We’ve hit another infielder on our Top Prospects, and with that we have the exciting Luis Carpio. He is just 18 years old and had a great season last year in Kingsport. Unfortunately, his season will start late as he underwent shoulder surgery recently.

#8 SS Luis Carpio

Ht: 6’0”   Wt: 165     Level: Kingsport Mets    B/T: R/R  Age: 7/11/1997 (Age 18)

Statistics: 45 G, 181 AB, 31 R, 55 H, 10 2B, 0 3B, 0 HR, 22 RBI, 17 BB/34 SO, 9 SB, 7 CS, .304/.372/.359 SLG

Carpio was signed by the Mets as an international free agent in 2013 on his 16th birthday. In 2014, he immediately went to work, playing for the DSL mets, and hitting .234/.347/.307 as a 16 year old. However, that didn’t deter the Mets from making an aggressive move and placing him stateside in the Appalachian league. He put himself on the map with an excellent Appy League campaign, hitting .304/.372/.359 as a 17 year old, which warranted him the 8th overall spot on our top 80.

Carpio is a line drive hitter who exhibits presence in the batters box. Using a short swing, Carpio experimented with a pull hitting approach in the Dominican Summer League, but returned to a middle-of-the-field approach in 2015. While Carpio is skinny, he has room to grow, but he will not have much power in the future. likely 8 to 12 home runs at most, but a lot of pop to the gaps as he learns to barrel with authority.

Scouts rave about his high baseball IQ, which definitely helps him as a middle infielder, proving to have excellent instincts and readings.  He has average speed, average first-step quickness and a fringe-average arm at this point in his development as a shortstop, meaning he would have to improve these tools to stay long-term at shortstop. Carpio is thought of as being very polished for his age defensively.

As for overall profile, he is looked at as a spark plug who would probably fit best at second base. He is at least three full years of playing time or more, after his shoulder surgery from cracking the big league roster. Still extremely young, he had a really impressive on base percentage for a 17 year old with an aggressive offensive profile, which is very unique for young players coming from overseas. Once he returns from surgery, expect to see Carpio assigned to Low-A Brooklyn. He will be an exciting name to watch over the next few years.

 Previous Prospects on the Top 80:

#9 Marcos Molina, #10 Robert Gsellman, #11 Logan Verrett, #12 Seth Lugo, #13 Jhoan Urena, #14 Gabriel Ynoa, #15 Ali Sanchez, #16 Luis Guillorme, #17 Chris Flexen, #18 Max Wotell, #19 Milton Ramos, #20 Akeel Morris, 25-21, 30-26 35-31, 40-36, 45-41, 50-46, 60-51, 70-61, 80-71

Editor’s Note:

We would like to welcome Kevin Lauro to the MMN Team! He runs the site planetmets.com and is very knowledgeable about prospects! –  Teddy Klein