Cleveland Guardians' Prospect Receives Surprising MLB Ranking

With 2025 Minor League Baseball season enters into the heat of the second half, the Cleveland Guardians have an offensive weapon that is quietly making noise down in the farm system.

The Athletic's Keith Law released his updated top-60 prospect on Thursday, with Guardians' shortstop Angel Genao claiming the No. 42 spot in the rankings.

"Genao missed the first two months of the year with a shoulder sprain, and since his return he hasn’t shown the same power he did last year — which could just be the aftereffects of the shoulder injury, as otherwise he’s putting the ball in play and showing strong plate judgment," Law wrote. "He’s an average-ish defender at shortstop who probably ends up bumped to second by a plus defender."

While it's no surprise that Genao is beginning to make noise on the national level, the 21-year-old shortstop was ranked ahead of the Guardians' 2024 first-round pick, Travis Bazzana. After suffering an injury earlier this season, the highly-acclaimed second basemen out of Oregon State has slipped out of Law's top 25 and is now the No. 47 prospect in his updated rankings.

Genao began the season in High-A with the Lake County Captians, but after eight games, he was quickly promoted to Double-A Akron. Since being moved up in the organization, the young switch-hitter is batting .257 with 10 doubles through 37 games. He is projected to be called up to Cleveland by 2026, according to MLB.com.

However, the one issue that Law mentioned is the fact that Genao could be bumped to second base in order to become a plus defender. If Cleveland does not believe he could play shortstop in the majors, this will create a log-jam at second with Bazzana. And with his first-overall draft capital, Bazzana will easily have the upper hand over Genao.

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