Mick Abel has had a roller coaster of a start to his young career. The Philadelphia Phillies drafted him in the first round of the 2020 MLB Draft, and since then, he has fluctuated all over baseball prospect rankings lists.
The 2025 season has been good for Abel thus far. He posted solid numbers at Triple-A to begin the year and has been a solid stopgap in the Phillies' rotation in Aaron Nola's absence.
His good start and early success on a big league mound has earned him some well-deserved recognition.
Mick Abel is back in MLB Pipeline's Top 100 prospect rankings after dropping out last year
Abel has reentered MLB Pipeline's Top 100 prospects after Nick Kurtz of the Athletics graduated from his time as a prospect. He is currently ranked No. 100.
The Phillies' right-hander has been ranked on this list before, however. Entering the 2024 season, Abel was ranked as the No. 49 prospect on the list. After a rough start to the season, he dropped to No. 63, and by later in the season, he dropped out of the list completely.
RHP Mick Abel joins the Top 100 Prospects list upon Nick Kurtz's graduation.
— MLB Pipeline (@MLBPipeline) June 20, 2025
Scouting grades and more on the 2020 first-rounder with a 2.21 ERA across his first four MLB starts: https://t.co/PXrqzDEklU pic.twitter.com/kRl9fCvWqD
The former first round pick faced real adversity in 2024 after posting a 6.46 ERA over 108 2/3 innings pitched. Command was always the big question mark for the young prospect as evidenced by the 78 walks he surrendered last year. This is what makes his resurgence all the more impressive.
In 10 starts with Lehigh Valley during the first two months this season, the 23-year-old pitched to a 2.21 ERA over 57 innings, going 6-2 in that span and striking out 67 batters. Yet, he still walked 26 hitters.
Once he was called up, Abel continued to show that perhaps he had fixed some of his control struggles, as he has found success early on in his MLB career. Through his first four starts for the Phillies, Abel has a 2.21 ERA and 17 punch outs over 20 1/3 innings logged. More impressively, he has walked only four hitters.
Mick Abel, 96mph Paint. 🖌️🎨 pic.twitter.com/OpT5KPortW
— Rob Friedman (@PitchingNinja) June 4, 2025
Manager Rob Thomson has liked what he has seen from the organization's No. 5 prospect. The skipper spoke with the media after Abel's most recent start in Miami, per Justin Morris of MLB.com.
“His first two [starts] were excellent,” Thomson said, per Morris. “The third one, he had some long innings, but still kept his composure. … and then tonight, again he has a second inning where he’s got traffic, he gets out of it, and then he settles right back in. I’m really pleased, I really am. He’s growing.”
It remains to be seen if Abel can continue to thrive in his role in this dominant Phillies rotation. He has been a key piece, however, and with Nola now to remain sidelined until after the All-Star break, his contributions will be more important than ever.
Now that Abel has been placed back in the Top 100 prospect rankings, it will be interesting to see if he can continue to impress around the game and rank higher on MLB Pipeline, and perhaps other, rankings lists.