The success of the hitters from last year's All-Teen team has been relatively poor while inconsistency is probably the best word to describe the pitching corps.

To this point in the season, the best pitcher -- so far, anyway -- has been Jake Peavy of the San Diego Padres. Overshadowed last year by rising right-hander Dennis Tankersley, SportsTicker's 2001 Emerging Prospect of the Year winner, and rising star Oliver Perez in the big leagues this season, Peavy has made a relatively quiet but quick ascent to the majors.

The hard-throwing Peavy has compiled a 3.67 ERA in his brief tenure in the big leagues and has fanned nearly a batter per inning for the Padres. Peavy started this season in his hometown of Mobile, Alabama with San Diego's Double-A Southern League club. He fanned over a hitter per inning there until he was promoted to the big leagues last month.

Another pitcher who has had success at a young age has been Jerome Williams of the San Francisco Giants. Williams, who is just 20 years old, has compiled a respectable 4.35 ERA in the hitter-friendly Pacific Coast League despite being hampered by back problems. Boof Bonser, another Giant farmhand, skipped the high Class A California League to start the season, but was back there by the end of the season's first month after a rude awakening in Double-A. He has been back to his dominating self despite being one of the California League's youngest pitchers (5-4, 3.14 ERA, 86 IP, 57 H, 99 SO, .186 opponents' batting average).

The sole left-hander in this group, Jimmy Gobble of the Kansas City Royals, has been fairly consistent for Double-A Wichita. The 6-3 southpaw has been a bit hittable this season, but is still 5-7 with a 3.38 ERA in the Texas League, which is known as a hitter's circuit.

The only pitcher who has really struggled this season is Beltran Perez of the Arizona Diamondbacks. Perez, who went 12-4 and fanned a batter per inning in low Class A ball last season, is 3-7 with a 5.20 ERA with Double-A El Paso this year.

American League
The Seattle Mariners have seen Jamie Moyer enjoy a great deal of success in the big leagues over the past few seasons. Why mess with that kind of success, right? Well, in Double-A left-hander Craig Anderson, Seattle has a pitcher in very much the same soft-tossing mold as Moyer. Anderson, a 21-year-old Australian who is best friends with Mariner outfielder and fellow Australian Chris Snelling (out for the year with a knee injury), is having his way with the Texas League this season to the tune of a 7-4 mark and a 2.54 ERA which ranks tops among all active pitchers in the circuit. Anderson has been hot of late, having yielded just three earned runs in 34 innings over five starts this month. Anderson has pitched scoreless ball over 13 2/3 innings over his last two starts. A 6-3, 182-pound southpaw, Anderson led the Class A California League last season in ERA (2.26), innings pitched (179) and had the best BB/9 IP ratio in the league at 1.96.

The news surrounding the Tampa Bay Devil Rays has been mostly bad since the franchise's inception. But, things have actually been looking up as of late. The organization recently promoted outfielder Rocco Baldelli and shortstop Jace Brewer from Class A Bakersfield to Double-A Orlando and gave multi-skilled outfielder Carl Crawford his long-awaited shot in the big leagues after an all-too-long apprenticeship in Triple-A Durham. Baldelli and Brewer have each rebounded successfully from underachieving 2001 campaigns at the low Class A level. Baldelli, the club's top pick in the 2000 draft out of Bishop Hendricken High School in Rhode Island, departed as the California League's leading hitter at .333. Brewer, who missed a bulk of time with shoulder problems last year, departed ranked among the league leaders in hits with 114. Though Crawford, still just 20, had slumped of late, he is still Tampa's top prospect after the oft-injured Josh Hamilton is once again done for the season and now has his career in jeopardy after a rotator cuff injury. A speedster who can do it all on both offense and defense, Crawford should get a couple of hundred at-bats in the big leagues over the next few months as he attempts to prove his worth.

National League
Dontrelle Willis probably thought his phone was broken. After all, the 20-year-old left-hander was 10-2 with a 1.83 ERA that ranked third-best in the low Class A Midwest League. But, Willis finally received the call to pack his bags and head south to Jupiter, Florida, where he will join the Florida Marlins' high Class A club. Willis, acquired in the multi-player deal with the Cubs this spring, is a 6-4 left-hander who compiled a 5:1 strikeout/walk ratio while with low Class A Kane County this season.

It has been a terrific season for Milwaukee Brewers right-handed pitching prospect Ben Hendrickson, who has moved to the Double-A level in his fourth pro season and is moving closer and closer to pitching in Miller Park. Hendrickson, a 21-year-old native of Minnesota, has not allowed a run in 12 innings over his last two starts for the Huntsville club in the Southern League. On July 14 against Mobile, he tossed six innings of no-hit ball. Hendrickson, who has compiled a 3.00 ERA in five starts at the Double-A level, was 5-5 with a 2.55 ERA in 14 starts for Class A High Desert. The Brewers like Hendrickson a lot. He gets his fastball into the low-90s and also has a solid curveball.

The San Diego Padres have not messed around with Khalil Greene, the organization's top pick this June out of Clemson University. The Padres promoted Greene from the short-season Class A Northwest League to the high Class A California League after just 10 games. The 22-year-old shortstop has held his own, with hits in eight of his first 10 games for the Lake Elsinore club. Greene was drafted by the Cubs in the 14th round of the 2001 draft, but elected to return to Clemson for his senior season, during which he batted .475 with 22 homers and 75 RBI in the regular season, breaking several school and Atlantic Coast Conference records. Greene joins other young and talented hitters Jake Gautreau (out since July 7 with an intestinal infection), Tagg Bozied, Xavier Nady and Sean Burroughs in what looks like a nice group of up-and-coming prospects.

The Padres can't like the control -- or lack thereof -- they have seen from Double-A right-hander Brad Baker, whom San Diego obtained from the Boston Red Sox in a deal for left-hander Alan Embree last month. Baker, a Massachusetts native, has walked 18 batters in 20 2/3 innings through his first four starts. He has walked six batters on two separate occasions. Baker had compiled a strikeout/walk ratio of nearly 3:1 while he was with Class A Sarasota earlier this season. Prior to this season, the Red Sox had stated that Baker had ironed out his mechanics and had worked out any control problems that he had experienced in the past.