I’m not done talking about college prospects by any stretch, but with the draft a little over two months away I figured now is the time to start ramping up coverage of 2011’s best high school prospects. To kick things off, a list of 17 of my favorite prep arms. All usual caveats (not a complete list, still early in the process, haven’t seen any player live) apply, so feel free to add a name or two that I’m missing.

Honestly, I’m not sure what the point of this list is, if there is a point at all. These aren’t necessarily the best 17 high school pitching prospects (although they might be), they aren’t ranked in order, and there are definitely names missing that I want to add but will hold off on in the interest of time and space. Plus, and I’ll be as transparent as possible here, there really aren’t ground breaking names on this list. So I like Bradley, Bundy, and Norris; doesn’t everybody? Yeah, most if not all the names below are pretty well established at or near the top of any prep pitching list at this point, but, to be fair, there is a perfectly good reason for that. All of these pitchers are really good.

Guess the point here is a simple, oft-repeated one: this works best as a follow list for fans of the draft looking for names to do more homework on potential first day picks.

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RHP Archie Bradley (Broken Arrow HS, Oklahoma)

RHP Bryan Brickhouse (The Woodlands HS, Texas)

RHP Dylan Bundy (Owasso HS, Oklahoma)

RHP Nick Burdi (Downers Grove HS, Illinois)

LHP Jake Cave (Kecoughtan HS, Virginia)

RHP Jose Fernandez (Alonso HS, Florida)

RHP Taylor Guerrieri (North Augusta HS, South Carolina)

RHP Dillon Howard (Searcy HS, Arkansas)

RHP Michael Kelly (West Boca Raton Community HS, Florida)

RHP Jorge Lopez (Academia la Milagrosa, Puerto Rico)

RHP Dillon Maples (Pinecrest HS, North Carolina)

RHP Christian Montgomery (Lawrence Central HS, Indiana)

LHP Daniel Norris (Science Hill HS, Tennessee)

LHP Henry Owens (Edison HS, California)

LHP Philip Pfeifer (Farragut HS, Tennessee)

RHP Kyle Smith (Lake Worth HS, Florida)

RHP Robert Stephenson (Alhambra HS, California)