Why a Braves Top Prospect Missed Out on Being in The Athletic's Top-100

Baseball America and MLB have him in the top 100; Keith Law left him out, but he has his reasons for why he made this decision

JR Ritchie has his fans, even if he isn't ranked by all of them | Olivia Crew | Columbus Clingstones

There has been growing expectations that JR Ritchie will soon in the majors with the Atlanta Braves. Baseball American and MLB.com are high enough of him to rank him in their top-100 prospects lists. However, one left him out: That was The Athletic's Keith Law.

With all the chatter, it comes as a surprise. However, when you look at Law's reasoning, there is at least reason to it. What could be a plus to others can be a concern to others.

Two main reasons seem to have kept Ricthie off of Law's list. One was his command. He has a walk rate that rose concern for him. He also said that Ritchie needed to work on his command in order to be a "decent fourth starter."

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Another issue was that depite his large arsenal, he doesn't have a "real plys pitch." However, he did highlight three of his pitches. His fastball was noted for topping out at 98 mph. His sinker has good velocity and has a solid ground-ball rate, and his curveball had a whiff rate of 35%.

While the arguement for command is a fair one, there is a solid counter argument to the number of pitches in his arsenal. The goal of a pitcher is to keep a hitter on his toes. In a sense, a larger arsenal allows a pitcher to be his own reliever.

Once a pitcher has gone through the order a couple of times, hitters are more likely to perform better against the pitcher because they've seen him and have a better feel. Along with reduced pitch counts, this trend has led to starters leaving the game sooner in favor of a reliever.

If a pitcher has more options in his arsenal, he can switch up the pitches that hitters are seeing once he gets to the third time through the order. Hence, he becomes his own reliever, because he is able to give hitters a different look on his own.

So, while he may not have a go-to pitch, that may not necessarily be a bad thing.

Across 26 starts during the minor league season, Ritchie had a 2.64 ERA, a 1.01 WHIP and 140 strikeouts in 140 innings. His showing in Triple-A was promising with a 3.02 ERA and a 1.08 WHIP across 59 2/3 innings in 11 starts. 

Baseball America ranks him as the No. 84 prospect overall, and he was ranked No. 90 for MLB.com. Cam Caminiti is the other prospect consistently ranked in each top-100 list.