Baseball America, widely considered to be the go-to source for prospects, has posted their 2011 Braves Top 10 Prospect List. Naturally, with any prospect list, there will be arguments and nit picking from here to doomsday, but that is what makes it fun.
↵The one-two of Julio Teheran and Freddie Freeman is a given. There is no argument to be made here.
↵Randall Delgado at number three is interesting because you will not see it in many cases. Delgado is considered to be the other half of the dynamic duo of Teheran/Delgado (yes, I know Teheran is a step above), but he is rarely placed in the top three, and in many lists he is behind Mike Minor, who is ranked number four here. I do not think you could go wrong either way, but Minor does have that upper-level success on his resume already.
↵Craig Kimbrel is always a debate in itself because he is a reliever, and people will rank relievers in extremely different spots based on their belief in minor league relievers. But you cannot deny that Kimbrel is probably the most advanced relief prospect in the minors, and ranking him at number five is certainly understandable.
↵Matt Lipka at number six sounds right. I do enjoy seeing Lipka projected as the starting center fielder in 2014. BA knows what it is doing. Same goes for Arodys Vizcaino at number seven and Brandon Beachy at number eight. Beachy exploded on the scene this past season and deserves a top 10 ranking for what he did.
↵Brett Oberholtzer at number nine is my biggest question mark. Having him in the top 10 at all is very questionable. What makes it even more confusing is the lack of Edward Salcedo or Carlos Perez in the top 10. Both are more deserving than Oberholtzer, yet neither made the list. J.J. Hoover at number 10 is not surprising, and he could be switched in and out of the top 10 in several lists.