One guy who is being a little overlooked is James Kaprielian, a 2015 first rounder. He entered the year as the Yankees best pitching prospect, and he certainly lived up to that in his first few starts, going 2-1 and striking out 22 in 18 innings at High A Tampa. Unfortunately, his season ended there with an elbow injury. He didn't require TJ Surgery and has ended up pitching in the Arizona Fall League. Still, it was a blow to lose all the development time.
The injury and lost time definitely took away some of the shininess of Kaprielian, but make no mistake, he's a great arm with a real opportunity to help the Yankees, maybe even in 2017 at some point. While he is no longer the shiny new toy like he was heading into 2016, he's quietly still one of their top prospects, and a guy I expect to have an impact on the team, assuming he's healthy.
The injury actually did help one thing: his card prices, which are fairly low right now. He's got a decent amount of autos and relics out there so far, and I'm stocking up, as I believe he'll be back on the prospect radar in 2017. The relic above cost me just a buck, and I'll probably add a few more during the upcoming COMC Black Friday promos.
Nice Kap. Glad to see he made it out of the AFL without any indication of major arm issues.
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