Ti'Quan Forbes Scouting Report

Ti'Quan Forbes Scouting Report: Texas Ranger infielder Ti'Quan Forbes ranked #21 on the LSB Community Prospect Rankings.

In the days leading up to Opening Day, I'm going to offer write-ups on the 30 players who made the Rangers' LSB Community Prospect Rankings Top 32, and who didn't get traded. I've done this the last couple of years, and I don't want to re-invent the wheel, so some of this will be a repeat of what I've written before, particularly regarding draft history or performance pre-2014. Also, this is not based on my personal observations -- I'm not a scout, and haven't seen most of these guys. I'm just aggregating the numbers and what others say about these players.

So, with that out of the way, let's take a look at Ti'Quan Forbes...

Ti'Quan Forbes is a 6'4", 175 lb. high school shortstop drafted by the Texas Rangers out of Columbia, Mississippi, with their second round pick in the 2014 draft, #59 overall.  Coming into the draft, Baseball America had him ranked #47 in their pre-draft rankings, and ESPN's pre-draft rankings had Forbes at #39.

The pre-draft write-ups of Forbes screamed Rangers draft pick...he was described as toolsy, projectable, athletic, profiling to be in the middle of the diamond, but with questions about how much he'd hit.  Forbes signed for a bonus of $1.2 million, although slot money was $957,900.

Forbes was assigned to the Rangers' complex team in the Arizona Rookie League, and put up a .241/.338/.282 slash line in 204 plate appearances, with 47 Ks and 23 walks.  Forbes had 33 games at third base and 11 at shortstop.  Forbes didn't make the Baseball America AZL top 20 list, but Bill Mitchell said in the AZL chat that he had Forbes in the 21-25 range, and that he's a guy who need more baseball reps.

Forbes ended up at #15 on the BA Rangers list, and #18 on John Sickels' top 20 list for the Rangers, while Kiley McDaniel had Forbes at #13.  Conversely, Jamey Newberg had Forbes at #42 on his list.

My guess is that, like Travis Demeritte, another toolsy infielder the Rangers drafted with their second pick in 2013, the Rangers will have Forbes start his first full season with an assignment at low-A Hickory, although they could be more conservative with him and have him go to the short-season A Spokane Indians when they start play in June.