Which of Rosario-Turner-Swanson-Crawford Quartet Will Be Biggest Shortstop Star?

There are great young shortstops everywhere in baseball these days, so many of them that it would be far too challenging a task to rank them all.

Far better to stick to one division, right? Yeah right, because ranking the four top young shortstop prospects in the National League East is a challenge by itself.

“Oh man, that’s a tough call,” one American League executive said.

First a little background, because the fact is there’s nothing wrong with any of these guys. All of them are big talents, and the way things go with prospects, it would hardly be a surprise to see any of them emerge as the best.

We’re dealing with four players here, because every NL East team but the Miami Marlins has a shortstop who qualifies as an elite prospect. The Marlins have their own fine young shortstop in 27-year-old Adeiny Hechavarria, but with four years of big league time, he’s far beyond prospect status.

We’ll stick to the other four teams, to four guys who are between 21 and 23. In alphabetical order for now, they’re J.P. Crawford of the Philadelphia Phillies, Amed Rosario of the New York Mets, Dansby Swanson of the Atlanta Braves and Trea Turner of the Washington Nationals.

MLB.com ranks Swanson, Rosario and Crawford, in that order, as the second-, third- and fourth-best shortstop prospects in the game (behind Gleyber Torres of the New York Yankees), and as the fourth-, fifth- and sixth-best prospects, regardless of position. Turner doesn’t make the MLB.com list, only because he has 368 major league plate appearances and they no longer consider him a prospect.

John Raoux/Associated Press

We will, though, in part to suit our story but also because Turner has started just two major league games at shortstop. He was a shortstop through the minor leagues, but he played mostly center field when the Nationals called him up last summer. He’s back at short now, after the Nationals traded Danny Espinosa to the Los Angeles Angels.

Turner and Swanson, who played in 38 games with the Braves in 2016, have major league experience. Crawford played his way out of a call-up with a disappointing end to 2016 at Triple-A Lehigh Valley, while Rosario went from Class A St. Lucie to Double-A Binghamton as the Mets continued to groom him to succeed Asdrubal Cabrera.

Rosario played all last year at 20, which makes his performance at Double-A all the more impressive. Competing against older players, he had an .874 OPS in 54 games, the best of his career so far. Given Rosario’s strong defensive skills, the offensive improvement gave the Mets reason to believe he’s on the fast track to the majors.

The Mets spent $1.75 million to sign Rosario, giving him a franchise record bonus for an international free agent. Swanson cost even more, $6.5 million, after the Arizona Diamondbacks made him the first overall pick in the 2015 draft. The Braves got him for what turned out to be a bargain, as part of the Shelby Miller trade.

Turner was also part of a steal of a deal, coming to the Nationals from the San Diego Padres as part of a three-team trade that sent Wil Myers to the Padres and cost the Nationals only Travis Ott and Steven Souza. The Padres had made Turner the 13th overall draft pick in 2014.

Crawford was the 16th overall pick the year before. His underwhelming 2016 season shouldn’t be much of a concern, given that he was playing in Triple-A at age 21.

“I tried to do too much last year when I got moved up,” Crawford told Matt Breen of Phillynews.com this spring. “I was trying way too much with the bat, and physically I was just trying to do too much. This year, I’m trying to go back to what I do best. Stick with a plan and produce offensively.”

Justin K. Aller/Getty Images

There’s no reason to get down on Crawford, but his slight setback last year has him fourth on this list. There’s just too much talent, and the other three players all made significant strides in 2016.

That leaves Rosario, Swanson and Turner. It would be easy to pick any of the three, but the choice here is between Swanson and Turner. Rosario’s skills and performance are impressive, but they’re not enough to put him ahead of two guys who have already shown some of what they can do in the big leagues.

So who is it, Swanson or Turner? Is it the Braves’ hometown kid so smooth and composed that Atlanta Journal-Constitution columnist Jeff Schultz is already saying he can be a team leader? Or the Nationals’ speedy leadoff man, who stole 33 bases in half a season last year and helped carry his team to the postseason?

As our AL executive said, oh man, that’s a tough call.

Turner is so good he finished second in National League Rookie of the Year voting, despite playing just three games before the All-Star break and despite learning a new position. His 33 stolen bases after the break ranked second in the majors behind Billy Hamilton's 36, and his 53 runs scored were tied for seventh.

Swanson didn't come up to the Braves until Aug. 17, and neither his game nor his numbers are as flashy as Turner's. But there's nothing wrong with hitting .302 with an .803 OPS in your first taste of the big leagues, especially when it comes with games like the one where Swanson had two hits off Noah Syndergaard on pitches clocked at 100 and 98 mph.

"This is a winning player, a special player," Braves general manager John Coppolella said that day.

Swanson has the range, hands and arm to stay at shortstop, while some have raised questions about whether Turner's arm is strong enough. But Turner's game-changing speed and slightly better skills at the plate give him the smallest of edges for us.

Feel free to go ahead and tell us we’re wrong. Crawford, Rosario and Swanson can feel free to go out and prove us wrong.

For now, though, Trea Turner gets our vote.

Danny Knobler covers Major League Baseball as a national columnist for Bleacher Report.

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