Who Is Korey Lee? A Deep Dive Into The Prospect Received For Kendall Graveman

Yesterday was a very busy day for the Chicago White Sox. After already trading Lucas Giolito and Reynaldo Lopez to the Los Angeles Angels a day ago, they moved Joe Kelly and Lance Lynn to the Los Angeles Dodgers. Quickly after that, Rick Hahn moved Kendall Graveman to the Houston Astros for catching prospect Korey Lee. This is an excellent trade for the White Sox, as they now get a new starting catcher, at least for the near future.

A Familiar Face For Andrew Vaughn

Korey Lee was a first-round draft pick out of Cal in 2019, where he was teammates with first basemen Andrew Vaughn. In his last year at Cal, Lee hit .327 with 15 home runs and 57 RBIs. He is a very solid hitting catcher that has an absolute arm behind the plate.

According to his MLB prospect page, on the grading scale that goes from 20-80, Lee has a 40 grade for hitting, a 50 grade for power, a 40 grade for running, a 70 grade arm, and a 50 grade for fielding. They seem to project him as a power-hitting catcher with average defense and good power.

The arm is on full display in this video. This will be nice to have behind the plate, as it seems White Sox pitchers have issues holding runners on. Having a cannon for an arm can really make up for that.

When he was on the Astros list, he was their number 5 ranked prospect, but after joining the new and improved White Sox list, he falls down to 13. Fangrahs does have him as a top-100 prospect in all of baseball, so he does have some fans within the industry.

This was a great value for the White Sox, as the White Sox needed to get rid of their expensive bullpen arms, as it was clearly not working. Graveman was good for us, but he made a lot of money for someone who could not consistently close games.

Catcher Of The Future?

Once the Sox trade Yasmani Grandal, it will just be Seby Zavala behind the plate. Carlos Perez has been up and down a bit this year, but none have inspired enough to give the majority of playing time. This is where Korey Lee can shine.

Lee has had minimum major league experience, but he seems like he is ready to be in the MLB. This year he is hitting .283 with five home runs and 32 RBIs. The power has been a bit down but he is still hitting very well in AAA. He deserves a chance to start for the Sox.

In the short time he was up, he only had 25 at-bats and was able to get four RBIs, so he can still produce when he is learning to hit at the major league-level.

The catching job should be Lee's for the next year or so and hopefully, he can cement himself as a major league regular and we have an issue when Edgar Quero gets called up. This was a good trade for the White Sox and I am excited to see how Lee pans out, as he is a very talented player.