2009 MLB Draft: Top 15 College Righthanded Pitchers (5-2)
Better late than never, right? The righthanded pitchers listed below comprise 5 of the top 8 prospects ranked on the College Big Board 1.0. If you’re a fan of a team picking in the top half of round one, these are five names to know forwards and backwards. We continue the countdown of college righthanded starting pitching prospects with the players ranked 5 through 2 (who will be number one??????)…after the jump. (more…)
Quick Schedule Update
Since I’m still wrapping up the the top five draft-eligible righthanded college starting pitching prospect writeups (I love doing 15-10, like doing 10-6, but something about 5-1 really gives me trouble), I figure I’ll at least give an update on what’s in store over the next few days. Sound good?
Wednesday evening: Top 5 college righthanded starting pitching prospects
Thursday: Top 10-5 college catching prospects
Friday: Top 5-1 college catching prospects
The goal over the next few weeks is to flesh out the top prospect positional lists (first college, then back to high school) while also mixing in college team profiles (a feature I’m darn excited for) . After that we should be able to put together a gigantic big board of draft-eligible talent and begin to make better mock draft predictions (the goal is to have the mock updated by the end of the month, by the way). And, of course, they’ll be deviations along the way – either by request (like the forthcoming comparisons between the 08 draft class and the 09 draft class) or whenever the heck I think of something to do.
2009 MLB Draft: Top 15 College Righthanded Pitchers (10-6)
And we’re back. We started the countdown of the top 15 draft-eligible righthanded college pitchers yesterday with 15 through 11. One thing I forgot to mention when players 15-11 were unveiled yesterday was that the list is restricted only to righthanded college starting pitching prospects – it’s a no reliever zone here. The bullpen guys will get their own special ranking at a later date. The top 10 through 6 draft-eligible college righthanded starting pitching prospects right after a very special picture. See, the young woman pictured below isn’t just making an appearance because showing pretty girls is an easy way to increase traffic; no, I’m far too classy a gent to stoop to that level. She is actually the significant other of the player used as a comparison to the sixth ranked player on the list. Hmm…
Photo Credit: DramaWiki
10 through 6 after the jump… (more…)
Site Redesign
Astute readers will notice, hey, things look a little different around here. Good, bad, ugly? Let me know either via email, comment, or telepathy. Since I don’t really have a clue when it comes to site design, there is literally no way my feelings can be hurt by any kind of constructive criticism. So if you do comment, be honest – I can take it. One thing that is bugging me is the tags – I hate that they show up at the top of each post and not the bottom, but I have no clue how to fix it. The RSS feed should be working, but if there are any problems with that, let me know. I’ve also been wracking my brain trying to think of a cooler graphic to use for the site title (currently in big red letters at the top), but don’t really have any clever ideas at present. So, again, if you’ve got an idea…let me know. Enough business, back to baseball…
2009 MLB Draft: Top 15 College Righthanded Pitchers (15-11)
Ahhh, actual content. Get your work week off started off right by perusing the first third of the 2009 Rule 4 Draft’s finest draft-eligible college righthanded pitchers. Make sure to check back throughout the week as we count down to the number one spot. I won’t reveal too much information about our number one college righty, except to say that he could potentially be referred to as S. Strasburg. No, wait – too obvious. Let’s just call him Stephen S. Yeah, that’s much better. College righthanders 15 through 11 right after this stunning picture our 11th ranked righty…
Photo Credit: Juan Blas/The Daily Gamecock
College Pitching – Out With the Strasburg, In With the Harvey; Last Day of February Retrospective
Pitching, pitching, pitching. It seems like all we ever do around here anymore, right? The most noteworthy pitching performances from college baseball’s second Saturday of the season below, but, before we start, a quick recap of some recent stuff you may have missed this weekend…
College Mid-Week Update, featuring the battle between Mike Leake and Kyle Gibson
All Strasburg, all the time!
College pitching from the second Friday night of the season
Matt Harvey (North Carolina): 4 IP 0 H 0 ER 2 BB 7 K, 2 separate games
Comparing any college pitcher to Stephen Strasburg is unfair and irresponsible, so let’s do it anyway. Strasburg will be the first overall pick of the 2009 Rule 4 Draft. Matt Harvey is the early favorite to go first overall in 2010. Below is a fair and responsible look at how their numbers stack up so far:
Harvey’s line: 9 IP 3 H 3 ER 2 BB 18 K (1 WP, 1 HBP)
Strasburg’s line: 12.1 IP 8 H 2 ER 3 BB 27 K (1 WP, 1 HBP)
Harvey
K/9: 18
K/BB: 9/1
GO/AO/LO: 3/3/2
Strasburg
K/9: 19.7
K/BB: 9/1
GO/AO/LO: 4/4/1
In the weird and wonderful world of amateur baseball, performance doesn’t always necessarily tell the whole story, what with park factors, levels of competition, strength of schedules, and relatively small samples and all. It’s hard to line up two statistical profiles and draw any kind of grand conclusion. But the raw numbers comparing Strasburg and Harvey do suggest similar performances thus far, something I think is pretty interesting.
There are reasons every move Strasburg makes is newsworthy and I’m not not not trying to say that anybody here or elsewhere is sleeping on Matt Harvey (he’s a big deal and has been for a good long while), I’m just throwing this out there as a lead-in to my question – what is the likelihood, if it exists at all, that Matt Harvey reaches the same level of hype other elite college pitchers (Strasburg, Price, and Prior, to name a few) had heading into his draft year?
Six other pitchers to watch after the jump… (more…)
The Baseball Draft Report 