Cleveland Baseball Insider

Cleveland Baseball Insider's 2024 Season Top 50 Prospects: No. 43 INF Juan Benjamin

Benjamin followed up his impressive 2022 season posting a solid 108 wRC+ along with a .362 OBP for Low-A Lynchburg in 2023

Todd Paquette

Gary Strieffer
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As we prepare for a new year and spring training to begin, there’s no better time to bring you an up-to-date look at Cleveland Baseball Insiders' top 50 prospects.

Rankings are based on seeing the players live, watching videos, and having conversations with evaluators within and outside of the organization, as well as other writers.

While prospect lists are fun and entertaining for fans, they are not an end-all-be-all in terms of who makes it eventually to the major leagues. Remember, Jose Ramirez was never a top-100 prospect nationally and players like Steven Kwan and Will Brennan weren't considered top-20 prospects in the Guardians organization by many outside publications.

The ultimate goal here is to inform our readers and give you information on some of the young talent in the organization that they can follow and look forward to seeing in the future at the MLB level.

Juan Benjamin - INF

AGE - 20

BATS - S

DOB - 4/25/2003

THROWS - R

HT - 5'8"

SIGNED - 7/02/2019

WT - 150

ETA - 2026

Benjamin signed on 7/02/2019 out of Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic for 100K as part of the Guardians 2019 international free agent class. His pro-debut was held back until the 2021 season as the 2020 minor league season was canceled by the pandemic.

During that 2021 season, Benjamin appeared in just 20 games in the Dominican Summer League in which he hit .250 with a .350 OBP and a 101 wRC+ over 81 plate appearances.

Benjamin was promoted to the Arizona Complex League to start his 2022 campaign where he really established a name for himself. He hit .300 while posting a ridiculous .462 OBP and 154 wRC+ over 33 contests before earning a promotion to Low-A Lynchburg to end the year. At Lynchburg, he played in three games going (3-10) .300 AVG adding three walks.

Scouting Grades

Hit - 50

Arm - 50

Power - 25

Field - 50

Run - 55

Overall - 40

While Benjamin may not put up huge power numbers what he can do is really hit. He has a nice eye at the plate with the ability to make decisions late and foul off pitches to stay alive with two strikes. Benjamin recognizes off-speed pitches well and has the bat speed to turn on fastballs on the inner half of the plate. 

Benjamin possesses above-average speed and is a solid defender with some range. His arm is considered average and while he has played over the entire infield his best position long-term maybe second base. 

2023 Stats

G

AB

R

H

2B

3B

HR

RBI

BB

SO

SB

AVG

OBP

SLG

ISO

OPS

wRC+

98

358

53

97

 16

 1

 3

 44

49

81

24

.271

.362

.346

.075

.708

  108

Benjamin appeared in 98 games for Low-A Lynchburg in 2023 where he hit .271 with a strong .362 OBP and 108 wRC+ over 413 plate appearances. While he only had 20 extra-base hits on the season including 16 doubles a triple and three home runs there is still time as he continues to develop and mature to add more pop to his game. To be fair the Carolina League in which Lynchburg plays ranked the toughest league to hit a home run in during the 2023 minor league season.

Benjamin's walk rate decreased from 18.4% in 2022 to 11.9% in 2023 but his strikeout rate remained relatively the same from 19.1% in 2022 to 19.6% in 2023. Definitely a good sign moving forward that as he faced more advanced pitching this past season, he still was able to keep his strikeout rate down.

He was able to utilize his speed on the basepaths stealing 24 bases while hitting all over the lineup.

On defense, he started 37 games at second base, 34 games at third base, six games at shortstop, one game at first base, and 15 as the designated hitter.

2024 and Future Outlook

In 2024, look for Benjamin to begin his season with the High-A Lake County Captains. With so many middle infield prospects in the Guardians system, he most likely will spend the entire year with Lake County unless he pushes the envelope with outstanding play.

As for the future, Benjamin does have some ceiling left to possibly be an average starting MLB level player most likely at second base, possibly third. He does scream currently that of a high-level utility player in the big leagues especially if he can handle the shortstop position adequately moving forward.

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Todd Paquette
TODD PAQUETTE

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