Rays can chant, "We're No. 2!"

Noted baseball author and analyst Bill James has a new system for ranking young talent, and in his upcoming new book, he rates the Rays as being second-best among the 30 big-league organizations, behind only the NL champ Rockies.

James includes LHP Scott Kazmir and RHP James Shields among his top 25 players under age 30. His findings are included in the Bill James Handbook 2008, which will be published next week by ACTA Sports.

His reasoning? “Five Grade-A young players -- Kazmir, Shields, B.J. Upton, Delmon Young and Carl Crawford,'' James said in a press release. "I know that a lot of people would list Delmon Young in the top five young players in baseball, but I don’t see that his performance justifies that, and this isn’t about scouting reports or press clippings, it’s about performance. Edwin Jackson just misses being A grade, and (Andy) Sonnanstine ain’t bad, either.”

James lists Kazmir, 23, as the No. 5 best young player in baseball. "Sort of a shorter Steve Carlton, he battled the league's strictest pitch counts and missed by one of leading the major leagues in strikeouts,'' James said. "He now has three straight winning seasons, which isn't that easy to do starting about five times a year against Toronto, Boston and the Yankees with the Tampa Bay Rays behind you.''

Shields, 26, is ranked No. 20 on James' Young Talent inventory. "He plays Drysdale to Kazmir's Koufax, had an oustanding season despite allowing 28 home runs and working against hard pitch counts,'' James said. "Never wastes a pitch, with a strikeout/walk ratio of 184-36.''

The book can be ordered through actasports.com.

(Pictured: Scott Kazmir. Times photo - James Borchuck. Click to enlarge.)

Comments

[Steve]

Bill James doesn't count minor league talent in his evaluations.Our minor league talent is rated #1 by most.Add that to the #2 rating in the majors, we have far and away the BEST collection of young talent in baseball !!

[***]

James lost me when he touted Jackson and Sonastine, a couple of jokes.