Browsing ESPN.com, and Keith Law has a great article on the top-100 prospects throughout Major League organizations. The Dodgers have four players amongst those 100 (LHP Clayton Kershaw, 3B Andy LaRoche, SS Ching-Lu Hu, and RHP James McDonald). While these players are all different ages, it appears each will provide the Dodgers with a much-needed influx of more youth into the Major League organization. Here is a little bit about the top two players, Kershaw and LaRoche.
Kershaw (Law rank: 6): Despite only being 20-years old, Kershaw looks to be the next great Dodger pitcher. While the club has been rather conservative with his pitching thus far (to prevent an injury, like what happened to Scott Elbert), he looks to be the kind of pitcher to form a solid staff with Chad Billingsley. Last season, Clayton went 1-2 with a 3.65 ERA in double-A Jacksonville, while going 7-5 with a 2.77 with the Gulf Coast League. In both of those systems, he had 2.43-1 K/BB ratio, which is quite solid. It may take him some time to get to the big leagues, but when he gets there, it should be quite something.
LaRoche (Law Rank: 25) The third baseman struggled last season when he was called up to the Big Leagues in early of 2007. In the 35 games in which LaRoche appeared, the twenty-four year old hit .226 in 93 at-bats, while slugging one home run, and knocking in 10 RBIs. He had a .365 on-base percentage, and a .312 slugging percentage, both of which were bellow his averages in the minor leagues. In 2006, he split time between Double-A Jacksonville and Triple-A Las Vegas, where he hit .315 with 19 home runs, and 81 RBIs in 117 games. He will have the opportunity to compete with Nomar Garciaparra at third base.
