Wow Look at these rotations !

While most baseball prospects pros have targeted the AA NW Arkansas rotation as the best in baseball Dayton Moore hasn't stopped there in loading this system with potential starting pitchers.

Potential Team
Name
Omaha Storm Chasers
Danny Duffy
Everett Teaford
Edgar Osuna
Mario Santiago

NW Arkansas Naturals
Mike Montgomery- BA - If you are talking about fastball-curveball-changeup, Montgomery's stuff grades out the best for his top three pitches.
John Lamb- BA - Few lefthanders can match Lamb's combination of three possible plus pitches and exquisite command.
Chris Dwyer
Aaron Crow
Will Smith

Wilmington Blue Rocks
Jake Odirizzi BA - "Two scouts called him a lesser version of Zack Greinke."
Tim Melville
Tyler Sample
Justin Marks KL - Marks is a solid inventory prospect
Noel Arguelles KL -Arguelles is a physical specimen with a workhorse frame.

Kane County Cougars
Jason Adam KL - "Adam was 92-94 mph with a plus two-plane curveball at 76-77, and most impressive of all was his plus command of both pitches, throwing the curve for quality strikes to both sides of the plate."
Robinson Yambati
Yordano Ventura KG -" This undersized teenager has plus-plus velocity and impressive command."
Crawford Simmons

That is 17 quality minor league starters with quite a few with solid upside. Even with the usual prospect failures KC should be able to piece together a solid staff of starters from 2012 and on.

KG= Kevin Goldstein checkout his stuff at Baseball Prospectus or on Itunes with his podcast Up and In. www.baseballprospectus.com
KL= Keith Law ESPN.com Insider subscription http://search.espn.go.com/keith-law/
BA= Baseball America www.baseballamerica.com

JJ Cooper tweets beautiful things about Mike Montgomery

1st Inning -Royals Montgomery 13 pitch first touched 95 mph struck out all 3

2nd Inning - 10 pitch 2nd for Montgomery one more k with a nasty change 6 up 6 down

3rd Inning - 10 pitch perfect third for Montgomery 2 more k's putting on a pitching clinic

4th Inning - 4 IP 12 batters for Montgomery one ball squared up by kinston

5th Inning - Royals Montgomery fans side in fifth 15 pitches touched 95 2 times in inning but got k's on off-speed

7th Inning - Montgomery loses perfect game in seventh on infield hit. Royals Montgomery gives up 2 hits including RBI 2b but fans 2 more (now 11) for game 86 pitches after 7 ip

Final Totals for Montgomery 86 pitches 23 batters faced 7 IP 13 strikeouts 0 Walks 5 groundouts 2 flyouts. Impressive doesn't quite say it.

Also said this about Hosmer when I asked how he looked : good swings against a lefty lined a 1b has done good job recognizing bb

Possible Omaha Royals OF should be exciting to watch.

Jarrod Dyson, David Lough and Jordan Parraz have all reported to AAA spring training. While I wouldn't be surprised if Lough or Dyson started the season in NW Arkansas the combination of the three would in my opinion make for the strongest defensive unit of any Royal minor league affiliate. Dyson showed off his speed and ability to track the ball in center field this spring while playing with the major league team. Dyson seems to be a Joey Gathright clone without the minor league hitting success, remember Gathright had a .761 OPS as opposed to Dyson's .668 effort so far. So temper any expectations to him being a starting CFr in Kansas City as I doubt he'll ever hit enough to make it but for us ORoyals ticket holders he should be fun to watch when he does get on base(82% SB %) and in the field. As for the corners Lough and Parraz are decently adept at tracking the ball and might also have the skills at the plate to contribute at the big league level. Lough exploded on the scene last season with a good effort at Wilmington(.850 OPS) prior to achieving quite a bit of success at NW Arkansas (.934 OPS). Lough probably has the speed to play CF but continues to be paired with speedsters in the minors and has only played parts of each season in center. Lough is the bright spot positionally in the system rated as my #4 prospect due to the fact that he continues to progress with the bat and his speed should make him playable in CF and a plus at the LF slot. As for Parraz he also was having an outstanding season in AA prior to some hamstring problems that developed. Before those problems Parraz was hitting at a .358 clip had earned more walks than strikeouts(29-25) and showed more pop in the bat than previous seasons with a career high .553 SLG. Parraz also has the athletic ability to play a little CF in a pinch but unlike Lough has a cannon for an arm rating #1 in the KC minor league system according to Baseball America. All things considered these three would probably give the KC current alignment a run for their money defensively.

I obviously like David Lough the best of these three but could see Parraz or Dyson as major league contributors in a 4th Outfielder role.