With the minor leagues' regular seasons over, it's time to present our second annual Prospect of the Year award, given to the prospect who showed the best performance in the minor leagues in 2017.

While the process of selecting the top prospects was ultimately subjective, I focused primarily on legitimate prospects who performed well relative to their age, level and experience in pro ball. In short, the younger a player was relative to the other players in his league -- especially when compared just to the players in his league with a chance to have some impact in the majors -- the more impressed I was with a strong performance.

The primary criterion here is performance as prospects, while still in the minors, because so many top prospects ended up in the majors this summer, performance I didn't count toward this list.

With that, here is my overall Prospect of the Year for 2017, as well as several other players who had outstanding seasons and deserved notice. I also gave a separate award to the 2017 draftee who had the best pro debut, as well as noted a handful of runners-up in that category.

2017 Prospect of the Year