning arms. With the limits on pitch counts and starters being minimized more every year, do you see this as the future of the big league staff in general? Or, does it take a pool of plus arms to make it worthwhile and successful beyond the usual bullpen game?
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| 1:15 |
: I think innings will continue to be spread out more evenly across the pitcher population until we get expansion and need to drill another 40 arms deep into the minors
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| 1:16 |
: Yeesh, not a good start for Auburn
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| 1:17 |
: Do you think Bazzana is up for good, or is the potential there for the Guardians to demote him if he struggles and someone like Arias is ready to return?
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| 1:17 |
: He’s crushing, he’s heir leadoff guy…he’s up for good.
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| 1:17 |
: Thoughts on Walbert Ureña’s MLB time so far? Would he still be a 40?
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| 1:17 |
: Outperforming his grade by a lot so far
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| 1:17 |
: What are the knocks on Ralphy Velazquez’ bat? KLaw says he stifles with spin – does he still? And what are his MLB comps in your opinion?
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| 1:19 |
: I would be so funny if Keith and I flipped on Ralphy. It’s a worse than average contact rate against spin but lower (as in better) than average chase. Doesn’t look super terrifying at first blush.
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| 1:20 |
: What’s your outlook on Johan De Los Santos?
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| 1:20 |
: Really love him, wish he were a better defender. If he could actually play second base, or if we had some idea of how he looks in CF, then we could justify sticking him right next to Roldy Brito on the hundred right now. Similar hitters, one guy can really play defense and the other cannot.
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| 1:21 |
: Deep cut…Any thoughts on Jack Lausch? Kiley had him top 100 and BA top 250 in 2022 out of HS. Played QB at Northwestern for a few years, came back to baseball after a three year hiatus. Struggled in year 1 but 1.000 OPS as a senior. Any intrigue as a senior sign?
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| 1:25 |
: I’m predisposed o love the two sport guys but yes, I like Lausch, overt physical tools, covers the top of the zone, pull side launch, good athlete with late bloomer traits. Rare for senior signs priority guys to be hitters, but I think he’s an exception
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| 1:25 |
: how does a 72% milb contact rate dropping to 58 in the majors get fixed?
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| 1:25 |
: He’s barely been up, give it a minute.
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| 1:26 |
: Baez has been absolutely obliterating the ball this past week. Any hope this is a sign he can get back into the 20s with his K rate?
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| 1:26 |
: I just think when you look at the very long track record of that player, that last season was clearly the anomaly.
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| 1:26 |
: Seems like Tyler Bell’s strong SEC performance this season has him moving up draft boards, while Justin Lebron is moving the opposite direction. Which of the two do you prefer?
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| 1:26 |
: Bell’s swing is so sexy
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| 1:27 |
: Anything to see in Taitn Gray or is he a flash in the A-pan?
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| 1:27 |
: Real juice, but if he’s not going to catch I’m way less interested.
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| 1:27 |
: how likely do you think it is that tyler bell goes in the top 10 in the draft? is he good enough to justify that?
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| 1:28 |
: O’s, A’s, Braves feel totally reasonable
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| 1:28 |
: Does Kendall George’s injury spell the end of the minor league bat dog? Or just a freak occurrence that probably never gets repeated?
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| 1:30 |
: Man, I think we need to be done with the bat dogs. In most cases the dogs only go get the bats for an inning or two. It’s cute, I like dogs, but it ends up being disruptive (just from a time standpoint) too often for me to advocate for it
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| 1:30 |
: Is there any way to easily see a player’s prospect history on FGs? I end up looking at older team lists, but it’d be nice to access it from their player page.
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| 1:30 |
: If you go to The Board and click on the player’s FV grade it’ll show he history.
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| 1:33 |
: ok everyone, i’m gonna split. Thanks for coming and enjoy the spectacular weekend of college baseball
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Source:
Eric Longenhagen
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https://blogs.fangraphs.com/eric-longenhagen-prospects-chat-2026-regional-edition/