What is Baseball Prospect Report? Where did it come from? Why does it exist? Why should I bookmark this site?
Baseball Prospect Report is the creation of a baseball person with a background as a journalist, author, scout and broadcaster, who saw a need for a website that offered a more objective and educated coverage of baseball prospects through excellent writing, video and professional-level scouting and grading. We also saw a need for a site for readers to meet players as more than just a name on a list.
Baseball Prospect Report uses the same methods Major League teams use to evaluate prospects. We seek to combine objectivity into our profiling. We believe that experience is the path to making the correct evaluation of a player. We want to help introduce you to these players, but we also want to help you see them the way professional baseball is going to see them.
Whenever a Major League team scouts, drafts and signs a player, the club breaks down each prospect by strengths and weaknesses. Baseball Prospect Report follows the same methodology. This doesn’t mean we want to trash players. It just means that we don’t want to be eye wash. We strive for accuracy, honesty and integrity.
Every prospect has some gifts and some shortcomings, but sometimes media hype distorts the player’s actual abilities and creates unrealistic expectations. Baseball Prospect Report wants to be the site where you can get the entire picture, not just bits and pieces of what someone else wants you to think.
What makes Baseball Prospect Report qualified to have an opinion on players and to know how to grade them?
After years of research and fieldwork that included studying with scouts who signed such players as Reggie Jackson, Willie Stargell, Gary Carter, Nolan Ryan, Dale Murphy, Dusty Baker, Bobby Bonds, Greg Maddux, Jack Clark and Matt Williams, we attended the invitation-only Major League Scout Development Program in 2010. The course, designed by the Major League Scouting Bureau, is professional baseball’s entry into the profession and the only certified “scout school” recognized by Major League Baseball.
Who comes up with Baseball Prospect Report scouting grades?
The grades on each player are created by Baseball Prospect Report. We see every player we scout in person. These grades are not taken from other scouts or from any other major league organization, publication, scouting service or other pre-existing source. We consult with professionals on our grades, but the buck stops with us.
How is it that sometimes Baseball Prospect Report says one thing and another publication says another?
I don’t trust scouting consensus. It’s my call on a player. There will always be very popular players that I like less as prospects. In my opinion, much of scouting journalism (and too much of area scouting, for that matter) runs on consensus. That’s just another way of being afraid to speak your mind and form your own opinion. There is a difference between speaking your mind and ripping a kid. The other big difference is that I see the players I write about at least once. Most scouting journalism and blogging is purely speculative. My writing is based on what the players show me seen through the eyes of my baseball career.
Does Baseball Prospect Report think it’s always going to be right?
Baseball Prospect Report is an independent third party. It doesn’t mean we’re always right, but by being objective and following correct methodology — and by having the guts to stick with it when everyone else is writing the same talking points – we’re going to be right more than we’re going to be wrong.
If I am a player or a parent of a player, how can I get him on Baseball Prospect Report?
If you are a high school baseball player or the parent of a high school baseball player looking for more college exposure, Baseball Prospect Report can help. Simply email us at recruiting@baseballbeginnings.com and we’ll get you started.
