Leonel Valera is the Number 15 prospect on the Dodgers’ Top 30 prospects. He stands 6’2 weighing 200 pounds at the age of 21. He currently plays shortstop for Great Lake Loons, Dodgers A+ affiliate.
He is hitting a nice .259 batting average with 10 homeruns and 33 RBI’s. He also has an On-Base Percentage of .873 which is very good. He has been with the Dodger Organization since he was 16, signing as an international free agent.
To be honest, didn’t know a lot about this guy until I decided to do a breakdown of the top 30 prospects. He reached full-season baseball in 2019 after spending the last few years in rookie ball. Leonel was invited to the instructional league last fall and came out looking like the best player on the field. A young developmental kid, but for a kid his age he has very strong legs. He loves to swing and miss, unfortunately. Though that has been the new baseball trend, either strikeout or hit a homerun. In-game, his power hasn’t shown up. He is, however, a homerun king in batting practice. The Dodgers organization just needs to find out how to translate that power from the cages to in-season games. Defensively he does not have the strongest arm but he is as smooth as Javy Baez and has an incredibly accurate arm. His biggest weapon, and it’s not even close, is his speed. The ability to beat out infield ground balls is there and he is a very aggressive base stealer. He stole 27 bases last year and has 9 this year so far. He has been thrown out only 8 times both years collectively. Tim Locastro is a player that Leonel Valera reminds me of with regards to his speed and base stealing ability.
ETA for Valera is 2023. He will be 24 by that time so it is safe to assume he will either be a top prospect or he will become nothing. At the age of 24, weirdly enough, you are now an old prospect and better figure it out. I can’t predict what kind of player he will end up being because he is so young and has so much more room to develop. He truly can be a star player or a guy that’s out of baseball in two years.