You have to at some point consider why they paid over $20 million for Gurriel. Yes he's been hurt, but I think that you are overstating the relevance of his age. Injury plus weather is why he is in Dunedin, so the fact that he is 23.5 really isn't some indicator to his future upside. Lack of track record is fair, but there are several guys above him on your list who really haven't done much to suggest that they are better prospects, even with Gurriel out.
Eh, we've had plenty of cubans get paid good money to come over. Some have worked out, some haven't. $3m per year is a decent chunk but not a huge gamble, and not near as much as some flops have got. And unfortunately Gurriel's cuban stats don't pop off the page, and that has mattered in the past (see: Rusney). I was pleasantly surprised with how he looked in the couple of at bats I saw him in the spring, though. The thing is to match up with what the guys ranked above him are doing he's going to have to excel all the way up in AAA this year for me, and given that they were going to start him in single A i'm not even sure they think that's realistic.
Borucki is a LHP who routinely hits 94/95 in his starts; his changeup is also one of the best secondary pitches in our system. Rios is ~90-92 as a RH starter with a pretty good albeit inconsistent slider, but like a lot of guys who come up with fringy stuff, his ceiling is likely limited to ~5th starter or mid-relief in the majors. You underestimate Borucki's stuff big time, his arm is easily superior to Rios. Rios is sitting at 6.04 K/9 in AA and was at 6.45 last year in A+, so you're already seeing a guy who isn't overpowering batters.
eh you're spinning a bit there - both of these guys sit low 90s with their fastballs. Borucki might have a tick or two on him there but it's not much. Borucki has a great change, and Rios has a good slider. Both need work on their 3rd pitches, which means as of now they both look likelier to be relievers than starters.
But more importantly Rios has simply outclassed Borucki performance wise so far, and has excelled while being of age or young for his level, while Borucki has been a good 2yrs old for his levels for the most part, including this year, and has been good but not dominant:
A+
Rios (21-21): 90.2ip, 17.4k%/5.6b%, 3.47era, 3.40fip, 3.59xfip
Borucki (22-23): 43.0ip, 18.5k%/9.2b%, 9.63era, 6.31fip, 3.85xfip
A
Rios (21-21): 30.0ip, 35.8k%/6.7b%, 1.20era, 1.61fip, 2.14xfip
Borucki (22-22): 115.2ip, 23.2k%/5.6b%, 2.41era, 2.54fip, 3.02xfip
A-
Rios (20-20): 65.1ip, 20.6k%/8.7b%, 4.27era, 3.28fip, 3.65xfip
Borucki (20-21): 28.1ip, 25.2k%/5.4b%, 2.22era, 3.01fip, 3.19xfip
The biggest thing you need to look at is what the Blue Jays themselves think: they placed Borucki on the 40-man despite the fact that he's only in Dunedin and has a history of health problems. They left Rios unprotected despite the fact that he is younger and further ahead in level.
eh, like with Gurriel, the "Front Office likes him" argument isn't too convincing to me.
How is Maese underrated? He shot up rankings pretty quickly and consistently. My point on Maese vs. Greene is that Maese isn't outperforming him two levels down and he also doesn't have as obviously explosive stuff, thus I'm not really sure what makes you think that Maese is the clear choice here. Yes Greene is a cluster*****, but you seriously understate Maese's struggles this year: his strikeouts are down and his walks are also up. He's at a pedestrian 6.43 K/9 and 3.21 BB/9, so I'm not really sure what you see when you say that the rest of his numbers "look good" when his WHIP is at an ugly 1.71 and batters are hitting .319 against him (38 hits in 28 innings). It should also be noted that Greene is also actually inducing way more GB's than Maese this season, so even with the sinkerball profile of Maese, Greene actually outperforms him in this regard as well.
Again, this isn't even a case of me "loving" Greene, its more a case of the fact that Maese is really disappointing so far this season, thus I really can't see the argument to rank him over a pitcher with better raw stuff, who is outperforming him at a much higher level.
I think Maese is underrated because what he did last year while young for the level was more impressive than any other jays pitcher other than SRF...and well ahead of what SRF had done at 19. For me, coming into the year, he was the clearcut #2 jays pitching prospect and just a tick outside our top 5 prospects. So for me he's underrated when prospecters still rank the likes of Harris ahead of him.
As for his numbers this year, you're wildly exaggerating - his 3.12fip is good and 4.09xfip ok - his ERA is inflated but that's largely due to a likely unlucky .380babip. Hasn't been a great start but he has plenty of leeway after his great year last year for me, just like Greene has to do a lot more of this before I forget last year's disaster. And while they are 2 levels apart, they are also 2 years apart, so the level argument only goes so far.
I'd also gues they kept him at the same level to work specifically on his slider, which might explain some of his struggles if he's throwing his worst pitch more on purpose. And you're probably underrating his pure stuff - he has a nasty mid-90s heavy sinking fastball that makes him a groundball machine. It's probably as good a pitch as Greene's high 90s heater, and both have similar secondary stuff.
And really, Greene hasn't been all that great this year either. Basically neither of them have been good/bad enough this year to move the needle much on how I ranked them coming into the year.
