Philadelphia Baseball Review - Phillies News, Rumors and Analysis
Philadelphia Phillies prospect Seranthony Dominguez
Seranthony Dominguez tossed a flawless inning on Monday night in his major league debut to become the latest highly touted prospect to make his mark in Philadelphia.

The 23-year-old even collected a strikeout, sitting down Evan Longoria after falling behind 2-0 before battling back and getting a called third strike on a slider up and over the plate.

Dominguez has the stuff to be a dominant arm in the later innings. In fact, he'll probably have the opportunity to close out a few games before the year is out, but his arrival also signifies the beginning of the end of major league prospects the Phillies can count on this season.

It's not a bad thing, but it's something to monitor. All rebuilding teams go through this stage where what once was a top-ranked farm system looks a bit barren because the young talent is performing at the big league level.

The Phillies have hit that spot.

Sixto Sanchez, the organization's top prospect according to MLBPipeline, is a starting pitcher with just nine starts under his belt at the high-A level with a 4.62 ERA. He has the potential to be a star, but he's probably two years away - if not more - from making a meaningful impact with the Phillies.

In fact, the top five prospects in the Phillies' organization according to MLBPipeline are all currently at the Single-A level.

Again, not a concern, but something to contemplate as the season moves forward.

The Phillies opened the year with the fifth-best farm-system in baseball according to MLBPipeline, but this ranking accounted for Scott Kingery and J.P. Crawford as prospects. Both, however, now have pivotal roles with the big league club and shouldn't be thought of as prospects.

Going by MLB's current top prospect list the Phillies have just the three in the Top 100 with Sanchez (26), pitcher Adonis Medina (86), and outfielder Adam Haseley (92).

There's talent elsewhere too on the farm, particularly in outfielder Roman Quinn (15th in org.) and starter Enyel De Los Santos (13th in org.), but neither appear to be a mega-impact type of prospect. At least not yet.

All of this to say there doesn't appear to be many more internal options that'll help the Phillies in a meaningful way this year. What we're watching is all that's available right now, and that's okay in the short term, but remember, part of the reason why the Phillies faltered so quickly following the 2008 World Series was a non-existent surge of impact talent rising from the minors to the majors.

It sounds simplistic, but a dominant team that excels over a long span of time needs major league talent at the ready in the minors. The Phillies aren't there yet, but that's one of the final growing pains of a total rebuild.
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Follow Patrick on Twitter: @PGordonPBR

BY PATRICK GORDON
Managing Editor
pgordon@philadelphiabaseballreview.com

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Philadelphia Baseball Review - Phillies News, Rumors and Analysis