Nationals Arm Race

Draft Coverage so far for 2017:

• 2017 Draft coverage; Local draft-prospects to keep an eye in for the 2017 draft
• 2017 Draft coverage; Mock Draft mania plus my projected top-5 and Nats picks
• 2017 Draft coverage; Prospect ranks, important links and local players of note
• Nats first two 2017 draft picks reaction: Risk and Reward
• First Look: Quick overview of Nats top 10 Draft picks for 2017

Here’s a quick rundown of the DC-area kids who got drafted this year.  My definition of “DC Area” includes any draftee who went to HS in the DC area or who attends a DC-area college.  Thus this includes University of Maryland players, even inf most of them went to HS outside the area.  NovaBaseballMagazine.com has a version of this story, and AllMetSports.com also published one if you’re interested.

Round	Overall	State	Drafting Team	Name	Position	Col/HS	HS	College
1	15	VA	Houston	J.B. Bukauskas	RHP	Col Jr	Stone Bridge (Ashburn)	UNC
2-S	70	VA	Colorado	Tommy Doyle	RHP	Col Jr	Flint Hill (Vienna)	UVA
4	129	MD	Toronto	Kevin Smith	SS	Col Jr	Update NY	Umaryland
6	172	MD	Arizona	Brian Shaffer	RHP	Col Jr	N. Harford, Pylesville MD	Umaryland
10	294	VA	Milwaukee	Alec Bettinger	RHP	Col Jr	Hylton (Woodbridge)	UVA
14	422	MD	New York Yankees	Harold Cortijo	RHP	HS	Riverdale Baptist	Seminole State
17	515	VA	Detroit	Billy Lescher	RHP	Col Jr	West Potomac HS	Penn
17	524	VA	Texas	Tyler Ratliff	3B	Col Jr	TC Williams	Marshall U
18	527	VA	Cincinnati	John Ghyzel	RHP	Col Jr	Westfield (C'ville)	U Rochester
19	558	VA	San Diego	Nick Feight	1B	Col Sr	Battlefield	UNC-Wilmington
19	566	VA	Colorado	Joey Bartosic	CF	Col Sr	Oakton HS	George Washington
20	598	MD/VA	Pittsburgh	Will Reed	RHP	J2	Loudoun Valley (Purceville)	Harford CC
21	625	VA	Los Angeles Angels	Devon Perez	RHP	Col Jr	Stone Bridge (Ashburn)	Oklahoma
22	653	VA	Philadelphia	Brian Mims	2B	Col Jr	Forest Park HS (Woodbridge)	UNC-Wilmington
27	800	MD	Atlanta	Randy Bednar	CF	HS	Landon School	Umaryland
27	820	MD	Los Angeles Dodgers	Jeremy Arocho	SS	HS	Old Mill	Northwest Florida State College
31	921	VA	Oakland	Brandon Withers	RHP	Col Sr5	Osborn (Manassas)	JMU
31	937	MD	New York Mets	Ryan Selmer	RHP	Col Jr	Riverdale Baptist	Umaryland
32	946	VA	Minnesota	Nick Brown	RHP	Col Sr	Patriot (Bristow)	William & Mary
34	1023	MD	Seattle	David Hesslink	LHP	Col Sr	Bethesda-Chevy Chase	MIT
36	1071	VA	Oakland	Logan Farrar	OF/LHP	Col Jr	Woodbridge HS	VCU
37	1109	MD	Miami	Jared Price	RHP	Col Sr5	Pennsylvania HS	UMaryland

That’s not a bad collection of DC-area guys.  We all knew J.B. Bukauskas would go high; lots of the mock drafts I saw had him as high as 6th.  However two unsteady starts to close out his career (in the ACC tourney and then in the Regionals of the CWS) dropped him probably 10 spots from where he could have gone.  Rumor has it he was suffering from a blister.  Suffice it to say, Houston has to be ecstatic that they got him at 15.  I’m slightly surprised how high Tommy Doyle went honestly; I would have guessed him to go a bit lower based on his profile now at UVA (reliever).  But he’s now looking at an $800k+ bonus.  UMaryland infielder Kevin Smith went a bit lower than projections.  Maryland RHP Brian Shaffer also went a bit ahead of schedule, going in the 6th round after having some helium this spring.  The last DC-area top-10 pick with a guaranteed slot was also a surprise to me: another UVA arm in Alec Bettinger went in the 10th round.  Again a surprise given his profile as a reliever.  But certainly not on talent or reputation; Bettinger’s name has been known to local baseball followers for years.

Riverdale Baptist’s Harold Cortijo, the All-Met player of the year, went in the 14th round.  It should be interesting to see what he does.  It seemed to me from reading his interviews that he intended to go pro, but a 14th round pick somewhat limits the bonus dollars he can get.  I wonder if he goes to JuCo and tries again next year.

Three DC-area prep graduates who, frankly, I’d never heard of went in the 17th and 18th rounds.  All three were at lower-profile baseball colleges.

Two area guys who play for UNC-Wilmington and who got some pre-season All America mention went in the 19th and 22nd round respectively: Nick Feight and Brian Mims were surprises to me to go so low.

The only other DC-area prep guys to even get drafted this year were two of the leading prep players in the area: Landon’s Randy Bednar, who went in the 27th and seems likely to honor his commit to UMaryland.  Also Old Mill’s Jeremy Orocho, who  is a longtime Evoshield Canes member and who apparently gave up on his UMaryland commit to go to JuCo.  I’m guessing he plays a year of community college and re-applies for the draft.

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So here’s a short list of the higher profile DC-area kids who did NOT get drafted at all that i’ve been tracking for a while: These commits change constantly so apologies if I have one of them wrong.

• Kyle Whitten, RHP/1B from Osbourn Park in Manassas, VA.  Early commit to UVA.
• Tyler Solomon, C/1B from Battlefield HS in Haymarket, VA.  Early commit to Vanderbilt
• Anthony Simonelli RHP from Millbrook in Winchester, VA.  Early commit to Coastal Carolina
• Michael Ludowig, OF from Briar Woods.  Early commit to Wake Forest.
• Connor Hartigan, OF from Millbrook in Winchester, VA.  Was Early commit to Coastal Carolina, now committed to University of South Carolina-Sumter.

 

A far cry from 2016 with multiple prep kids from the area going in the top rounds.  I’ll do a similar post for the extended DC/MD/VA area next.

Here’s a recap of our CWS coverage so far for 2017:

• College Baseball 2017 Kickoff
• Field of 64 announcement with Regional predictions and highlights of top-end draft prospects.
• 2017 Draft Preview with coverage of Local College-age eligible players of note (publishing closer to the draft)
• 2017 CWS tournament: Regional Results, Super-Regional Pairings

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Lost in Draft 2017 mania was the finishing of the Super Regionals on Monday evening.  This post is a couple days old but just in time for the CWS to start.

Super Regional Recaps:  I’ve got these ordered by they way they’ll be playing into the CWS field (i.e. by bracket).  And this is the order they’re listed on d1baseball’s Tourney Central, the quickest way to find results.  Rain throughout southeast cancelled half the friday slate of games.

• #1 Oregon State vs Vanderbilt: Oregon State’s #1 starter Luke Heinrich left the team after some past indiscretions were uncovered by the local paper (you can google the details yourself; the timing of the unveiling couldn’t have come at a worse time for him, his team or his future just days ahead of the draft,  however reprehensible his transgressions were).  Behind #2 starter Jake Thompson they rolled over Vanderbilt nonetheless 8-4 in game one.   They continued the onslaught, destroying one of the best SEC teams 9-2 to go two and out; Oregon State advances to the CWS even without its ace.
• Cal State Fullerton vs #9 Long Beach State: LBSU blanked CS-F in the first game 3-0, taking the 6th game out of the 7 times they’ve now played this season.  Fullterton came roaring back and destroyed the Dirtbags 12-0 to force the decider.  In a shocker to me, Cal-State Fullerton got a dominant pitching performance from a mid-week starter and won the clincher 2-1 to advance.
• Sam Houston State v #12 Florida State: FSU rallied to beat Sam Houston in the first game 7-6.  Sam Houston was in control before FSU scored 3 in the 6th to tie it, eventually getting the walk-off in the bottom of the 9th.  In game 2, Florida State scored in each of the first six innings to turn it into a laugher 19-0 and advance to their 22nd CWS.
• #4 LSU vs Mississippi State: LSU scored 4 in the 8th to rally past Mississippi State in the first.  LSU’s ace Alex Lange was a bit wild; he got relieved by Virginia product Zach Hess, who got the Win.  In Game 2, LSU turned a close game into a laugher as Mississippi State seemed to run out of arms, eventually winning 14-4 to advanced to the CWS.

 

• Davidson vs TAMU: Texas A&M beat the cinderella story Davidson 7-6 in the first game … in 15 innings (!).  One worry you always have seeing these collegiate long extra inning games is pitcher abuse; TAMU did seem to select a periodic starter to eat up the extra innings, so that’s good to see.  In Game 2, Davidson was ahead into the 8th … and then their lack of pitching depth finally got exposed.  TAMU exploded for 10 runs in the 8th and 9th to blow them away 12-6 and be the second team to punch their ticket to the CWS.
• #7 Louisville v #10 Kentucky; Lousiville took game one behind their #2 starter, with super star  Brendan McKay going 0-3 at the plate.  McKay got the win in game two to punch Louisville’s ticket to the CWS, the first team to do so.  (Louisville had clinched the super regional before the LSU regional had played an inning thanks to weather).
• #6 TCU v Missouri State: TCU won a close one 3-2 behind ace Jared Janczak; they scored 2 in the 8th to go ahead.  TCU cruised in game 2 8-1 to advance to their 4th straight CWS.
• #3 Florida  vs #14 Wake Forest: Florida won game 1 in 11 innings; they threw ace Alex Faedo but he was on 72 pitches through 4 and got pulled.  Wake’s ace Parker Dunshee threw a fantastic game; 8ip, 3hits but Florida won on a walk-off.  Game two was suspended sunday night due to rain; the last regional to finish.  Wake Forest took the suspended game to force the decider, which unfortunately was being played just as the MLB draft started monday night.  There, Florida held serve and advanced 3-0 to finish out the field.

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My CWS Predictions: Oregon State, TAMU, Florida, LSU, Florida State, TCU, Louisville, Long Beach State.

Actuals: Oregon State, TAMU, Florida, LSU, Florida State, TCU, Louisville, Cal-State Fullerton

I got 7 of 8 right, missing on the Fullerton pick (figuring that Long Beach State would continue to dominate them).

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CWS Field and Profiles

Top Bracket:

• #1 Oregon State: 54-4 overall record (27-3 in conference).  1st place Pac12,   Regular season conference champ (no post-season Pac12 tourney)
• Cal State Fullerton: 39-22 (15-9).  3rd place Big West regular season (no Big West tourney)
• #12 Florida State 45-21 (14-14): 5th place, Atlantic division ACC regular season.  1st place ACC tournament.
• #4 LSU: 48-17 (21-9): 1st place, SEC West conference.  SEC tourney champs.

Bottom Bracket

• Texas A&M: 41-21 (16-14): 5th place SEC West.
• #7 Louisville: 52-10 (23-6): 1st Place Atlantic division ACC regular season.
• #6 TCU: 47-16 (16-8): 1st place Big 12.  Lost in Big12 tourney title game.
• #3 Florida: 46-19 (21-9): 1st Place SEC East regular season.

CWS field review by the numbers

• Pac12: 1 team
• Big West: 1 team
• ACC: 2 teams
• Big12: 1 team
• SEC: 3 teams

 

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CWS Field thoughts

What a great CWS field.  Several legendary programs (Cal-State Fullerton, Florida State and Florida) with dozens of appearances between them.  The undisputed #1 team in the land (Oregon State).  The undisputed #1 pre-season team in TCU.  Arguably the hottest team in the land in LSU.  The team with the likely #1 overall pick (Louisville).  Great spread amongst the power conference; you have 1st place teams from both SEC divisions, the ACC, the Pac12 and the Big12.  Every team in Omaha this year has been there already this decade, making it a very experienced field.  Should make for great baseball.

Quick predictions: LSU from the top; I’ve always been slightly biased against Pac12 teams and when the #1 team from the west meets the #1 team from the powerhouse SEC conference, something tells me the Tigers will prevail.   TCU from the bottom, though its tough to pick against Louisville.  I think TCU gets a break not having to face Brendan McKay in game one and that might be the difference.

Final: TCU takes the title over LSU and fulfils their #1 pre-season ranking.

Player Star power in this CWS: By team, here’s the guys to look for either for Nats interest or for overall talent/draft position:

• Oregon State: two dominant starters in Luke Heimlich (possibly not playing) and Jake Thompson.  Also Drew Rasmussen, drafted ahead of either guy.  Max Engelbrekt has the best ERA on the team and was the Nats 40th round pick as a 5th-year senior.
• TAMU; RHP Corbin Martin
• Florida: Alex Faedo.
• LSU Alex Lange their #1 starter plus their clean-up hitter Greg Deichmann, both first day draft picks.  Nats 2017 4th rounder Cole Freeman is their engine.
• Florida State; none really, despite FSU’s ranking.  They’re a solid and younger team this year with no major 2017 draft prospects.
• TCU’s Evan Skoug might get drafted relatively highly.
  
• Louisville:  led by #4 overall pick Brendan McKay.
• Cal State Fullerton; no 1st round notables; same as FSU: team depth, not superstars this year.
  

Nats 2017 Draftees in the CWS: thanks to the Nats strategy of drafting only College players, they drafted a ton of guys who are playing in Omaha.  By team:

• Oregon State: Max Engelbrekt has the best ERA on the team and was the Nats 40th round pick as a 5th-year senior.  Not sure why he lasted til the 40th round…
• TAMU: 5th rounder Jr RHP Brigham Hill, 18th rounder OF Nick Choruby.
• Florida: none
• LSU  Nats 2017 4th rounder 2B Cole Freeman is their engine.
• Florida State: none
• TCU: none this year, last year’s pick Evan Skoug got picked.
  
• Louisville: none
• Cal State Fullerton: 24th rounder sr. SS Tim Richards

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College CWS tournament references:

• d1baseball.com’s daily scoreboard is my go-to link
• d1baseball’s Tourney Central
• Baseball America’s College coverage home page
• CollegeBaseballDaily.com has coverage as well.
• CollegeBaseballCentral.com has coverage as well.
• Ncaa.com’s interactive full 64-team bracket for 2017
• NCAA Individual player stats
• Warren Nolan.com’s College Baseball RPI
• Warren Nolan’s Conference RPI rankings for 2017

Here’s a first look at our top 10 draft picks, or where we stand after day 2.

At the top of round 1, a last minute switch led to a surprise first name being selected: Royce Lewis went 1-1 instead of one of the two big college arms being rumored there all week; twitter reportedly had Brendan McKay rejecting an underslot deal at 1-1 and thus falling to 4th … where he’ll still get paid.  Nonetheless, the top 5 ended up being the same top-5 on nearly every mock draft … just in a different order.

How about the Nats picks?  Lets just say there was some back and forth among the pundits about these top 10 picks.

Round	Overall	Name	Position	Col/HS	College or Cmtm	State	Slot Value
1	25	Seth Romero	LHP	Col Jr	Houston	TX	2530400
2	65	Wil Crowe	RHP	Col SR	South Carolina	SC	946500
3	103	Nick Raquet	LHP	Col Jr	William & Mary	VA	522300
4	133	Cole Freeman	2B	Col SR	LSU	LA	390000
5	163	Brigham Hill	RHP	Col Jr	TAMU	TX	291200
6	193	Kyle Johnston	RHP	Coll Jr	Texas	TX	226100
7	223	Jackson Tetreault	RHP	J2	State Col Florida Manatee	FL	178100
8	253	Jared Brashner	RHP	Col Sr	Samford	Fl	149600
9	283	Alex Troop	LHP	Col Jr.	Michigan State	MI	138000
10	313	Trey Turner	RHP	Col Jr.	Missouri State	MO	131300

Pick by Pick: if they’re ranked on the main prospect ranking sites I like (see links at bottom):

• 1st Round/#25 overall: Seth Romero, LHP UHouston. (Espn #59, MLBPipeline #25, BA #27, Minorleague #29, BDR #49, 2080 #30).  Well, the worrisome situation came to pass; the Nats couldn’t help themselves and drafted perhaps the draft’s biggest knucklehead.  His list of transgressions at Houston were large and dumb; fights with teammates, weight/conditioning issues, drug issues.  Prior to the spring, he was easily a top-10 talent, with early projections having him going as high as 6th overall.  He’s a power-lefty; works 92-95, touches 97 and per MLB already has two 60-grade pitches.  He kind of reminds you body-wise of Chad Cordero, with mechanics kind of like Drew Storen.  He’s got a very quick arm, is a big-body kid who might still need some conditioning work, but whose mechanics may give him some issues later on.  I don’t like the pick for the character issues; the Nats left one big college arm who I would have preferred in Alex Lange, but the guy I really liked here (Tanner Houck) went the pick before, so perhaps that sewed up the Nats choices.
• 2nd/#65: Wil Crowe, RHP from South Carolina.  (Espn #43, MLBpipeline #44, BA #47, MinorLeague #30, BDR #185, 2080 #51):   A guy who I saw in some mock drafts going to the Nats at #25 overall falls somehow to #65 overall, despite nearly every ranking system having him 20 picks higher.  Crowe is a TJ survivor (aren’t they all these days?), with a 65 fastball and a couple of 55s on his other tools who was solid if unspectacular for USC this year.  Big guy, big arm, physical comparison to Joe Blanton.  I like this as a safe pick.
• 3rd/#103: Nick Raquet, LHP from William & Mary.  BA #145, BDR #348.  A lefty weekend starter from a bad baseball school in a small baseball conference.  Raquet had good K/9 numbers, but also horrible BB/9 numbers, had an ERA in the 4s and was a non-entity on the rankings.  Where is this pick coming from?  He wasn’t anywhere even listed on the Virginia-only prospects lists on the various sites.  A cost-savings pick?  There’s still significant talent on the board, not the least of which is Tristan Beck from Stanford; is his injury worse than people thought?
• 4th/#133: Cole Freeman, 2B senior from LSU.  BDR #429.  BA #166.  A senior sign, twitter reports that he’s 5’9″, has a short compact swing, can hit, has blazing speed, is high-energy and is plus-plus make-up.  Sounds great; this is a fourth round pick?  Sounds like an 8th rounder.  Still not sure what the Nats are doing.
• 5th/#163: Brigham Hill, Jr RHP from TAMU.  BA #346.  MLB #159.  BDR #171.  Texas A&M’s #1/friday starter, went 8-3 with a 3.16 era in the tough SEC.  Smaller guy, throws low 90s.  50s on most of his pitches, plus change up.  I like a guy like this; he reminds me of Austin Voth in terms of draft pedigree and collegiate accomplishment.
• 6th/#193: Kyle Johnston JR RHP from Texas.  BA #250, MLB #136, BDR #492.  Weekend starter who bounced around roles for Texas this year but had some very solid outings against good Big12 competition.  Not a ton of K/9, but two grade 60 pitches (fastball and cutter).  Profiles as a reliever, both by pitch capability and by stature (6’0″ right hander).  Not a bad pick here.
• 7th/#223: Jackson Tetreault, J2 RHP from State College of Florida Manatee – Sarasota.  BA #286.  I’m not a BA subscriber so I can’t read the scouting report, but his peripherals at his Juco (where a few others are getting drafted) are solid.  Worked as a starter, big K/9 numbers.
• 8th/#253: Jared Brashner.  Coll Sr RHP from Samford.  BA #430.  We’re clearly in the senior sign territory; Brashner’s a reliever from Samford with nearly a walk an inning to go along with 46 Ks in 30 relief innings.
• 9th/#283: Alex Troop, Coll Jr LHP from Michigan State.  BA #179 BDR #184.  Solid lefty with good numbers this year.  Not a bad 9th round pick, one who still rates on BA’s list.
• 10th/#313: Trey Turner, Coll Jr LHP from Missouri State.  Unranked anywhere, limited time this year ; just 13 IP but 22 Ks in those 13 innings and a stellar BAA.  Didn’t pitch after March because … he tore his UCL.  So there’s your annual Nat draftee with TJ surgery.

First 10 rounds worth of picks breakdown:

• 9 arms, 1 position player.
• 10 college (1 juco), zero prep.
• A few picks that seem like clear money savers: Raquet, Brashner, perhaps also Freeman.
• Heavy influence in the South East: 6 of the 10 picks come from Texas, Louisiana or Florida).

Conclusion: We’ve talked about the risk of Romero.  I liked the Crowe pick.  I question the Raquet and Freeman picks.  I liked the two SEC starter picks in rounds 5 and 6, and I liked the 9th and 10th rounders too as good risks.  Clearly this draft is about arms for the Nats after picking mostly positional players in 2016.  No screwing around with prep players; they drafted a bunch of college guys to try to get them to the majors more quickly, likely to fill voids coming up in the next couple of years.

What do you guys think of it?

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Draft Links of Use

1. Mlbpipeline’s Draft Tracker for 2017
2. All 10 rounds of slot bonus figures for 2017
3. BA’s draft database, including link to get BPA
4. Perfect Game to get profiles on more obscure draftees.

Draft Rankings referred to within here:

• ESPN (Keith Law) Top 100 “Big Board” Draft prospect rankings
• MLBPipeline (Callis & Mayo): top 200 draft prospects
• BaseballAmerica Top 500 Draft Prospects
• MinorLeagueBall.com (Michael Cook) Top 151 Draft Prospects
• BaseballDraftReport’s top 500 (published just as the draft started)
• 2080baseball’s top 125.
• Fangraphs top 100 draft sortable board.

Well, it came to pass.  The nats couldn’t help themselves and took talent over character.

Here’s my quick reaction to our first two picks.  Not surprisingly, the team went with two college arms.

• 1st Round/#25 overall: Seth Romero, LHP UHouston. Well, the worrisome situation came to pass; the Nats couldn’t help themselves and drafted perhaps the draft’s biggest knucklehead.  His list of transgressions at Houston were large and dumb; fights with teammates, weight/conditioning issues, drug issues.  Prior to the spring, he was easily a top-10 talent, with early projections having him going as high as 6th overall.  He had 85 frigging strikeouts in 48 collegiate innings this year, and his slider is reportedly unhittable.  Sounds like a Carlos Rodon comp while he was in college.  He’s a power-lefty; works 92-95, touches 97 and per MLB already has two 60-grade pitches.  He kind of reminds you body-wise of Chad Cordero, with mechanics kind of like Drew Storen.  He’s got a very quick arm, is a big-body kid who might still need some conditioning work, but whose mechanics may give him some issues later on.  I don’t like the pick for the character issues; the Nats left one big college arm who I would have preferred in Alex Lange, but the guy I really liked here (Tanner Houck) went the pick before, so perhaps that sewed up the Nats choices.
• 2nd/#65: Wil Crowe, RHP from South Carolina.  A guy who I saw in some mock drafts going to the Nats at #25 overall falls somehow to #65 overall, despite nearly every ranking system having him 20 picks higher.  Crowe is a TJ survivor (aren’t they all these days?), with a 65 fastball and a couple of 55s on his other tools who was solid if unspectacular for USC this year.  Big guy, big arm, physical comparison to Joe Blanton.  I like this as a safe pick.

Interestingly, both guys might be “slot savings” picks too.  Romero may be a Scott Boras advisee, but his free-fall may not put him in much of a bargaining position.  Meanwhile, Crowe has now passed up being drafted twice, is a redshirt Junior and really doesn’t need a 5th year of college.  So perhaps we’re seeing some strategy here, saving some cash for a run at a prep arm in the 3rd or 4th.

Verdict: in Rizzo we Trust.  If Romero’s issues are past him, then we very well could see a Brandon Finnegan like movement through the minors this season (especially since he didn’t pitch a full year), with him even helping in the MLB bullpen later this season.  Why not?  If he’s got two 60-grade pitches right now, then he could probably pitch in a MLB bullpen right now.  Crowe seems like more of a classical big-body RHP innings eater who we may see slowly rise with solid but unspectacular stuff; just the kind of solid starter every team needs to develop from within.

I will now begin talking myself into Romero.  Hey, we were all 21 once and did dumb things too.  There’s my justification for the pick 🙂

2016’s version of this post.

Its Draft Day!

The 2017 MLB rule-4 (Amateur) draft starts  6/12/17 at 7pm.  The MLB Network will have full coverage of the first round of picks. This post is my dumping ground of draft coverage for 2017.

This post uses last year’s format, with links to use to see draft prospect rankings, links to help cover the draft (which I personally come back to time and time again), some blurbs on local players of interest, and then links to a bunch of mock drafts.

Draft Coverage so far at NAR for 2017:

• Local Draft prospects of note for 2017: namely, J.B. Bukauskas, Adam Haseley and Pavin Smith (see more below)
• Mock Draft Overview for 2017.  The same top 5 names seem to appear … and the Nats are more and more rumored towards a problem child.

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Draft Links of importance

• MLB.com Official 2017 Draft Central home page.
• MLB’s Awesome 2017 Draft Tracker; you can slice and dice the draft 10 different ways, search by schools and home states, etc.
• Official MLB 2017 Draft Order, including slot values for the first few rounds. Nats pick 25th, then 65th, then 103rd, then 133rd and 30 more each add’l round.
  
• Official Draft Bonus Pool totals for 2017.  Minnesota most with $14M, Nats have about $5.5M.
• MLB Draft Database for all past drafts.
• Baseball-Reference Draft Tools: links to their draft database plus some custom reports.
• MinorLeagueBall.com’s 2017 Player profile index; an index of their profiles of all the top-end draft prospects for this year.

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Here’s a slew of Draft Prospect rankings : these are NOT the same as mock drafts; these are independent rankings of the players without consideration to draft considerations.  Apologies in advance; many of these are insider/subscription.  Fork over the dollars and subscribe and support baseball coverage that you like!

(Pundits to track: D1Baseball, ESPN Law, MLBpipeline, MinorleagueBall, USAToday, BaseballAmerica, PerfectGame, Scout.com, MLBDraftReport, BeyondtheBoxScore)

• D1baseball early top 100 HS/Prep Draft Prospects 12/2/2016: Greene, Adell, Lewis, Rogers, Hall.  No DC/MD/VA players in their early top 100 list, but two UVA commits here (Andrew Papantonis, Devin Ortiz)
  
• D1Baseball early top 100 College Draft Prospects 12/9/16: Kendall, Wright, Faedo, Bukauskas, Houck.  Other players with local ties mentioned include Pavin Smith, Kevin Smith, Adam Haseley, Ernie Clement, Hunter Williams plus a few others who might be top-10 round picks.
• BaseballAmerica top 200 Draft Prospects 5/4/17: Greene, McKay, Wright, Gore, Lewis.
• BaseballAmerica Top 500 Draft Prospects 6/5/17: Greene, Wright, McKay, Gore, Lewis.  Filterable by State, which is awesome.
• Fangraphs/Eric Longenhagen 2017 Sortable top 50 Draft Board 5/23/17: Wright, Greene, Gore, Lewis, McKay.
• MLBPipeline (Jim Callis/Jonathan Mayo) top 100 Draft Prospects: 5/26/17: Greene, McKay, Wright, Lewis, Gore.
• MLBPipeline (Callis & Mayo): top 200 draft prospects dated 6/5/17: Greene, McKay, Wright, Gore, Lewis.
• MinorLeagueBall.com (Michael Cook) Top 151 Draft Prospects 5/15/17: Greene, McKay, Adell, Wright, Bukauskas.
• ESPN (Keith Law) Top 100 “Big Board” Draft prospect rankings 6/7/17: Greene, Wright, McKay, Gore, Lewis.

Notice how nearly EVERY list has Greene as the best prospect in this draft?  That’s pretty consistent view … but there’s no chance that Greene goes #1 overall.  So thanks to the perverse risks associated with drafting prep kids, yet again we will likely see the best prospect not getting taken #1 overall.  This seems to happen nearly every year since the Strasburg/Harper drafts.   In 2011, Gerrit Cole went 1-1 when Anthony Rendon should have been.  In 2012 i think the “right guy” went 1-1 (Carlos Correa).  Imagine the Astros right now had they taken Kris Bryant instead of Mark Appel (who didn’t sign and who has yet to matriculate to the majors) in 2013 1-1 overall.  Brady Aiken 1-1 overall in 2014 was defensible at the time … but Carlos Rodon was the presumed 1-1 heading into the spring season.   I don’t think anyone disputes the Dansby Swanson 1-1 pick in 2015 (it was a weak class), but few think that Mickey Moniak was the best prospect in the 2016 class (most had it as Jason Groome or Riley Pint;  Groome fell to 12th thanks to some off-the-field stuff and is now hurt while Pint is struggling in low-A).  So its good to be the 2nd team picking this year.

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Now, some news about College Players with local ties who are serious draft candidates (meaning first couple of rounds projected or present on top 100 draft ranking lists).  Note that I’ve got a far, far larger list of local players that I’ll follow-up on after the draft; these are just the significant/top 10 round types.

• J.B. Bukauskas: has had a fantastic junior season and has become perhaps the 2nd best collegiate pitcher this class.  Still undersized … but there are some 6’0″ guys with success in the majors right now.
• Adam Haseley: has rocketed up draft boards by being perhaps the 2nd best two way player in college baseball.  Upper 1st round talent.
• Pavin Smith: 1B only but a sweet, solid bat.  Upper 1st round talent.

At this point, all three of these players are projecting in the first half of the first round; no other local player seems close.  There’s a slew of other local college kids mentioned in the BA top 200, which means they’re all likely 5th-8th round material.

Local Prep players of note who are serious draft candidates: none this year.  Unlike last year, where Joe Rizzo and Khalil Lee both were top 5 round picks, there’s nobody anywhere in the DC/MD/VA landscape that is threatening to be a top-end prep pick (at least as far as I can tell right now).

Nats Re-Draft players of interest: these are guys who the Nats have previously drafted but who did not sign.  Using the Nats Draft Tracker as a guide, here’s some prep guys we drafted generally in 2014 who are now rising college juniors and are bigger names in this draft:

• Stuart Fairchild, OF from Wake Forest: we drafted him in the 38th round in 2014; he’s now perhaps projected mid 2nd round.
• Evan Skoug, C from TCU: we drafted him in the 34th round in 2014; now he’s perhaps projected as a 3rd rounder.
• Tommy Doyle, RHP from Flint Hill HS/UVA: we drafted him in the 35th round in 2014, probably as a hat-tip to a local kid more than a possible signee.  He’s projected as a 6th rounder after a decent career at UVA coverting to relief.
• Quinn Brodey, RHP from Stanford: we drafted him in the 37th round in 2016; now he’s perhaps a 6th-7th rounder projected.
• Morgan Cooper: RHP from UTexas; we drafted him in the 34th round last  year in 2016: he chose to stay in school to build value and now is projected as a 5th-6th rounder.
• Tristan Clarke and Cory Voss: two Juco draftees from 2016 who are draft eligible for 2017.  Clarke started for UNO and put up solid numbers, albeit in the weaker Southland conference.  Voss only played part-time at UofA and isn’t a draft prospect.
• Other Prep draftees in 2014 not mentioned here who are not draft prospects:
  • Elliot Cary was a part-time player hitting .219 for Oregon State this year
  • Clay Casey appears to have transferred yet again, playing 2017 for Delta State and slugging his way to a 17-homer season.
  • Jon Little slashed.267/.351/.420 his junior year, starting in the OF.
  • John Henry Styles has had just one appearance this entire season, and he failed to retire a batter.

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Mock Drafts

See separate Mock Draft post.

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Mock Drafts

Every year I say i’ll stay away from the Mock Draft links … and every year I come back.  Here’s a running collection; i’ve listed their top-5 and then who they project the Nats to take at #25 (if they project out that far).  Honestly, projecting even the top 5 has been folly in year’s past; last minute changes occur all the time and drastically change the top of every draft.  Look no further than the 2011 draft that netted the Nats presumed top pick Anthony Rendon.  

I’ll continue to add in mocks as they get published post-posting up until the draft.

However this year you’ll notice that the same general collection of names are listed in nearly every top 5 collection.  Here’s a quick summary of those top-5 guys.

Collegiate top-5 names:

• Brendan McCay: 1b/lhp Louisville.  All-American as a Soph.  2016 Collegiate National team.  Good two-way player likely being drafted as a pitcher.
• Kyle Wright rhp Vanderbilt.  2016 Collegiate National team.  Solid #1 starter for Vanderbilt, a machine for developing top-end pitching draft picks (see Jordan Sheffield, Walker Buehler, Carson Fuller, Tyler Beede, Sonny Grey, Mike Minor and David Price, all of whom were 1st round starting pitcher picks from Vanderbilt over the last 10 years)
• Alex Faedo: rhp Florida. 2016 Collegiate National team; #1 starter from Florida, less known for developing pitchers but who did have two 1st round arms drafted just last year (A.J. Puk, Dane Dunning).
• Jeren Kendall OF Vanderbilt.  2016 Collegiate National team; was presumptive 1-1 before really struggling at the plate in 2017, opening the door for one of the above college arms likely going 1-1.
• J.B. Bukauskas rhp UNC via Ashburn, VA.  2016 Collegiate National team, fantastic numbers leading UNC to its first national seed in a while.  Considered undersized (he’s 6’0″) but has a big arm; widely projected at #6 to Oakland but does get some top-5 press.
• Tristan Beck rhp Stanford who did not play in 2017 due to injury but was a pre-season all-american; some thought he may get picked as an injury stash like we’re seeing more and more.
• Adam Haseley, 1B/rhp from UVA who has massively improved his draft stock this year.  He went from being just a good player to being mentioned in the top 5 in some mocks.  I don’t think he goes top-5, but he’s gone before the top-10 is done.

Prep top-5 names:

• Hunter Greene: ss/rhp Notre Dame High, CA (UCLA commit). 2015 18U team as a Jr., Standout at PG Nationals 2016. Two-way talent, 95-97 on the mound but also a fantastic hitter. 18U National team trials. Area code star.  Likely getting drafted as an arm, might be the first prep RH starter to go 1-1.  Stopped pitching mid-way through the spring though, presumably to save his arm for his first pro season.
• Royce Lewis ss/2b San Juan Capistrano, CA (UC Irvine). flashed power at Under Armour Game.  Helium guy, likely a top-5 pick.
• MacKenzie Gore lhp Whiteville (North Carolina) High School (ECU commit).  Also a helium guy, has has his stock rise highly this spring.
• Jordon Adell of/rhp Ballard High, KY (Louisville).  18U National team trials.  Area Code star; falling status early 17 badly but still gets some top-5 love.
• Shane Baz, rhp from Concordia HS, TX (TCU): fast mover, mid-90s big righty in the same prep construction from the Houston area as the likes of Josh Beckett, Jamison Taillon and Tyler Kolek.  I don’t think he’s a top-5 pick but should be top-10.

 

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Here’s the Mock draft collection that i’ve saved over the past months.  If you know of one I’m missing, let me know and I’ll add it in.

• MLBPipeline (Jim Callis) 2017 Mock Draft v1.0 12/14/16: Faedo, Kendall, Greene, Wright, Lewis (only projected top 10 picks)
• MLBPipeline (Jim Callis) 2017 Mock Draft v2.0 5/12/17: McKay, Greene, Gore, Lewis, Wright.  Nats taking Alex Lange, a polished, quick moving RH starter from LSU who I’d love to get.
• MLBPipeline (Jim Callis) 2017 Mock Draft v3.0 5/26/17: Wright, Greene, Gore, McKay, Haseley.  Nats still on Lange.
• MLBPipeline (Jim Callis) 2017 Mock Draft v4.0 6/9/17: Wright, Greene, Gore, McKay, Lewis.  Nats on Clarke Schmidt, a good RH starter from South Carolina who had to have TJ surgery (sound familiar?).  However, in his mock this leaves Houck, Pearson and Carlson on the board, and I think the Nats would take any of those three ahead of TJ guy.
• MLBPipeline (Jim Callis) 2017 Mock Draft v5.0 6/12/17: McKay, Greene, Gore, Lewis, Hiura.  Wow.  Nats taking Seth Romero, a LH starter who was just kicked off of UHouston’s team, his 3rd “strike” with the team.  Sounds like a winner to me and I hope the Nats are not foolish enough to take a 3-time suspended college player.  Problem is, he’s a Scott Boras client, and people are worried that Boras is talking to the ownership again…
• MLBPipeline (Jonathan Mayo) 2017 Mock Draft v1.0 12/14/16: Greene, Kendall, Faedo, Lewis, Wright (only projected top 10 picks).
• MLBPipeline (Jonathan Mayo) 2017 Mock Draft v2.0 5/31/17: Wright, Greene, Lewis, McKay, Gore.  Nats getting Lange (the MLB.com guys seem confident on Lange dropping to #25).
• MLBPipeline (Jonathan Mayo) 2017 Mock Draft v3.0 6/12/17: McKay, Greene, Gore, Lewis, Hiura.  Nats on Lange.

• ESPN (Keith Law) 2017 Mock Draft v1.0 dated 5/11/17: McKay, Greene, Lewis, Wright, Gore.  Nats taking Tanner Houck, a polished, quick moving Missouri RH starter.
• ESPN (Keith Law) 2017 Mock Draft v2.0 dated 5/30/17: Wright, Greene, Gore, McKay, Lewis.  Nats on Romero.
• ESPN (Keith Law) 2017 Mock Draft v3.0 dated 6/11/17: McKay, Greene, Gore, Lewis, Wright.  Nats taking Romero, again.  Great.
• Fangraphs (Eric Longenhagen) 2017 Mock Draft v1.0 dated 6/5/17: Wright, Greene, Gore, McKay, Lewis.  Nats taking Tristan Beck, the injured Stanford RHP.  Considering that Beck was once rumored to be possible top-5, if he falls to 25 I think the Nats would jump.
• D1Baseball (Frankie Piliere) 2017 Mock Draft v1.0 dated 5/18/17: Wright, McKay, Greene, Lewis, Gore.  Nats taking Tanner Houck.
• D1Baseball (Frankie Piliere) 2017 Mock Draft v2.0 dated 6/9/17: Wright, Greene, Lewis, McKay, Gore.  Nats taking Romero.  Problem with this mock: the next 3 after Romero are Carlson, Peterson and Lange, and I’d have to think the Nats would take any of those three over Romero.
• Baseball America (John Manuel) 2017 Mock Draft v1.0 dated 3/16/17: Greene, McKay, Lewis, Bukauskas, Beck (only projecting 1st 10 picks: no Nats pick).
• Baseball America (John Manuel) 2017 Mock Draft v2.0 dated 4/20/17: McKay, Greene, Lewis, Wright, Beck.  Nats taking Brady McConnell, a prep SS from Florida who i’ve never heard of and have a hard time believing we’d actually take.
• Baseball America (John Manuel) 2017 Mock Draft v3.0 dated 5/18/17: Wright, McKay, Greene, Lewis, Baz.  Nats taking Romero.
• Baseball America (John Manuel) 2017 Mock Draft v3.5 dated 5/30/17: Wright, McKay, Greene, Lewis, Gore.  Nats on Schmidt.
• HeroSports.com (Chris Crawford) 2017 Mock Draft v4.0 dated 5/12/17: McKay, Greene, Wright, Bukauskas, Beck.  Nats taking Jordon Adell, a prep OF from Kentucky who entered the year projected near the top of the draft but whose stock has fallen precipitously.  I could see the Nats having him ranked high and (much like what happened with Lucas Giolito) them taking the chance if Adell is still available after being a top-5 rumored guy entering the 2017 season.
• MinorleagueBall.com (John Sickels) 2017 Mock Draft v1.0 dated 5/18/17: McKay, Wright, Greene, Gore, Beck.  Nats taking Keston Hiura, an OF from UC-Irvine that i’ve never heard of.
• PerfectGame.org (Brian Sakowski) 2017 Mock Draft v1.0 dated 5/10/17: Greene, Wright, Lewis, McKay, Beck.  Nats taking Hans Crouse, a prep RH starter from California.  Crouse is good, but I can’t see the team taking a prep 1st rounder if the likes of Houck and Lange are on the board.
• PerfectGame.org (Brian Sakowski) 2017 Mock Draft v2.0 dated 6/2/17: McKay, Greene, Lewis, Wright, Gore.  Nats taking Houck.
• PerfectGame.org (Brian Sakowski) 2017 Mock Draft v3.0 dated 6/12/17: McKay, Greene, Gore, Lewis, Wright.  Nats taking Romero.  But leave the likes of Carlson, Schmidt, Houck, Lange, Canning and Little on the board??  No way.
• SI.com (Jay Jaffe) Mock Draft v1.0 dated 5/16/17: McKay, Greene, Lewis, Wright, Gore.  (Only projected top 10 picks).
• SI.com (Jay Jaffe) Mock Draft v2.0 dated 6/12/17: Wright, Greene, Gore, McKay, Lewis.  Nats again on Romero.  This mock leaves Pearson, Houck, and Carlson on the board, which I have a hard time believing would happen (that the Nats would take head case Romero over any of those three).
• Seedlings to the Stars/Calltothepen.com (Benjamin Chase) Mock Draft v1.1 dated 5/3/17: Greene, McKay, Lewis, Wright, Gore.  Nats on Wil Crowe, a RH starter from South Carolina.
• Seedlings to the Stars/Calltothepen.com (Benjamin Chase) Mock Draft v2.1 dated 5/10/17: McKay, Adell, Greene, Wright, Gore.  Nats on Matt Sauer, a prep RH starter from California.
• Seedlings to the Stars/Calltothepen.com (Benjamin Chase) Mock Draft v3.1 dated 5/18/17: Wright, McKay, Greene,  Beck, Adell.  Nats taking Brendon Little, a JuCo LH starter by way of UNC who has impressed mightily this year.
• Seedlings to the Stars/Calltothepen.com (Benjamin Chase) Mock Draft v4.1 dated 5/25/17: Greene, McKay, Gore, Wright, Lewis.  Nats taking Schmidt the TJ guy.
• Seedlings to the Stars/Calltothepen.com (Benjamin Chase) Mock Draft v5.2 dated 6/1/17: Wright, Greene, Gore, Beck, Pratto.  Nats taking Houck.
• Seedlings to the Stars/Calltothepen.com (Benjamin Chase) Mock Draft v6.1 dated 6/7/17: Wright, McKay, Greene, Lewis, Gore.  Nats on David Peterson, Oregon State’s #2 starter, a big body LHP who could be a faster mover and fill the void of SP prospects in our system.
• Seedlings to the Stars/Calltothepen.com (Benjamin Chase) Mock Draft Final dated 6/12/17: Greene, Wright, Gore, Lewis, Adell.  Nats on Griffith Canning, UCLA’s friday starter who projects as a slight framed #3 starter.  I saw him in the CWS regionals and wasn’t terribly impressed.  Chase’s final mock is kind of out there; he’s the only guy who has Greene 1-1 and he has a ton of guys normally being projected to the Nats very early.
• TheBigLead.com (Ryan Phillips) Mock Draft v1.0 6/7/17: Wright, McKay, Greene, Lewis, Gore.  Nats taking Sam Carlson, a prep RHP from Minnesota who is highly ranked on every board that I see, but has some risk being a skinny RHP from a cold-weather state whose entire profile is based on his showcase results.  I’d guess the Nats would prefer a college arm.
• TheBigLead.com (Ryan Phillips) Mock Draft v2.0 6/12/17: McKay, Greene, Gore, Lewis, Wright.  Nats on Houck (leaving Carlson, Pearson and Schmidt on the board).
• CBSsports (Mike Axisa) Mock Draft v1.0 6/8/17: Wright, Greene, Lewis, McKay, Gore.  Nats taking Romero but with curious logic.

 

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Todd Boss’ Mock draft top-5 prediction?

I think the risk-averse Twins will go with a solid college arm at #1, picking Wright.  This lets the rebuilding Reds at #2 take the guy who is probably the best player in the draft in Greene, who might just be the next Dwight Gooden.  At #3 San Diego can afford to take a prep kid since they too are rebuilding, taking Lewis.  At #4, Tampa takes the solid, fast moving McKay and internally debates whether to put him on the mound or in the field.  At #5, Atlanta can’t help themselves (they love taking local guys) and takes the North Carolina prep product Gore, who might be the 2nd best player in this draft.  Oakland passes on Bukauskas thanks to his two late season iffy outings and goes with the next best collegiate arm on their board.

My top 5: Wright, Greene, Lewis, McKay, Gore.

ACTUAL DRAFT Results (added after the draft): Lewis, Greene, Gore, McKay, Wright.  Reportedly McKay wouldn’t take an under-slot deal at 1-1, so Minnesota popped Lewis instead, allowing McKay to go 4th to Tampa where he still probably sets a bonus record.  Lewis going 1-1 shakes up the order of the top 5, but not the top 5 themselves.

Who are the Nats going to take at #25: 

I like the projections for a solid college arm, so if Houck or Lange is there, look for that as the pick.  I could be talked into Schmidt as another TJ reclamation project.  If a highly regarded prep falls (Adell, Hall, Crouse, and especially Carlson) look for that as a longer-term play pick.  Notice not one projector puts them on a bat, so the talk of MSU’s Brent Rooker seems unlikely here.  I think they’re set on a polished college arm to quickly move up and start to fill holes that will soon be left when the likes of Tanner Roark and Gio Gonzalez hit free agency.

Actual Nats #25 Pick (added after the draft): Seth Romero, LHP from Houston.  Most of the pundits above called it correctly; the Nats take Romero.

 

Here’s a recap of our CWS coverage so far for 2017:

• College Baseball 2017 Kickoff
• Field of 64 announcement with Regional predictions and highlights of top-end draft prospects.
• 2017 Draft Preview with coverage of Local College-age eligible players of note (publishing closer to the draft)

Now we’re through the Regionals and the field has been winnowed from 64 to just 16.

We’ll review the 16 regionals in order of the larger bracket.  Bold is the host and Bolded Red is the winner.  We’ll also highlight significant players and/or guys who are big names in the upcoming draft as we get to them.

It was a crazy set of regionals; by Sunday night only 6 of the 16 brackets were decided; a slew of regionals were forced to monday games (two weather delays involved).  And we saw one of the biggest upsets in recent memory.  Read on.

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Regional Recaps

In the #1 Oregon State regional, Oregon State held serve easily while Yale scored the unlikely upset over Nebraska in the 2/3 game.  In the winners bracket game, Oregon State blitzed Yale 11-0 behind Luke Heimlich‘s 7ip-2hit performance.  Holy Cross sent home Nebraska in the loser’s bracket, cementing their status as a drastically over-seeded team from the Big-10.  In the regional final, Oregon State again crushed Yale 8-1 to cement their status as the #1 team in the land and advance to Super Regionals.
In the #16 Clemson regional, Vanderbilt crushed an over-ranked St. John’s team in the opener (an upset not by seeding but by ranking) while Clemson snuck by UNC-Greensboro.  In the losers bracket, St. Johns was sent home 2-and-out by UNCG while Vanderbilt blitzed by Clemson 9-4.  Clemson fought their way out of the loser’s bracket and then forced the Monday decider with a 6-0 win over Vandy.  In the do-or-die game though, Clemson never got started and Vanderbilt advanced 8-0.

In the #8 Stanford regional (which started a day early), both top teams blasted inferior competition to setup a Stanford-Cal State Fullerton winner’s bracket game.   In that game, Fullerton won easily to put themselves into the driver’s seat.  Sacramento State became the first team eliminated thanks to this regional starting a day early to placate BYU.  Stanford made their way back to the title game, but were beaten again by Fullerton, making Cal State Fullerton the upset winner and the first team to advance.
In the #9 Long Beach State regional, Texas beat UCLA for the fourth time this season (beating UCLA’s ace and likely 1st rounder Griffin Canning along the way), while host Long Beach State beat SDSU easily.  In the winner’s bracket game, Texas’ Morgan Cooper (the Nats 2014 34th round pick) threw a solid game and the Longhorns got into LBSU’s bullpen for an extra inning’s victory.  UCLA went 2-and-out in the loser’s bracket game; yet another example in SDSU of a #4 seed not finishing 4th.  Long Beach got back to the deciding game and took one from Texas, forcing the Monday finish.  There, Long Beach State got 2 runs early and made them stick, advancing through the loser’s bracket and setting up an in-conference matchup with Fullerton.

In the #5 Texas Tech regional, the hosts won easily while Sam Houston state took it from Arizona in a 2/3 seed upset.  TT took out Sam Houston easily in the winner’s bracket.  However the pesky #3 seed Sam Houston took out Arizona again, then took a game from TTU to force the Monday decider.  There, the amazing happened, with tiny Sam Houston State beating the #5 national seed again and becoming the 2nd most unlikely regional winner this year.
In the #12 Florida State regional, Auburn scored the slight upset over UCF in the opener and then Tennessee Tech took out Florida State for 2 upsets in a row.  Auburn won the winner’s bracket game while FSU kept their hopes alive in the elimination game.  Florida State grinded their way back to the final and then took a walk-off win over Auburn to force the Monday decider.  Florida State made the decider a non-issue, dominating Auburn and winning 6-0 to advance.

In the #4 LSU regional, both top seeds won in an offense-minded regional, scoring double digits.  The region continued to go chalk with both seeded teams again winning and again scoring in the double digits.  Rice beat out SELA to get to the regional final, but there LSU got 8 shutout innings from its #3 starter Eric Walker and they advanced to the super-regionals.
In the #13 Southern Miss regional, the host won a barn-burner to avoid a first round upset against Illinois-Chicago while South Alabama upset SEC power Mississippi State.   Southern Miss held-serve to advance to the final, while Mississippi State got revenge against South Alabama to reach the regional final.  There, the SEC power Mississippi State took two from Southern Miss to advance.

In the #2 UNC regional, Davidson took it to upper 1st rounder J.B. Bukauskas and knocked him out early, then held on for the day’s biggest upset over UNC.  Meanwhile FGCU easily topped Michigan to setup a very weird winner’s bracket game.  Bukauskas’ final collegiate performance (coupled with his struggles in the ACC tournament) may have cost him draft spots; lots of mocks have him going 6th overall, but now I think he falls.  In the winner’s bracket game, Davidson again defied the odds, taking out FGCU while UNC salvaged some hope with an easy 8-1 win over the over-seeded Michigan team (again showing why the Big-10 did not deserve as many teams in the CWS as they got).   UNC made it back to the regional final, but their bats came up empty as Davidson shocked the baseball world and took the regional 2-1.  The most amazing thing I heard about Davidson this week?  They only gave out three (3) scholarships.  Three!  UNC probably has 3 full-rides just in its rotation.
In the #15 Houston regional, both top seeds were upset, with TAMU and Iowa topping Baylor and Houston respectively.  And Iowa did it without any input from their cleanup slugger Jake Adams (who had 27 homers this season).  Houston took out some aggression on Baylor in the elimination game, winning 17-3, while TAMU (who were supposedly one of the last four teams in) took the winner’s bracket game to hold the driver’s seat in this regional.  Houston made it back to the title game with a win over Iowa, but couldn’t take out Texas A&M, who won the regional and likely won the right to host a super-regional despite not being a regional host.

In the #7 Louisville regional, both top seeds advanced with ease (Oklahoma and Louisville).  Louisville destroyed Oklahoma 11-1 in the winner’s bracket game behind top-pick Brendan McCay‘s 6 1/3 innings of one-run ball (to go along with his batting clean-up as perhaps the best two-way college player we’ve seen in a while).  Virginia’s Radford went two-and out as the #4 seed.  Xavier blitzed Oklahoma in the loser’s bracket final, but then couldn’t hang with Louisville in the regional decider, losing 8-7 as Louisville advances.
In the #10 Kentucky regional, Kentucky survived a late rally to top Ohio in the opener while under-seeded NC State topped Indiana in a 2/3 seed upset.  NC State showed why they were underseeded as a #3 by taking out the host in the winner’s bracket game.  Kentucky made it back to the regional final, and took a game from NC State to force the extra decider.  There, hand it to Kentucky, they got the win they needed and advanced to setup a great in-state super-regional.

In the #6 TCU regional, all games were delayed a game due to rain to start.  Both top seeds advanced, with UVA getting a strong performance from #2 starter Derek Casey over the tough Dallas Baptist team.  In the winner’s bracket game, UVA’s Daniel Lynch got hit early and their hitters could do nothing with TCU’s Jared Janczak and they lost 5-1.  UVA has to face DBU again, as DBU eliminated #4 seed Central Connecticut in the loser’s bracket.  In the loser’s bracket final rematch between UVA and DBU, UVA’s thin pitching staff was finally exposed, giving up 9 runs in the first two innings (Evan Sperling could not record an out as the starter) and never getting all the way back.  It didn’t matter much, as TCU destroyed DBU in the final to advance and show why they were the consensus #1 ranked team pre-season.
In the #11 Arkansas regional, the host won easily while the day’s best game featured Missouri State getting a do-or-die walkoff 2-run homer to top Oklahoma State.  Missouri State showed they belong by upsetting the hosts in the winner’s bracket game while Oral Roberts pounded OK-State in the elimination game.  Arkansas made it back to the regional final, taking an 11-10 wild game from Missouri State to force the extra decider on Monday.  There, Missouri State gritted out the win over Arkansas to advance.

In the #3 Florida regional, the hosts and South Florida easily advanced to hold serve against lower-seeded competition.  The region continued chalk with Florida scoring 4 in the 12th to ease past South Florida (Florida threw their ace Alex Faedo in this game; he delivered with 7 innings of one run ball).  Bethune Cookman advanced out of the losers’s bracket and promptly took a game off of Florida, forcing the extra regional decider Monday.  There, Florida outlasted tiny Bethune to advance as expected.
In the #14 Wake Forest regional, the two top seeds both battered Maryland teams UofMaryland and UMBC.  In the loser’s bracket, UMaryland committed some Terrapin-on-Terrapin crime by destroying them 16-2, while  Wake held on for a win over WVA in the winner’s bracket.  WVA took advantage of Maryland’s thin pitching corps to advance to the regional final, but lost 12-8 as Wake Forest advanced.

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Predictions versus Actuals

My Predictions: Oregon State, Vanderbilt, CS-Fullerton, Long Beach State, Texas Tech, Florida State, LSU, Mississippi State, UNC, TAMU, Louisville, Kentucky, UVA, Arkansas, Florida, Wake Forest.

Actuals; Oregon State, Vanderbilt, CS-Fullerton, Long Beach State, Sam Houston, Florida State, Mississippi State, LSU, Davidson, Tamu, Louisville, Kentucky, TCU, Missouri State, Florida and Wake.

I got 12 of 16 right.  I missed on Davidson and Sam Houston State (like every one else), but over-thought the TCU/UVA matchup, forgetting how good TCU was, and missed on the Arkansas/Missouri State matchup.

 

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Summary of Regionals statistically:

• 9 of 16 hosts advanced, including 5 of 8 National seeds.  National Seeds losing: #2 UNC,  #5 Texas Tech, #8 Stanford.
• 3 first time Super-Regional participants; Davidson, who was also a first time REGIONAL participant.  Sam Houston State.  Kentucky is also a 1st timer despite being seeded.
• 7 = number of regionals forced into the “extra” deciding game: Vanderbilt/Clemson, Long Beach/Texas, Texas Tech/Sam  Houston, FSU/Auburn, Kentucky/NC State, Arkansas/Missouri State, Florida/Bethune-Cookman.
  
• 9 number one seeds, 4 number two seeds, 2 number three seeds, and 1 number four seeds advance to the super regionals.  
• 7 number of #4 seeds who didn’t finish 4th in their regional; Holy Cross, UNC-G, SDSU, Tennessee Tech, Davidson, Iowa, Oral Roberts.  That’s great balance.
• Zero hosts that went 2-and-out this year.
• 1 of the regionals went pure chalk (Wake Forest).  That’s either a great testament to the balance of the tournament, or a real indictment of the seeding of #2s versus #3 teams.
• #4 over #1 openers: Davidson over UNC, Tennessee Tech over Florida State, Iowa over Houston
• Most surprising regional winner: Davidson easily, followed by Sam Houston State.

Conference Breakdowns of the teams in the Super Regionals:

• SEC: LSU, TAMU, Vanderbilt, Mississippi State, Kentucky, Florida
• Big12: TCU
• ACC: Louisville, Wake Forest, Florida State
• Pac12: Oregon State
• Big West: Cal State Fullerton, Long Beach State
• Atlantic 10: Davidson
• Southland: Sam Houston State
• Missouri Valley: Missouri State

9 of the 16 super regional teams from the two power conferences ACC and SEC.  The Big12 was the #1 ranked RPI conference and placed 7 teams into the tourney, but just one advanced, perhaps an indictment of these conference RPI rankings in general.  But, with 8 conferences represented overall, there’s good spread.  Only the Big10 really didn’t show up, putting 5 teams in the tourney and faring horribly.  It seems like this is a recurring theme; Big10 gets 5 teams in and does nothing while higher ranked conferences like the AAC and C-USA put in fewer teams (3 and 2 respectively).  I doubt anything will change in the future; the committee seems to fall in love with wins (not one eligible team with 40+ wins missed the tourney) and with marginal big-conference teams in lieu of better teams from smaller conferences .

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Super Regional Matchups:  the higher ranked team is the host in each case.

• #1 Oregon State vs Vanderbilt
• Davidson vs TAMU
• #3 Florida  vs #14 Wake Forest
• #4 LSU vs Mississippi State
• Sam Houston State v #12 Florida State
• #6 TCU v Missouri State
  
• #7 Louisville v #10 Kentucky
• Cal State Fullerton vs #9 Long Beach State

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Super Regional Thoughts:

Hard not to pick Oregon State, who looks the part of a #1 ranked team.  Also hard to pick Davidson to continue their upset run, so I’ll go with TAMU based on experience.

I’ll take Florida over Wake, despite Wake’s being rather under-rated.  They lost only two weekend series allyear, both away to top teams.  But Florida has the ace in Faedo and the cache.

A SEC rematch between LSU and Mississippi State might be a laugher; LSU swept MSU on their field in their weekend series earlier this year, and LSU will host.  Look for two quick wins for the National power.

As with Davidson, its hard to give Sam Houston a shot at the veteran Florida State team.

The in-state Kentucky matchup between Louisville and Kentucky is a good one; they met twice in mid-week games and split them, but those games (both throwing mid-week starters) aren’t a great predictor.  I like Louisville’s pitching and experience here.

The final matchup, between two Big West teams, seems easy enough to call on paper: Long Beach State and CS-Fullerton met 6 times this year and Long Beach won five of them.  I’m guessing LBSU hosts, where they swept Fullerton earlier this year.  I think the Dirtbags should advance easily.

Super Regional Star Power

Lots of top-end draft picks will be playing this weekend, just ahead of the MLB draft which starts on 6/12/17.  By Super Regional:

• Oregon State/Vanderbilt: the likely #1 overall draft pick Kyle Wright, also Kendall, plus Oregon State’s two dominant starters Heimlich and Jake Thompson.
• Davidson/TAMU; none really.
• Florida/Wake Forest: Alex Faedo mostly.
• LSU/Mississippi State: Alex Lange for LSU, Brendan Rooker for MSU.
• Sam Houston State/Florida State; none really, despite FSU’s ranking.
• TCU/Missouri State; MSU’s Jake Burger; TCU is led more by under-classmen but does have Evan Skoug who might get drafted relatively highly.
  
• Louisville/Kentucky; Louisville of course led by possible #1 overall pick Brendan McKay.
• Cal State Fullerton/Long Beach State; no 1st round notables.

MLB.com has a nice summary with all the above names plus more.

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CWS Predictions: Oregon State, TAMU, Florida, LSU, Florida State, TCU, Louisville, Long Beach State.

Or, in the CWS groupings: Oregon State, CS Fullerton, FSU, LSU in one bracket, and TAMU, Louisville, TCU and Florida in the other.

That’d be a great CWS field.

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College CWS tournament references:

• d1baseball.com’s daily scoreboard is my go-to link
• d1baseball’s Tourney Central
• Baseball America’s College coverage home page
• CollegeBaseballDaily.com has coverage as well.
• CollegeBaseballCentral.com has coverage as well.
• Ncaa.com’s interactive full 64-team bracket for 2017
• NCAA Individual player stats
• Warren Nolan.com’s College Baseball RPI
• Warren Nolan’s Conference RPI rankings for 2017

 

With the news that Jayson Werth had to hit the D/L and the team suddenly needing a RH hitting options on the bench, new acquisition Ryan Raburn was called into action.

The Nats had finally run out of procedural moves that prevented them from cutting loose someone … and the answer to the question “who is the first guy off the 40-Man roster” this year goes to Rafael Martin.  Unfortunately for Martin, he was DFA’d yesterday to make room for Raburn.

Personally, I thought the team would cut loose under-performing AA hurler Jimmy Cordero before Martin … but he was 2nd on my list.  He’s struggled in AAA this year, and has been passed over for promotion by several 2017 NRIs.  The writing was on the wall, even given his SSS K/9 rates int he majors.  This year in Syracuse he’s sported a kind-of-unlucky 5.21 ERA with a 4/1 K/BB rate and a decent 1.27 whip.  But he’s also a 33-yr old junk baller who isn’t exactly a prospect anymore.

I’ll guess he passes through waivers, takes his assignment to AAA and may return to the Mexican league next year.

He’ll always have 2015 though (25 Ks in 12 innings).

 

Update #2 for DC/MD/VA Prep baseball for 2017.

Here’s the rough schedule of posting and what we’ll cover:

• #1: DC/MD/VA District High School Tournament Report: post-season kickoff.  Covers: MD regionals, VA district brackets, Private school tourney updates.  Usually publishes the week before Memorial day tournament finals.
• #2: Maryland State Champs, Northern VA Regional Champs crowned (this post).  Covers: MD state finals, VA regionals finals.  Usually publishes first week of June.
  #3: Virginia State Champions crowned.  Covers: VA state tourneys, recaps MD, DC, Private School results.  Publishes mid-June once the Va state tourney wraps up.
• #4: Players of the Year/All-State lists and final rankings; publishes early July once all the all-state lists are published.

Lets see where we stand now with Virginia having completed their regional tournaments and setup state semi finals’ matchups.

Text in Red are pending results, which we’ll pick up in the next post in this series.

All Virginia regional finals were played on 6/2/17; here’s the scoreboard with all results.  Winner highlighted in bold red.

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Virginia

Here are the Virginia Conference champions, regular season and tournament.  All these playoff brackets, if they exist, are at this link at VHSL.  I won’t re-link all the playoff brackets per district/region below.

6-A North Regional  Conference Tournament Results: 

• 6-A Conference 5/Concorde: Oakton beat Westfield
• 6-A Conference 6/Liberty: Madison squeaked by Langley
• 6-A Conference 7/Potomac: West Springfield blanked South County
• 6-A Conference 8/ Cedar Run: Patriot cruised to the district title over Osborne Park

Regional Tournament Results: The four expected #1 seeds advanced easily in the first round of the Regional tournament; Oakton, Madison, West Springfield and Patriot.  In the regional quarters, all four #1 seeds advanced again; Madison advanced easily over Lake Braddock 6-0, Oakton advanced over Battlefield 5-3, West Springfield easily handled Westfield 9-2, and Patriot downed Robinson 1-0 on a walk-off homer.   The regional semi-finals on 5/30/17 were both interrupted by a massive storm that moved through and were completed on 5/31/17.  In those regional semis, Oakton walked-off with a Sac Fly in the bottom of the 7th to top Madison 3-2 while Patriot held off West Springfield 4-3 to punch their tickets to the State tourney.  The Madison/Oakton game was a rematch of an earlier game this season, easily won by Madison, so that result was surprising.  Patriot over West Springfield was more expected, given Patriot’s traditional strength.

Regional Final: Oakton got a n extra-innings, 2-run walk-off homer  from Junior Eric Lingenbach to take the 6A regional title from Patriot 3-2.

 

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6-A South Region: mostly covering Richmond, Roanoke and Virginia Beach area.  But there are just enough schools in Woodbridge proper to form a 6-A conference closer to DC with teams that are typically considered for All-Met rankings.   Unlike 6A-North, just the top two teams from each district make the Regional tournament.  Thus, the district tournaments here are lagging the district tournaments for the North region, which finished before theirs even began.

VHSL bracket link here.  Direct link to Tide-water area tourney schedules at Pilot Online.    Direct link to Richmond area tourney schedules at the Times-Dispatch.

• 6-A Conference 1/Coastal: Cox defeated Kellam in a battle of Va Beach heavy-weights.
  
• 6-A Conference 2/Monitor Merrimac: Western Branch beat Oscar Smith in an upset-filled district tourney where top-ranked Granby and Woodside were upset early.
  
• 6-A Conference 3: Manchester d Thomas Dale in a district tourney that went chalk.
  
• 6-A Conference 4: Woodbridge d Colonial Forge 12-11 in a barn burner.

Regional Results: all four district champs won their quarter final matchups, with Cox having the easiest time of it.   In the Semis, Cox beat Manchester 3-2 and Western Branch handled Woodbridge 5-3. 

Region Final:  Cox rallies to defeat Western Branch 4-3.

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5-A North Region:

Conference winners:

• 5-A Conference 13/Capitol: Marshall
• 5-A Conference 14: Briar Woods
• 5-A Conference 15: Potomac
• 5-A Conference 16: Halifax

Regional Results: (5-a Regional bracket): There were some small upsets in the play-in games in the first round of the 5A North regional; an under-seeded Stafford fell to Stone Bridge (despite finishing the regular season 19-2) and#3 Seed Atlee easily beat #2 seed Wakefield.  The other #2 seeds (Orange and North Stafford) advanced as expected to face the #1 seeds in the quarters.  Stone Bridge faces one of the best teams in the state in Halifax, whose #1 starter (Andrew Abbott) has a ridiculous 133/3 K/BB ratio this spring and is UVA bound (h/t NovaBaseballMagazine.com).  In the quarters, #1 seeds Briar Woods, Potomac and Halifax all advanced, while North Stafford blanked Marshall to advance to the semis.  In the Semis, Briar Woods thrashed Potomac 8-1 while Halifax held off the surprising North Stafford team 2-1 in 12 innings.

Region Final: Briar Woods destroyed top 5-A team Halifax 10-0 to continue a surprising run in the post-season (they weren’t even the #1 seed in their own district).

 

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5-A South Region

• 5-A Conference 9/Atlantic: Kempsville d Hickory.
  
• 5-A Conference 10/PenSouth: Menchville d Clouchester.
  
• 5-A Conference 11: Deep Run d Mills Goodwin.
  
• 5-A Conference 12: Prince George d Matoaca.
  

Quick predictions for 5-A south regional tourney: Prince George at 19-1 and Hickory are good bets to advance

Regional Results: as with the 6A-South tourney, all four district champs held serve in the quarter finals, mostly with ease.  In the Semis, Prince George and Menchville advanced, with the Menchville pitcher throwing a no-hitter to add insult to injury.

Region Final: Prince George continued 5A dominance, topping Menchville 13-5.

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Smaller Virginia Classifications

4-A West:

• 4-A Conference 21 East/A: Heritage upset #1 seed Loudoun Valley then #2 Seed Loudoun County to win the district.  Heritage and Loudoun County to regionals.
  
• 4-A Conference 21 West/B: Harrisonburg beat Sherando in a 2/1 seed upset to advance to regionals.
  
• 4-A Conference 22: Kettle Run easily won the region over Freedom to advance as the 4A North #1 seed with an unblemished 19-0 record.

4A Regionals preview: (bracket here): Kettle Run and Liberty Christian Academy look like they’re destined to meet in the 4A West regional final.  In the tournament though, Kettle Run was upset early by Lynchburg’s EC Glass.  Liberty Christian won on a walkoff, and they are joined by Harrisonburg and Freedom-South Riding (which recently dropped down from 5A).  The semis were a contrast in styles, as LCA won 1-0 over Freedom-South Riding while Harrisonburg topped EC Glass by a football-score of 14-13.

In the 4A regional final, Liberty Christian won another squeaker, topping Harrisonburg 1-0, validating their move to compete in the public schools VHSL.

4-A East (Bracket here)

Preview: I’d say that the two best teams here are Great Bridge (which has great baseball history as of late and just dropped down from 5A) and Hanover (which won the old AAA title just before reclassification and can easily compete with 5A and 6A schools).  In the 4A East quarters, Great Bridge, Dinwiddie, Hanover and Jamestown all advanced to the semis.  There, the expected wins for Hanover and Great Bridge occurred, setting up a great regional final (thought it took Hanover 13 innings to top Jamestown.

In the 4A East final, Hanover held on to top Great Bridge 4-3 in a battle of two of Virginia’s top high schools irrespective of division.  This matchup, coincidentally was the 2013 State Final just prior to going to 6 divisions.

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3A West: Turner Ashby blanked Brookville 4-0 in the Regional final.

3A East: Riverside beat Spotsylvania in the final 9-6.  Riverside is in Ashburn and is coached by the former Stone Bridge coach Sam Plank, fyi.

Lower Divisions 2A and 1A features teams from the smaller areas of Virginia and we won’t bother covering them this year.  IF you want to see their regional and state brackets, visit the VHSL site above.

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Maryland

Here’s the 2017 state finals results in Maryland, played over the 5/26/17 weekend.  Brackets here at the MPSAA website.

• Maryland 4-A: In the State Final, Northwest blanked Howard 8-0 to win the state title.
• Maryland 3-A: In the State Final, Poolesville outlasted Chesapeake-Anne Arundel 4-3.
• Maryland 2-A: In the State Final,  Middletown easily beat Fallston 8-0.
• Maryland 1-A: In the State Final, St. Michaels destroyed Boonsboro 12-1 to claim its 3rd 1-A title of the decade.

A quick list of past Maryland State champions by division:

• 4-A: 2016: Bel Air beat Quice Orchard 8-1.  2015: Gaithersburg beat Severna Park 5-3.  2014: Chesapeake beat Sherwood 2-0.  2013: South River defeated Catonsville 6-0.  2012: Northwest.  2011: Westminster.  2010: Sherwood
• 3-A: 2016: Huntington beat Chesapeake 4-3.  2015: Chopticon beat Mt. Hebron 1-0.  2014: Reservoir beat North Harford 2-0.  2013: Bel Air defeated La Plata 3-2.  2012: Bennett.  2011: Bennett.  2010: C. Milton Wright.
• 2-A: 2016: La Plata eased by Williamsport 4-1.  2015: Southern beat Eastern Tech 6-1.  2014: Southern beat Parkside 3-2.  2013 : Catoctin defeated North Caroline, 4-2.  2012: Williamsport.  2011: North Caroline.  2010: North Hagerstown.
• 1-A: 2016: Brunswick beat Patterson Mill 4-0.  2015: Brunswick beat McDonough 4-0.  2014: Smithsburg beat Sparrows Point 9-0.  2013: Cambridge/South Dorchester defeated Allegany, 15-0.  2012: Mountain Ridge.  2011:  St. Michaels.  2010: St. Michaels.

The Maryland public high school seasons are now complete.

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DC Public Schools/DCIAA:

• DCIAA: (2017 playoff bracket): Wilson defeated School Without Walls 7-4 to take the DCIAA title and continue its ridiculous winning streak within DC public school competition.
• DCSAA: (2017 Playoff Bracket): Gonzaga beat Wilson 9-1 to win the DCSAA baseball title (Wilson upset St. Albans to make the final).

DC public (and private) High school seasons are now complete.

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Private Leagues: WCAC/MAC/IAC and VISAA/Maryland Private

State-level Private School tourneys:

• MIAA: Regular Season: Calvert Hall, Spalding and Gilman were the class of the MIAA Class A all  year.  Boys Latin takes the Class B regular season title while St. Johns Catholic is again the Class C regular season title winner.   Loyola Blakefield came out of nowhere to beat Calvert Hall in the MIAA-A playoffs (their first title in 71 years), having just a .500 record during the season.  Boy’s Latin beat Severn to take the MIAA-B final.  St. Johns Catholic ended up beating Gerstell Academy 5-0 to win its 4th straight MIAA-C title.
• VISAA: The VISAA playoff brackets show the top 8 private schools in each Virginia division.  In Division I; DC local schools Paul VI and Potomac School were upset early, with #3 seed Benedictine taking the VISAA Division I title.  The Miller School took the Division II title with defending champ Greenbrier Christian getting upset in the first round.  Southampton Academy repeated as VISSA Division III titleists.
• Maryland Private School “Governor’s Flag” Tournament: tbd.  Draws are here. Only seems like there’s 4 teams for 2017: DeMatha, Spalding, McNamara and Avalon.  I’d guess this would be a cake-walk for Spalding.

DC-area Private School Leagues

• WCAC: St. Johns defeated DeMatha 6-1 to take its 4th straight WCAC title.  Paul VI and Our Lady Good Counsel were semi-finalists.
• MAC: Flint Hill defeated Maret to win the MAC 2017 baseball title, repeating as winners.
  
• IAC: St. Albans beat Georgetown Prep to win the IAC title.
• PVAC: no news yet on this smaller private DC-area conference.

Of note, Maryland baseball factory Riverdale Baptist won their 4th straight NACA National Championship, finished the year 30-1 and nationally ranked in every publication that attempts to rank national high schools.

All Area private schools’ seasons are now complete.

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Individual Player Accolades Announced

In addition to being playoff-baseball time, this is also the time of the year that we start to see player awards.  I’ll put these in as they publish, but we won’t expect most of these until the end of June.

Gatorade announced their player of the year awards on 5/29/17:

• Maryland: Harold Cortijo, RHP/OF from Riverdale Baptist.  Committed to play at Seminole State U.
• Washington DC: Jack Roberts, RHP/SS from St. Johns.  Committed to play at Elon.
• Virginia: Andrew Abbott, LHP from Halifax County HS.  Committed to play for UVA.

Pending Awards to be announced/expected later this spring:

• Louisville Slugger All-Americans: pending
• Washington Post All-Met teams: pending
• The Baltimore Sun’s All-Metro Team: pending
• Richmond Times-Dispatch All-Richmond team (if exists): pending
• Virginian Pilot All-tidewater team (if exists): pending
• Virginia All 6-A North Regional team: Langley’s Danny Hosley is player of the year (no PG profile/unknown college commit).  Madison’s Jake Nielsen pitcher of the year (a Junior w/o a current college commitment).
• Virginia All 5-A North Regional team: pending
• Other Virginia All-Regional teams: pending
• Northern Virginia All-District teams: Available at this link at Novabaseballmagazine.com, thanks to Joey Kamide for all his hard work.
• VHSL All-State Teams: pending
• VISAA’s All-State teams:
  • Division I All State Team with several Paul VI and Flint Hill players.  Player of the Year: Evan Justice– Collegiate School, a LHP from Richmond committed to NC State.
  • Division II All State Team.  Player of the year: Ethan Murray– Miller School, a Junior SS/RHP who sports a 4.0 and is an early commit to Duke.
  • Division III All State Team.   Player of the Year: Carter Davis– Blessed Sacrament-Huguenot, a C from Powhattan committed to St. Andrews Presbyterian College.
• Maryland MIAA All-State teams (if exists): pending
• All WCAC 2017: Jack Roberts, RHP/SS from St. Johns player of the year.
• All MAC 2017 and all IAC 2017 also at Novabaseballmagazine.com’s site.

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My master list of links used to cover HS Baseball:

Local and National High School Baseball Ranking Lists:

• Washington Post All Met Sports Area top-10 ranking: Riverdale Baptist has been in a class by themselves all year.  Madison and Spalding have been just below.
• NovaBaseballMagazine.com Rankings: Kettle Run and Madison have dominated the rankings all year.
• PrepBaseballReport maintains a VA State-Wide Power25 Rankings: they have Patriot over Madison, with 6A-south Woodside and Cox at the top.  In the private Ranks, Miller and Greenbrier Christian 1-2.
• Baltimore Sun Top-10 Poll Archives: Calvert Hall and Severna Park at the top, both upset victims in their playoffs.
• The Virginian Pilot Top-10 for Hampton Roads area: Hickory and Great Bridge at the top, with a gap below them.
• Richmond times-Dispatch Richmond-Area top-10:Mils Godwin, Glen Allen, Deep Run, Lee-Davis and Freeman.
• Baseball America’s National High School Rankings 5/16/17: Riverdale Baptist at #16.
• USA Today High School Experts top 25 for 5/25/17: Riverdale Baptist #9.  Calvert Hall previously ranked.
• MaxPreps “Excellent 50” ranking for 5/22/17: Riverdale Baptist #6.

These National rankings are dominated by teams in Texas, Florida and California, as you might expect.  These teams can play nearly 40 games and usually have at least 15-20 under their belts before DC/MD/VA teams even get going.  So its somewhat of an accomplishment just to have a local team get some recognition.  In fact, any cold-weather state team appearing in these lists is pretty special.

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Major Newspaper Links/Resources for following prep baseball around the state

• Washington Post’s AllMetSports section with standings and schedule results.
• The Baltimore Sun’s high school page has information on some of the programs outside the DC area mentioned in the Maryland section
• InsideNova.com‘s coverage of high school sports, but has put limits on the number of stories you can read.
• Richmond Times-Dispatch has a HS scoreboard.
• Hampton Roads Pilot (Hampton Roads) has scores for teams in the Chesapeake/Norfolk/Va Beach area.
• NovaBaseballMagazine: great coverage of Prep baseball in NorthernVirginia (thanks to Joe Antonellis for the heads up on this great new resource).

Local Newspaper Coverage, including links to many local papers covering smaller jurisdictions.

• The Connection family of newspapers has a sports section that is rarely updated, but it does do some coverage.
• Nvdaily.com (Strasburg) has some results for some of the teams in the smaller conferences/outskirts of DC, generally in the Strasburg area.
• WinchesterStar (Winchester) has results for Winchester teams but its pay-only.
• The Daily Progress (Culpeper local paper) also has some scores for schools in its areas.
• Fauquier Times (Fauquier) has some local sports news.
• VivaLoudoun tracks the Loudoun/Ashburn/Leesburg teams.
• The Loudoun Times also covers Leesburg-area teams.
• LoCosports blog, with tons of Loudoun county Coverage
• Fredericksburg.com has some local coverage of Fredericksburg and Woodbridge teams.
• The Lynchburg News & Advance for Lynchburg-based sports.
• The Virginia Gazette for Williamsburg local stuff.

Non-newspaper Links for Local and National Prep Baseball Coverage

• VHSL’s and MPSSAA home pages for updates on VA and MD respectively.
• DCIAA‘s website, which barely has a schedule but will eventually print results and playoff brackets
• PerfectGame: perfectgame.org is the best place to find HS prospect information.
• MaxPreps DC/VA specific coverage.
• Prep Baseball Report: DC/VA specific coverage (thanks again to Joe Antonellis for this link)
• Dynamic Baseball: good prep coverage on the east coast.
• BaltimoreBaseball.com does a great job covering Baltimore-area high school baseball.

Good Twitter accounts to follow:

• https://twitter.com/toddeboss/lists/prepbaseball: I maintain an open list at my twitter account via this link, which contains direct links to dozens of local resources (including all the below).  Way too many retweets from the travel team accounts especially, but its a good way to keep up with local ball.
• https://twitter.com/PBRVirginiaDC: Prep Baseball Report VA/DC coverage
• https://twitter.com/NVBaseballMag: NoVa Baseball Magazine
• https://twitter.com/NoVAHSBB
• https://twitter.com/DynamicBaseball

This time of year is generally light on pure Nats coverage for me: I like to track local Prep tournaments, I like to track the CWS tourney, and I like to do draft prep.  All of these these things basically hit at the same time between Mid-May and Mid-June.  So bear with me if these aren’t your cup of tea.  I’ll get back to my “where are they now” series soon, as well as more regular stuff on the Nats.

I didn’t even bother to post about the ridiculous Bryce Harper/Hunter Strickland brawl.  I’ll say this: I got a MLB.com app notification on my phone that said simply, “Harper charges the mound in SF” and I immediately said to myself, “Strickland must have hit him.”  So clearly the intent was obvious, and I think personally the right punishment was arrived at (Bryce 3 games for charging the mound, Strickland 6 days for his ridiculous action).

But, I know my readers mostly care about the Nats.  So luckily MLB.com Nats beat reporter Jamal Collier posted an Inbox last night, so I have some Nats content to invent.  Here’s how i’d have answered the questions he took.

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Q: Have any reason why Bryce has struggled the past few games? Seems like his batting average and other numbers has taken quite a hit.

A: I’d probably say “regression to the mean.”  Nobody can post a 1.200 OPS for an extended period of time (Harper had a 1.281 OPS in April).  But he’s also been a bit unlucky in May in terms of BABIP (.268), just as he was overly lucky in April (BABIP of .429).  I’m guessing he’ll eventually settle back into a .310-.320 BABIP (he does hit the ball hard, so it shouldn’t be a surprise to see his BABIP regularly higher than league average; his career BABIP is .320) and his numbers will rise back up to impressive levels.

I also notice that he hasn’t missed a game yet; he has sat just one game and got a PH appearance in it (April 24th).  Dusty Baker gives other guys regular rest but Harper hasn’t sat in 6 weeks … maybe he was just starting to drag a bit.  The suspension will be well-timed, especially since it takes him out of the Oakland series (death to hitters).

Collier attributes it to regression as well.

Q: If Glover keeps up his recent dominance, will he stay closer rest of season or do Nats trade for Robertson or Herrera?

A: Well, the question here really should be, “Has the Ownership learned its lesson about fiddling with the closer yet?”  I’m not entirely sure they have; they still seem to buy into the closer narrative, a mind-set that led to them jerking around Drew Storen constantly and demoting him during perhaps his best season.  So will the narrative continue in 2017?  It goes like this: “Gee yeah Koda Glover has been throwing the ball really well, but he’s a rookie so he can’t possibly handle the pressure of October baseball, so we better get the “Proven Closer” and pay out the wazoo for him because that’s what we really need in the playoffs.”

I hate that mindset.  Yes Storen blew a couple of games in the post season; he pitched a grand total of 5 1/3 post-season innings for the Nats across 6 games, and in four of those games he gave up zero runs.  Can  you say “small sample size?”  But to continue to over-react and over-pay for closers is something this team has to stop doing.  Lest I remind everyone of Joe Posnanski‘s research on the topic: teams have won 95% of games they lead in the 9th for about the last 100 years, irrespective of whether they were throwing Joe Schmoe in the 9th in the 40s or Goose Gossage in the 70s or Aroldis Chapman today.

Right now Glover, at league minimum salary, is posting a 200+ ERA+ figure and hasn’t given up a run in a month.  Meanwhile, two of the the three big-money closers on the FA market this past off-season have hit the D/L and have worse seasonal numbers for approximately 30-times the salary.  Which situation would you rather be as a team and a GM?

So; if Glover keeps pitching well (and as long as he’s throwing a 95mph cutter or slider or whatever it is, he should), then leave him there and augment the bullpen at the trade deadline with quality middle relievers who won’t cost as much in terms of prospects.  That’s my suggestion.

Collier thinks the Nats may still get a closer at the trade deadline, and noted (using Storen as an example) that they’ve not hesitated to replace a closer mid-season in the past.  In other words .. he thinks they may go ahead and do something stupid too.

Q: Question for your mailbag: can we expect Albers to revert to his norm? Same for Taylor? (That K rate and BABIP…)

A: Yeah, at some point.  There was a reason Matt Albers was a NRI this past off-season, and there’s a reason Taylor has now had nearly 1,000 major league PAs and is still slashing just .234/.285/.374 for his career.  As far as Albers goes … its ok to have a 6th/7th inning guy who gets blown up every once in a while, as long as those outings are mitigated and don’t really cost you games all that much.  So far, he’s been so much better than expected for us.  Projecting forward, his FIP is a bit higher than his ERA and his BABIP is unsustainably low (.208), so we’ll see some regression back to the mean.  But also there’s this: for as bad as he was in 2016, he was great in 2015.  Who is to say that 2016 was the one-off season and he’s re-gained whatever enabled him to post a 1.21 ERA in 30 appearances for the White Sox?

As for Taylor, I’m not going to re-litigate the whole “Can Michael Taylor turn it around” case.  There’s clearly people dug into the sand on both sides.  His BABIP with his current surge of productivity is .385; that’s all that we need to say.  At some point he’s going to stop having stuff fall in for hits and he’ll regress back to the .230 hitter he’s always been.  Lets just hope Baker is smart enough to keep him in the 8-hole as it happens.  That or recognize it as it happens and think about giving those empty ABs to someone else when it happens.

Collier thinks both players are coming back to earth at some point.

Q: In the time you’ve been covering the Nats, tell us about the value you see JW adding to the team and clubhouse

A: Hard for an armchair psychologist such as myself to give an intelligent answer here.  I know there are many who read this who put little to no value in “clubhouse chemistry,” “team leadership,” and other fuzzy emotional issues when it comes to professional athletes, and I’m fine with that.  I tend to think that clubhouses work like any other workplace team; you have “good” co-workers and “lazy” co-workers, you have respected leaders who have “seen it all” and who have “been around the block” and you have rookies who do dumb things because they just havn’t been around that long.  So in that respect, Jayson Werth should be a valued team-mate who steps up and helps lead the clubhouse, but I have no idea if he actually does.  Its all conjecture on my part, having never stepped into a MLB clubhouse.

Collier says … similar things to what I just said.  Its hard to value leadership.  But he also says (and I agree) that Werth has proven he deserves another contract.  I wonder if it will be with us.