This draft is really atrocious after the top tier or two — there’s a very strong group of eight college players who should be the first eight picks in some order, then a decent second tier of guys from the college and high school ranks that maybe gets us to about pick 20, and then the position player group and the college pitchers just kind of fall apart. There are certainly interesting players beyond that, and if you are willing to swim in the high school pitching pond there are plenty of those guys to sign, but this year’s draft is going to have a lot of first rounders who wouldn’t go nearly that high in a typical draft.
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The names at the top haven’t really changed, although I’ve moved their order a bit since my first ranking. The last 10-15 names feel like as much of a wild stab as I ever put on a ranking. Too many guys who were on the first ranking and/or projected to be on this list have just not been good enough to make a top 50, like Mike Sirota, Drew Beam, and Josh Hartle. Perhaps in a few weeks, when I expand this list to 100 names, enough cold-weather high school kids will emerge to make the top of the draft look a little stronger, but I doubt it.
(Note: Tools are graded on the 20-80 or 2-8 scouting scale. Stats are through Tues., April 16.)
Charlie Condon
What more could Condon possibly do this spring to cement himself as the top player in the draft? He’s hitting for average and ridiculous power, he’s getting on base, he’s not chasing or striking out, he’s playing solid defense in center field — and he’s doing it all in the SEC. He has electric bat speed, and he’s got a lean, athletic frame that should let him put on a little more strength to compensate for the power he’ll lose going from tin bats to wood. I don’t think he’s a center fielder in the long run, but he’ll be an above-average defender somewhere else, with the potential for a huge triple-slash line. He may not be the first pick, but he is the best prospect in the class.
Travis Bazzana
Bazzana might have the best story in the draft — he grew up in Australia, playing all through high school there, excelling in the Australian Baseball League as a teenager, then coming to the U.S. to further his career by playing in college. He might be the best pure hitter in the draft class, both in terms of contact and overall contact quality, and his baseball IQ is apparently off-the-charts — even more amazing for someone who grew up in a country where baseball lags behind many other sports. He doesn’t offer projection or further upside; what you see is what you get, but it’s more than enough for him to be a top-5 pick and at least serve as an alternative at 1-1 if Cleveland doesn’t want to take Condon.
Nick Kurtz
Kurtz got off to a miserable start this year for the Demon Deacons, where all he was doing was drawing walks, but after a shoulder injury, he came back on a mission, hitting 14 homers in 10 games through Tuesday and showing scouts that he’s more than willing to swing the bat. He’s limited to first base so he has a higher bar to clear at the plate, but he has the kind of bat speed and raw power that would let him be an above-average or better regular there.
Jac Caglianone
Let’s just dispense with the two-way talk — Caglianone’s future is in the batter’s box. It’s 80 raw power, the best in the class, and he’s shown some improvements in his approach this year, although I think his real opportunity for growth will come when he gives up pitching. He is up to 98 mph and can spin a breaking ball, but it’s an ugly, cross-body delivery, with one Tommy John already on his resume and an injury scare in pre-season this year. Just let the kid hit dingers.
JJ Wetherholt
Wetherholt came into 2024 in that group of players who might go 1-1, but the spring hasn’t gone as planned, as he’s been hurt and only played one weekend in the field, although he’s at least hit well when he’s played. He’s a contact hitter who’s hit everywhere and has shown he can hit better stuff. Defensively, he’s limited to second base but is more than adequate there. The knock on Wetherholt is that he hasn’t been durable: He missed over a month this spring with a different injury to the same hamstring that he hurt last summer, and that’s just increasing the questions about whether his modest stature is a real cause for concern. He’s only DH’d since he returned from the injury, and may not return to the field for another week or two. It’s possible that this is nothing and some team will get a steal if he slides a few picks because teams didn’t get as many looks at him or are concerned about his ability to hold up for 150+ games a year.
Chase Burns
Burns is leading Division I in strikeouts for Tenne… wait, I’m getting something here from my editor, it appears that the Volunteers let the best pitcher in the country get away. Knoxville’s loss is Wake’s gain, as Burns has been otherworldly this year, hitting 100, sitting 96-97, with a grade-70 slider and improved changeup. If I’m nitpicking, it’s more control than command, and he can just overpower most hitters with the fastball/slider combination. There’s only one other pitcher his caliber in the class, and I have Burns first because he hasn’t had a major injury yet.
Hagen Smith
Smith is that other guy, the best southpaw in the draft class, and he’s shown a classic progression in his three years for the Razorbacks, gaining velocity and command each season, so that now he’s working in the upper 90s with a hellacious slider of his own that has huge horizontal break. His outing against Oregon State in Week 2 had scouts saying it was the best-pitched game they’d ever seen, with 17 strikeouts in 6 innings. He did have Tommy John surgery in high school, and I get the sense that at least some teams are going to value such players a little differently going forward, with some well-publicized cases of pitchers needing a revision surgery within a few years of the original.
Braden Montgomery
Montgomery was a first-round talent out of high school, but his Stanford commitment made him unsignable. After two seasons on the Farm, he transferred this year to College Station and he’s taken off with the bat, showing tremendous bat speed and plus power from both sides. He’s a good enough athlete that he should at least go out as a center fielder, with a plus-plus arm that will let him settle in right. His hit tool isn’t as advanced as those of Condon, Bazzana, or Wetherholt, though, which is why I don’t have him in the top 5.
Bryce Rainer
There are two elite high school position players in this draft class, and you can pick your poison: Do you want the tooled-out Mississippi outfielder who may have the highest ceiling in his category, or do you want the polished California shortstop who offers defense and instincts and some power but doesn’t have the big hit potential? Rainer is the guy behind door No. 2, and he’s an excellent defensive shortstop with a 70 arm who should have at least average power and possibly more in the end. I saw him at NHSI and loved everything but the bat speed, which raises some concerns about his ability to hit better velocity, and that’s been an issue for him over the last year in showcases and tournaments. His reputation was that he had bat speed but didn’t have great feel to hit; I think his feel to hit is fine, and if there’s an issue here it’s with his hands and wrists.
Konnor Griffin
Griffin is a big-bodied athlete who’s a plus runner with plus raw power and has a plus arm to handle any position in the outfield. His swing gets long thanks to a first move back further behind his body, although once he gets the bat going it’s a traditional swing with outstanding hand acceleration that should produce a lot of line drives. The history of Mississippi high school hitters will work against him, but Griffin has hit well enough for scouts this spring that I think he’s going in the top half of the first round and may end up in the back of the top 10.
Seaver King
Might as well call him Seaver Swing, since he’s not the most discerning hitter you’ll ever see, chasing stuff out of the zone more than a first-rounder should yet getting away with it because he has bat speed and some strength for average power. King transferred this year from Division II Wingate, and the Athens, Ga., native has been hitting cleanup behind Kurtz, so he’s had someone on base for him a ton of the time. He’s a natural shortstop who looks no worse than above-average in center and average at short, so I’m sure he’d be a 55 or 60 at second base. The walk rate is pretty low and his swing decisions aren’t great; some teams shy away from those players, while others think that’s one of the easier things to address.
Slade Caldwell
“Oh, he’s shorter than you” is not a phrase scouts typically say to me about a draft prospect, but at last year’s East Coast Pro showcases, Caldwell measured 5-foot-5 1/2, and while that might make him my new favorite player, you can already guess the questions scouts have about his long-term outlook. He does just about everything you’d want a true center field prospect to do — he plays great defense, he can throw, he can run, and he can hit, just with fringy power. He’s short to the ball, because it would be hard for him to be otherwise (sorry), and did more than enough against better pitching last summer and fall to put himself into first-round consideration. Let’s just say it’s going to take a GM or director with some job security to go after him in the top 20.
Trey Yesavage
Yesavage is probably the No. 3 college pitcher in the class, not close to Chase Burns or Hagen Smith but in the group of six or seven other guys who’ll go somewhere between 11 and 30. He’s 93-96 with a plus splitter that has both big bottom and some more horizontal movement than most splitters do, along with a slider that he likes against right-handed batters and that’s probably a 55. He throws strikes and can even land the splitter in the zone. It’s as short an arm action as you’re going to see on a starter prospect, though, and there’s definitely injury/reliever risk from the delivery, possibly enough to deter some teams from taking him over college starters with a little less stuff but more conventional mechanics.
Malcolm Moore
Moore has gotten off to a tough start at the plate this year, but scouts say he’s had a ton of bad luck and that his .220 average is misleading. He’s making a lot of contact, almost never missing a fastball, and he’s hitting the ball pretty hard with a lot of line drives and flyballs, but he has just a .198 BABIP that is wildly out of line with his history (.339 last year) and his quality and frequency of contact. He’s an adequate defensive catcher but not a lock to stay there, so he does have to hit enough to show he can stay a regular even at first base.
Kaelen Culpepper
Culpepper has boosted his stock by playing strong defense at shortstop, making him one of the very few good college shortstops in the entire draft class and by far the one with the best potential with the bat. He’s very short to the ball and makes a ton of contact with fringy to average power, possibly offering a little more projection there if someone loosens him up and has him load his hands a little deeper. I thought coming into the year he was moving to third or second base, but his defense has impressed scouts all spring and he at least goes out into pro ball as a shortstop.
Brody Brecht
Brecht is a huge wild card in this class, as he was a two-sport guy (football) until this year, and still looks a lot like a two-sport guy. He’s up to 100 with a plus slider from a 6-6 wide receiver’s body, extremely athletic, but with the lack of command or feel you’d associate with a high schooler. The arm action isn’t terrible but it’s busy and he doesn’t repeat it for strikes, let alone anything resembling command. You can dream on the stuff and the athleticism, though. The obvious comparison is Jeff Samardzija, another wide receiver-turned-pitcher, and while Samardzija turned out to be pretty good in the end, it took him five years to get there.
Caleb Bonemer
Bonemer had a rough start to his senior year in a trip to Florida — he struggled with contact against better pitching than he’s going to see back home in Michigan, putting his status as a first-rounder in a little doubt. He’s got plus power and can run, with a chance to stick at shortstop, but he’s changed his stance and swing several times, so it’s hard to know what version you might actually be drafting. He’s pretty athletic and should be able to make adjustments — well, better adjustments — once he gets into pro ball.
Dakota Jordan
Jordan was a two-sport commit to Starkville in 2022 as an outfielder and wide receiver, but he’s built more like an NFL running back and is now only playing baseball. He’s at least a 60 runner out of the box and has 60 raw power, with a .370/.494/.770 line so far this year for the Bulldogs. He’s also struck out 27 percent of the time and has trouble with all pitch types, even fastballs, as it’s easy to get him to expand the zone. Despite his speed, he’s not a good outfielder and may spend his career in left field. He’s one of the more intriguing upside plays in the draft because of his body and athleticism and the potential for a power/speed combination if he can bring his contact rate up.
Carson Benge
Benge is a low-power, high-contact hitter who looks like he should be able to drive the ball. He lunges out over his front side, though, and when he tries to get big with his swing he just rolls over. He controls the zone well and recognizes offspeed stuff, so there’s a strong foundation here, and he’s got a plus arm with solid defense in right field. He might be a target for teams that believe they can help hitters remake swings for more in-game power.
Tommy White
Tommy Tanks is having his worst season as a college player at the wrong time. He was the top freshman in the country in 2022 for NC State and then repeated the performance last spring for the Tigers, but this year he’s hitting for less power — his best attribute at the plate. He’s walking and striking out at the best rates of his career, so the glass half-full view is that he could put the new approach together with the old power and be a cleanup hitter for an MLB team. He’s a rough defender at third who scouts think might end up at first, so his value in the draft is very heavily tied to his bat.
Cam Smith
Smith really remade his body from last year to this year, getting leaner and quicker so that some of his natural athleticism can come through. It’s shown up more at the plate, where he’s hitting .411/.486/.669 and has cut his strikeout rate from 29 percent as a freshman to 17 percent so far this year as a draft-eligible sophomore. He was clearly power over hit last year, and questionable at third base, but this year he’s playing better defense (with a plus arm) and he’s improved his pitch recognition pretty substantially, going from a guy you could beat with any offspeed pitch to someone who hits all pitch types better than the norm. I was a skeptic coming into the year, but I can’t argue with the results or the process.
Peyton Stovall
Stovall missed the start of 2024 with an injury, but he’s raked since returning — all the more impressive because he didn’t get to fatten up against non-SEC competition. Through 23 games he’s hitting .341/.421/.571, a huge improvement from his mediocre sophomore year. He’s hitting lefties well, hitting all pitch types, rarely whiffing or chasing. It’s a small sample, but in this draft he might be the poor man’s version of JJ Wetherholt or Travis Bazzana — a good hitter limited to second base (and Stovall probably needs help to stay there) — because he lacks their track record.
Kellon Lindsey
Lindsey is the fastest guy in the draft, running 4 flat from the right side and, impossibly enough, gaining speed as he gets underway, with the athleticism and hands to stay at shortstop. He’s a projectable hitter with a great body that looks like it’ll let him put on 20 or so pounds and get to some power, whereas now it’s more gap-to-gap when he gets his hips involved and drives the ball more. He’s a former quarterback who’s still searching for his ideal throwing motion, but he can show above-average arm strength when he doesn’t have time to think or mess around with his arm path. There’s definitely hit-tool risk here, as he hasn’t seen much premium offspeed stuff and didn’t play much last summer and fall, but few players have his overall upside.
PJ Morlando
I’m not sure any one decision has cost a player more money than Morlando’s choice to switch to the widest stance in the known universe — it looks like he’s straddling a four-lane interstate — which has not only curtailed the plus power he showed before but has made it harder for him to adjust to different pitch types. Morlando came out of the summer/fall season as a likely top-10 pick and contender to be the first high school hitter taken, but since he’s not the same hitter and he’s limited to left field, he’s at risk of sliding out of the first round entirely.
Cam Caminiti
Caminiti is the cousin of the late Ken Caminiti, but Cam’s future is on the mound, as the lefty has been improving all spring, going from a 35 breaking ball when the season started to a solid-average pitch now that’s still improving. He’s an easy 93-97 and repeats the delivery pretty well for a high schooler, with athleticism oozing out of his ears (not literally, otherwise he should see a doctor), with no gimmicks or red flags to it. I think he’s the top high school pitcher in this draft, and while that’s not my preferred player category in the first round, we’re going to see some teams go that route because the college crop is so thin.
William Schmidt
Schmidt came out very strong this spring and could be the first high school pitcher taken in the draft, or at least the first high school righty. He sits 92-96 with a hammer 12/6 curveball that he uses often, showing some projection still on a 6-4 frame. He’s listed at 180 pounds but might already have filled out beyond that. He drives the fastball down in the zone well and has shown he can miss bats with both pitches. High school pitchers are what they are, but if you’re in that market, Schmidt has some big positives — a real breaking ball, projection, enough present stuff to pay him, a delivery he can repeat for strikes. He’s committed to his hometown school of LSU and is expected to be a very tough sign.
Ryan Sloan
Sloan was already one of the most advanced high school pitchers in the class last year, but this year he’s seen his velocity tick up, hitting 98 mph after he’d topped out at 95 last year, along with a plus slider and a potentially plus changeup. He has one of the better deliveries in the group, getting out front on time and repeating the arm swing very well pitch to pitch. He has a great pitcher’s build at 6-4, 220.
Kash Mayfield
Mayfield is Cam Caminiti’s main competition in the race to be the first high school lefty taken this year, and while he’s less famous than the Arizona pitcher, he’s got the better present arsenal. Mayfield is 93-98 with an above-average slider and good feel for a changeup, with surprisingly low effort for that kind of arm strength. He also gets good ride on the four-seamer and repeats his delivery well enough to project future above-average command. If he were a college pitcher, he’d be a top-10 pick in this class.
Walker Janek
Coming into the year, Janek seemed like he’d be a nice third- to fifth-round pick as a potential big-league backup with the power to maybe serve as a pinch hitter and occasional DH. He’s going to go a lot higher than that as he’s exploded with the bat this year and is hitting .392/.477/.730 for the Bearkats, with the potential now for an everyday catcher who hits 20 or so homers. He’s making much better swing decisions this year, cutting his chase rate, even with a big swing that sees him really get his lower half involved for power to all fields. He may be discounted a little for playing in a non-Power 5 conference and thus doing this against lesser pitching. That said, possible regulars behind the plate go in the first two rounds, at the least.
Kevin Bazzell
Bazzell makes a ridiculous amount of contact — he’s punched out just 12.9 percent of the time this year for the Red Raiders, and 11.2 percent of the time over his college career so far — showing a skill some teams particularly value in amateur hitters, believing they can often add strength or tweak a swing to get to more power. The biggest question about Bazzell is his position — he was primarily a third baseman in his first two years in college, but moved behind the plate this year. He definitely has the arm, while the receiving is, naturally, a work in progress.
Carter Johnson
Johnson is one of the more advanced hitters in the draft, making excellent swing decisions and very rarely swinging and missing, while playing well enough at shortstop to at least start his pro career there, with a move to second or third probably the most likely outcome. He had a mixed bag of results in showcases last summer and fall, with strong contact rates, especially against velocity, but scouts were hoping to see him put on more strength this spring for better contact quality, and that hasn’t happened. He’s still projectable at 6-2, 180, and could easily end up coming into that power once he gets into a minor-league system. I doubt he ends up at the University of Alabama, but if he does he’s a good bet to end up a top-10 pick in 2027.
Vance Honeycutt
Honeycutt might be a 7 defender in center with a 7 arm, and he’s got juice, but I don’t know if he can hit. He’s striking out nearly 30 percent of the time as a junior in the ACC, and there’s in-zone swing and miss here that is truly scary. That said, the floor from the power/defense is really enticing; he could just be Drew Stubbs, but if you squint you can see more than just everyday upside.
Tyson Lewis
Lewis, the rare high school prospect from Nebraska, has surged this spring and may be pushing himself into the very back of the first round or the comp round. He’s extremely toolsy, a plus runner with plus bat speed from explosive hand acceleration, showing the hands for shortstop but not necessarily the arm. He could end up in centerfield or at worst at second base. He can definitely hit a fastball but hasn’t shown the same production when he’s seen better offspeed stuff, a common concern for cold-weather high school hitters.
Blake Burke
Burke has been one of the best hitters in Division 1 this year, ranking 10th in batting average and eighth in slugging, with just a 14 percent strikeout rate. He has no real position, but he should still be a Day 1 pick for someone because the bat will play even if he ends up a DH. He has tremendous bat speed and has hit all types of pitches, even making contact when he expands the zone, with plus power to his pull side and the other way. He’s just not very good at all at first base, and while he should get a year or two there in the minors to see if he can find a way to stick there, I’m betting he’s a DH in the long term, hitting enough to still be a regular there.
Joey Oakie
Oakie has only thrown one inning so far this spring, as Iowa high schools don’t have spring baseball, but he pitched a ton on the circuit last summer and showed velocity and a plus slider that should make him some team’s second pick. He comes from a low three-quarters arm slot that gets him a little natural sinking action on the 92-95 mph two-seamer, and his slider is at least a 60 already with sharp tilt. He repeats the delivery well but he gets his elbow high in the back and his arm’s a little late relative to his landing leg. That, combined with the low arm slot, leaves definite reliever risk here. He’ll be most attractive to teams that heavily weigh advanced metrics — like his low attack angle — over traditional variables like mechanics.
Caleb Lomavita
Lomavita has plus power and projects to stay behind the plate, with good energy and a potentially plus arm, but my God, man, take a walk every now and then. He’s drawn five walks this year in 157 plate appearances, and he’s only seen seven pitches in three-ball counts. He swings at everything, in, out, up, down, near, far, what have you, and it’s going to be a huge issue in pro ball if he doesn’t calm that down. There’s a foundation for a regular here, though, with 27 homers since the start of 2023 in 82 games for the Golden Bears and good contact rates.
David Shields
Shields reclassified from 2025 to this year, which looks like a very shrewd move given how weak this year’s class is. He’s a former quarterback and a Miami commit who has a very easy arm action, working low-90s with projection left and feel to spin a curveball already, throwing very well two weeks ago in his first start of the year after he’d missed some time with mono. He cuts himself off when he lands and doesn’t get the extension he should from his 6-2 frame, something I would expect a pro team to try to address, and that would help his stuff play up. He’s one of the better command guys in the high school class, and with the extra attention paid this year to the risk of UCL tears, maybe Shields and other strike-throwers who don’t throw all-out all the time will benefit.
Tegan Kuhns
Kuhns works with four pitches already, including a two- and four-seamer along with a hard two-plane curveball and a split-change with big fading action. There’s still plenty of projection left on his 6-3 frame to envision plus velocity in time. He’s got some effort to the delivery, including some head-whack at release, while he gets on top of the ball well to get that late action on the sinker and the change. He’s in between the pure power guys in the class and the command guys; if you like him, he offers enough of both to project as an above-average starter.
Jonathan Santucci
Santucci can show first-round stuff, working 94-95 with a plus changeup and average slider when I saw him, although he’s had starts where the slider was plus and he didn’t throw the changeup at all. He fractured his elbow last spring, ending his season about halfway through, and I don’t even know what team doctors are likely to say about that. He’s missing bats but also walking way too many guys, with 30 walks already in 191 batters faced.
Luke Holman
LSU has a slew of potential picks for the top five rounds, although many of those players have underperformed this spring relative to expectations going into the year or, in the case of sophomore-eligible Paxton Kling, relative to what he might have gotten out of high school. Holman is the big exception among the Tigers, as he’s posted every week and struck out 37 percent of batters he’s faced while walking 8 percent. He started out with four scoreless outings before SEC play began, but he’s had more trouble facing the nation’s best hitters in conference play. Holman works 91-94 with a 55 slider that’s missed a ton of bats this year. He has a curveball as his third pitch but no real weapon for lefties yet. He shows solid control and repeats his short arm action well enough to start. He’ll have to show better against SEC hitters the rest of the way.
James Tibbs III
Tibbs is just a bat, where you’re hoping he can stand in left field. He currently has a .410/.500/.849 line and a very impressive 25 walks to 12 strikeouts on the season. He doesn’t miss fastballs and has really tightened up his pitch recognition from last year, while hitting for even more power to the opposite field. His ceiling is limited by the lack of any defensive value, so he’s probably more of a second-round pick, where teams that particularly value hitters with high contact rates should be all over him.
Carson DeMartini
DeMartini had a slow start this year while coming back from a shoulder injury, picking it up in conference play. He’s hit better in the ACC than he has in non-conference games, with a .353/.453/.882 line in ACC games and 10 homers, tying him with Nick Kurtz for the conference lead. He’s got too much swing and miss in his approach, including fastballs in the upper half of the zone, to profile as a first-rounder, even if someone believes he can stick at third base. He’s similar to his former teammate Jack Hurley, a third-round pick by Arizona last year, as a high-whiff, pull-power guy, but with the potential to stay somewhere on the dirt.
Garrett Shull
Shull is a switch-hitting corner outfielder and Oklahoma State commit who has excellent bat speed batting left-handed, projecting to hit for average and power, with a slower and slightly more mechanical-looking swing right-handed. He’s an average runner and probably just goes right to a corner outfield spot in pro ball. He’ll also turn 19 the day of the draft, which will hurt him with teams that weigh age heavily in their draft models.
Ryan Johnson
Johnson is a huge strike-thrower, literally, as he’s 6-6 and has walked just eight batters this year (3.3 percent), even improving on his above-average walk rate from last year of 6 percent. He does it with breaking stuff, throwing his slider nearly half of the time and his 92-95 mph fastball for only 30 percent of his pitches, with the slider and cutter missing a ton of bats. The delivery is insane, though, as he doesn’t even pause after bringing his glove over his head and just flings the ball at the plate — it’s so hard to reconcile what you see from watching him pitch with what you see on the stat sheet. It’s a low three-quarters arm slot and almost everything he throws breaks to his glove side, so left-handed hitters do give him some trouble. The results might get him into Day 1, even with the clear reliever risk from his delivery.
Kavares Tears
Tears only had 66 plate appearances as a redshirt freshman in 2023, but he’s exploded this season to become one of the Vols’ best hitters, going .377/.493/.377 with more walks (27) than strikeouts (25). He’s a very disciplined hitter who rarely chases, and he’s actually hit lefties better than righties this year. He and teammate Dylan Dreiling are both candidates to go in the second or third rounds, with Tears likely to go first as he’s got a little more bat speed and the better swing decisions of the two.
Cade Arrambide
Arrambide is very strong and offers future plus power that would make him a regular if he stays behind the plate. He’s got a very wide stance with no stride or even a toe-tap, so his timing isn’t great and he swings and misses way more often than he should, while behind the plate he’s got a cannon but gets mixed reviews on his receiving. He’s committed to LSU.
Carter Holton
Holton is a four-pitch starter who’s had success in the SEC for two and a half years now, with a 36 percent strikeout rate so far this year in 47 2/3 innings. He’s 92-95, touching 97, with a hard slider and big-breaking curveball, with fringe-average control even with a rough finish to his delivery. Holton falls off hard to the third base side after release, so everything he throws tends to go towards his glove side (in towards right-handed batters), even his mid-80s changeup. He’s undersized and doesn’t seem to offer projection for more stuff, so his path to remaining a starter in pro ball likely requires him to throw more and better strikes — and perhaps to finish more online to the plate.
Anthony Silva
Silva has struggled in his sophomore year at TCU, where he’s draft-eligible because he’ll turn 21 a week after the draft. He’s hitting .274/.367/.371 with just one homer all season after he hit seven as a freshman. He’s still a high-contact hitter against all pitch types, but continues to hit the ball on the ground too often, without the modicum of power that he showed last year to balance it out. He’s one of the few true college shortstops in the draft, though, and hit well enough as a freshman to go somewhere in the top two rounds.
Ben Hess
Hess came out strong to start the year, putting himself into the late first-round mix, but as the season’s gone on his results have tapered and he has yet to go six innings in any single outing. He’s 93-96, up to 98, with two above-average or better breaking balls, a hard mid-80s slider and a slower mid-70s curveball, with the slider the better bet for a future plus pitch while the curve gets more swings and misses now from college hitters. His ERA now sits at 6.41, though, as he’s walked 13 percent of batters he’s faced and given up nine homers in 39 1/3 innings, six of them off his fastball. At this point, he’s still a second-rounder (at best) because of his pitch quality, with very high spin rates on the breaking balls, but to get back into the first round he’ll have to show better results and work deeper into some games in the last half of the SEC season.
Michael Massey
If Yesavage doesn’t have the shortest arm action in the class, it’s because Massey does; his might be even shorter although it’s cleaner and more fluid compared to Yesavage’s. Massey works mostly fastball/slider, up to 95 with hard downward break to the latter pitch, barely using a changeup and showing a mild platoon split, mostly in OBP. Wake has used him judiciously, as he’s pitched into the sixth inning just once all year and he’s topped out at 78 pitches, so there’s a lot of projecting involved if you want to keep him as a starter. I think he’s a reliever in the end because there are so many things that have to go right for him to work in a rotation.
More 2024 MLB Draft coverage
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2024 MLB Draft notes on risers Kellon Lindsey, Trey Yesavage; plus NHSI notes and more
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Scouting potential No. 1 pick Charlie Condon and more 2024 MLB Draft notes
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Scouting the MLB Draft: Keith Law on potential first-rounders for Wake Forest, Duke
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MLB Draft 2024: Keith Law's top 30 prospects rankings to start the season
(Top photo illustration by Sean Reilly / The Athletic: From left to right: Nick Kurtz: Jeff Moreland / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images; Charlie Condon: Eakin Howard / Getty Images; Hagen Smith: Michael Wade / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
