I barely even know who these people are, failed prospects would mean someone who was actually a prospect, these people were never anything special to begin with, look at the alex gordon and thomas diamond’s of the world, those are “failed” prospects who could turn it around

edwin jackson, gavin floyd, wandy rodriguez, and rob tejeda have all really broken out in a big way, in the last 12 months. i never lost faith.

i’m still waiting on ricky romero, jason botts, val majewski, josh wilson, blake hawksworth, and craig hansen, but i’ve got a feeling that botts and wilson are just flotsam, while romero and hawksworth would be lucky to get 6 starts at the major league level in any one season.

have an unhealthy man-crush on both Laynce Nix and Jeremy Reed.

Jeremy Reed: Baseball Prospectus’s insane #2 overall prospect rating was never justified in any way, shape, or form, but I had some hope that Reed would develop into a guy who could hit .300/.370/.460 in his prime years while playing plus corner OF defense. Yeah, that didn’t happen.

Andy Marte. Best-case scenario now is a bounceback to league average in his late-20’s. This one’s a major bummer.

Rafael Soriano: it may seem weird to call a guy with several years of experience and a career 148 ERA+ a bust, but I don’t think I can quite convey the excitement I used to feel over the possibility of a Soriano/Felix Hernandez 1-2 punch at the front of the rotation. Soriano started all through the minors and posted great K/BB rates and maintained his wicked stuff. Injuries and a stubborn organization that actually believed a lockdown set-up man was as valuable as a potential frontline starter ruined my dreams.

Dallas McPherson: In a different vein, this guy’s failure as an Angels ’spect brought me all kinds of joy as a Mariners fan. Not one of my favorite prospects, but definitely one of my favorite failures.

As in, I’m happy he failed since he turned out to be a low-character cheating rat fink.

n/t

It won’t be next year, but at some point, he could finally have a Ryan Ludwick season.

I also think lil’ Joey Thurston could be a league average 2b.

And I’d like to see Josh Phelps have a chance as a full-time 1b or DH.

Too many injuries

Can we throw him on the fire? I know if you bring him up, you also have to bring up Corey Patterson, but how can a fanbase be fooled TWICE by the same player?

We are collectively still holding out hope for George Lombard!!

I know, I know but all kidding aside, I would still like to see Kyle Davies become the top of the rotation starter he was billed to be.

Those guys are why, even as a Mets fan, Flores worries me a little. Teenage SS prospects who look like they might be Buster Douglas-sized one day can pose problems, no matter how talented they are.

about Brian Bullington, John VanBenschoten, Sean Burnett, Chad Hermansen, J.R House, Bobby Bradely, Clint Johnson, Bobby Hill, and Sean Burroughs.

Jesse Foppert, Kurt Ainsworth, David Aardsma, Tony Torcato, Jerome Williams, Todd Linden

How about Adam Lowen?

His career isn’t per se over, but it doesn’t look like he’s going to get past 4th outfielder.

I have to support him because he’s the only D-III athlete I’m aware of in any major sports league (I went to D-III Pomona College). I loved it when the A’s traded for him, but he’s had trouble staying on the field lately.

Plantier is my all-time favorite failed prospect. Watching him back then, you really thought he was in for a long and successful career even despite that on-the-crapper batting stance.

As for today’s players, I still hold out hope that Joel Zumaya can actually string together a couple of healthy seasons before he washes out of the league.

Zaire born, Canadian raised Oriole OF prospect.

We went for him based on pure athleticism alone and that was a huge mistake

Reading Comprehension.

I’m hoping he makes a comeback and people stop listing random failed prospects of the past, which is not very interesting, and actually address the thread’s topic (‘failed’ former prospects who you hold out hope for), which is much, much more interesting.

Anyway, I’m still naively optimistic about old R. Comprehension’s possible future.

Phil Hughes and Ian Kennedy as failed prospects! (I know, I know, they still have plenty of time left, and I actually think Hughes will become a solid pitcher; Kennedy, I’m not so sure of). What do you guess think on these two?

Chin-Hui Tsao — Top pitching prospect for the Rockies back in 2004… He was basically the Chris Snelling of pitching prospects in that he was totally awesome when he did play, which was basically never. He is only 26 but was apparently released by the Royals last year. I still hold out utterly irrational hope that he’ll pop up in a bullpen somewhere, but his career is probably over.

Ryan Anderson — He is out of baseball, and in fact was last heard from in culinary school. I don’t hold out any hope, though he apparently says he might give baseball another try if his arm heals. Yeah… ack.

(for anyone who doesn’t remember, he was a pitcher for the Mariners who was billed as the next Randy Johnson in the late 1990s. He had control problems but pretty much pwninated minor leaguers up through AAA before he missed 4 whole seasons with arm injuries)

Craig Hansen got me too.

Got me bad - Josh Barfield.

Andy Marte. I expected a great deal more from Rickie Weeks and Phil Hughes by this point. Luke Hochevar Im still holding high expectations for. Brandon Wood I expected to explode onto the scene.

What a fun story line that was.

I was shocked to notice at some point this year that Dennis Tankersley was with the Nats’ AAA club this year. I was pretty convinced back in 2001 that he was going to be an unstoppable force. I’m sure the chances of him contributing at the MLB level are pretty slim based on his numbers the past couple of years though.

I keep holding out hope that Merkin Valdez’s arm will stay attached long enough for him to be a solid RP arm, but I’m not sure that will happen. Same with Angel Guzman.

Blake Hawksworth comes to mind. He had a nice bounce back year in ’06, but has been terrible at Triple-A ever since. Although he has put up good K rates the last couple years and his FIP in ’08 was over a run lower than his ERA.. He could still be decent if given another shot.

First-rounder Chris Lambert was supposed to be a front of the rotation talent but in the end was traded for a half season of Mike Maroth. He had a good 2008 at Toledo and has some hope of filling in for an injured starter in ’09.

But everyone’s favorite Anthony Reyes has to take the cake. The guy who really shined in Game 1 of the ‘06 WS and never really got it together after that, but has always had decent peripherals and there is speculation(maybe more) that his lack of success was in part due to a difference in philosophy with Dave Duncan, who gets what he wants in this organization. Maybe he’s next year’s Cliff Lee…

This thread got me to thinking about one of my favorite Astros prospects from a few years back. I didn’t think he would fit into this thread topic, but it was nice thinking back about him and how I thought his potential was great before he ran into some small control issues and some large injuries. On a whim I typed his name into baseball-reference.com to remind myself of what got me so excited about him and I was surprised!! He put up a darned good 6 starts last year for Vero Beach in the FSL as a 28 year old in A+ ball . . . so perhaps he fits this topic after all! I will be checking in on him again come the spring.

I had no idea that Dee Brown was still playing until I saw this thread, thought “OMG, FAILED PROSPECTS? DEE BROWN!”, and visited this page.

He is a really, really interesting case. Do I hold out hope for him? Not really, so this is all kind of irrelevant with regards to the topic at hand.

:-)

Josh Hamilton & Jason Allison

. . . oh yeah, 1 out of 2 ain’t bad.

He just needs to strengthen that knee, and…

Man, what a waste.

His snapping of his leg is still memory that makes me cringe when i think about it

That kid could throw the ball about as hard as it can. Too bad he couldn’t control it or have any other pitches.

Brien Taylor too as long as we’re on former #1 picks. Talk about the worst thing that can happen if you get into a fight.

The Cardinals got the one good year from Ankiel(which should have led to a ROY award) but he collapsed after that.
I was looking forward to multiple Cy Young awards for Rick. The kid was absolutely sick. 92-95 mph heater, a faster version of Barry Zito’s curve and an improving changeup. And he had enough control before he melted down. He wasn’t like Daniel Cabrera.

I’d much rather have Ankiel in the rotation than in the outfield. I was extremely excited when he made it back in 2004. I really thought he was over his problems but then they came back in the spring of 2005.

I’m so glad I taped his NLDS start against the Braves. I can still watch Ricky pitch 2 dominating innings. Although I will say watching the 3rd inning blows.

Mark Rogers!

Guillermo Quiroz - with the O’s as a backup last season with a +39 OPS…ouch.

Russ Adams - I’d say he still has a chance to catch on as a utility guy but his arm sucks. He looks like he was rushed despite some success in the minors… never really got it together in the majors.

Josh Phelps - I thought at the time we gave up on him way too early…

followed closely by Roberto Petagine and Sherman Obando.

Andy Sisco, Justin Jones, Luke Hagerty, Chad Blasko, Ryu, Mark Prior?, Bobby Hill, HEE SEOP CHOI!….

Holy crap I could do this all day just for the Cubs.

Then theres personal favorites I had like Clint Everts, Greg Miller, Brandon Claussen, Mark Phillips, Russ Adams…yea I could do this all day…

Just kidding, but check out some of the Cardinal message boards. They are already starting to talk about him as if he were.

He needs to get as far away from the Yankees organization as possible. Overly aggressive in promoting him and never put him in a situation to succeed.

I’ll add Ryan Leaf and Dan McGwire to the list.

Just to name a few (top 10 guys):

Kiki Jones (Dodgers)

Roger Salkeld (Mariners)

Todd Van Poppel (A’s)…of course

Brien “Bar Room Brawler” Taylor (Yankees)

Ryan Anderson (Mariners)

Ruben Rivera (Yankees)…I was fooled by this one BIG TIME

Matt White (Devil Rays)

…and, frankly, Rickie Weeks is treading water.

As a trio they’re pretty tough to beat…

Back in the mid-late 80s, Baseball America was pushing this guy as the next Roberto Clemente.

Maybe it was just the gaudy power numbers that got to me, but I really liked him

how about: Brien Tyler(yankees), Matt Drews(yankees), Ruben Mateo (rangers)and Tony Gwynn Jr.(Brewers)? Looks like Tony Gwynn Jr. is turning out more like his uncle than his dad.

No one broke my heart more than Roberto Petagine. I suppose you could argue that he didn’t fail given that he was a star in Japan, but in terms of being the long-time star 1B of my APBA team, he was a disappointment. I still think he could have done something had someone given him the chance….

are these guys really prospects to begin with? and they’re not really failed, since they weren’t really given a chance in the majors.

you could add a whole bunch of “never had a chance guys” like Stubby Clapp, Pedro Swann etc…