| DRAFT 2008 |
| Bonus Records Fall At Deadline |
| By Allan Simpson |
| |
With Major League Baseball on target to set an attendance
record for the fifth year in a row and revenue streams from other sources at
unprecedented levels, there is no question that baseball is awash in cash like
no time in its rich history. That point was driven home on Friday when teams
spent record amounts as the signing deadline for the 2008 draft came and went.
Fueled by three of the six largest bonuses ever signed by draft picks signing
with the team that selected them, including a draft record $6.2 million deal
given to Giants first-round pick Buster Posey, the average bonus paid to
first-round picks was $2.485 million. That topped the previous record of $2,154
million, set in 2001, and was an 18.4 percent increase from last year’s
first-round average of $2.098 million.
Remarkably, this year’s record average could have been higher had two
first-round picks not gone unsigned. The Nationals failed to get a deal done
with Missouri righthander Aaron Crow, the ninth overall pick, and the Yankees
couldn’t reach an agreement with California high school righthander Gerrit
Cole, the 28th overall selection. Both players were in line for significant
deals, but the Nationals and Crow remained so far apart in negotiations all
summer that even an 11th-hour compromise on both sides couldn’t close the gap.
Crow will be forced to re-enter the 2009 draft, but recently signed to pitch
with the Fort Worth Cats of the independent American Association for the
balance of the 2008 season and beginning of next season. Cole reportedly had a
change of heart about signing with the Yankees over the course of the summer
and elected to honor his college commitment to UCLA. |
Full Article  Posted:
8/18/08 11:05am |
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| SIGNINGS/SIGNING BONUSES: Top 10 Rounds |
| 2008 Signing Bonuses Updated:
8/13/2008 9:56am |
| |
| TOP 15 ROUNDS: Round By Round with Scouting Reports |
| Round By Round Updated:
6/27/08 10:00am |
| |
| PG National Showcase and the Draft |
| Who Didn't Get Drafted? Posted:
6/8/08 5:45pm |
| PG National and the Draft Posted:
6/8/08 5:00pm |
| New Perfect Game Draft Record Posted:
6/7/08 5:00pm |
| Perfect Game Draft Totals Posted:
6/6/08 4:30pm |
| |
| Draft Notebook by Allan Simpson |
| Draft Notebook Posted:
6/6/08 2:15pm |
| |
| Draft Day Blog by David Rawnsley |
| Live Blogs Posted:
6/5/08 4:30pm |
| |
| Mock Draft |
| By David Rawnsley |
| |
As founder and president of the world’s largest independent
baseball scouting service, Perfect Game’s Jerry Ford often questions the
approach that Allan Simpson and I take in our coverage of the baseball draft as
our various rankings tend to represent the consensus opinions of the scouting
world, rather than our own.
With this year’s draft set to be held Thursday and Friday, we thought it would
be a perfect opportunity to have both worlds collide as we take a close-up look
at the first 30 selections and how they might unfold. On one hand, I’ll list
who our industry sources indicate will be picked in the first round in the form
of a true mock draft, but I’ll spend more time and energy figuring out who I
would pick in the same spots if I were sitting in the scouting director’s seat
for each team. |
Mock Draft  Posted:
6/5/08 7:45am |
| Crack of the Bat: Final Draft Projections
Posted:
6/5/2008 10:00am |
| Daily Schedule Updated:
6/5/08 7:45am |
| Projected Top 50 with Comments
Updated: 5/27/08 12:30pm |
State By State Previews with Scouting Reports  Updated:
6/5/08 12:30pm |
| Updated State By State Follow Lists Updated:
6/5/08 12:30pm |
| |
| RAMBLINGS ON EVE OF 2008 DRAFT |
| By David Rawnsley |
| |
When I was a young front-office type back in the early
1990s, Houston Astros GM Bill Wood, one of the nicest people I’ve ever come
across in the baseball industry, took me aside for a little lesson.
His message, somewhat paraphrased, was, “Your job in the scouting department is
to create assets for me, the general manager, to turn into a team that can win
the National League pennant. Don’t worry about what’s in our system, who’s on
the major league club. Get me assets that I can use.”
When I think about the Tampa Bay Rays pick at the beginning of the 2008 draft,
that lesson keeps coming to mind. Tampa Bay is set for a serious run, not only
at the respectability that they’ve never achieved since expansion, but in the
AL East race for years, even with the ominous presence in the division of the
Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees. |
| Ramblings on Eve of 2008 Draft Posted:
6/4/08 2:30pm |
| |
| Player Spotlight: Brett Wallace |
| By Patrick Ebert |
| |
By winning his second consecutive Pac-10 player of the year
award, Arizona State slugger Brett Wallace has certainly put an exclamation
mark on his college career.
Hitting is nothing new to Wallace, who was one of the nation’s best prep
hitters eligible for the 2005 draft and a former Aflac All-American. Questions
about his body, conditioning, defense and overall athleticism led to Wallace
falling in the 2005 draft with scouts wondering if he would become a
one-dimensional player as a hitter.
Those questions are slowly but surely starting to go away, as Wallace continues
to show his versatility by helping his team win in ways more than his bat can
provide by being a team leader, a threat on the basepaths and taking on the
defensive responsibilities at the hot corner to allow the Sun Devils to put the
best team on the field as they can, while cementing his eventual status as a
first-round pick in the draft later this week. |
| Player Spotlight: Brett Wallace Posted:
6/4/08 1:30pm |
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| |
Top 250 Draft Prospects
| 1 - 50 | 51 - 100 | 101 - 150 | 151 - 200 | 201 - 250 |
Updated:
5/16/08 7:30pm |
| |
| Preliminary State By State Follow Lists Updated:
5/10/08 7:30pm |
| Top 100 Updated:
5/8/08 3:50pm
|
Signing Bonuses: Top 10 Rounds
2006,
2007 Posted:
5/5/08 10:30am |
|
| State-By-State Previews Posted:
continuously up until Draft Day 2007 |
We began our release of each states' top prospects with Alabama and Puerto
Rico and will continue to release them daily leading up to Draft Day 2008.
These top prospect lists contain a brief scouting report on every player listed
and are linked to a complete draft-follow list for that particular state. Check
back daily as the draft content provided by Perfect Game Crosschecker will be
unmatched by anyone, anywhere!
NOTE: Non-subscribers can click the links to these lists and
get a preview of what type of information they contain, however, to get the
full lists, one must be a subscriber! Enjoy! |
|
|
| High School National Rankings: Class of
2008 UPDATED! |
| Top 2,125 High School Prospects
Updated:
6/2/08 4:45pm
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| |
| Top 500 Prospects |
| Draft 2008: Top 500 Prospects Posted:
3/28/08 5:40pm |
| |
Top 200 Junior College Prospects
(Now with player profiles of top 30 prospects!) |
| Draft 2008: Top 200 Junior College Prospects Updated:
1/29/2008 2:15pm |
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| Top College Prospects By Class |
| Draft 2008: Top 100 College Freshmen Posted:
1/11/2008 8:15am |
| Draft 2008: Top 100 College Sophomores Posted:
1/10/2008 10:00am |
| Draft 2008: Top 100 College Juniors Posted:
1/9/2008 10:00am |
| Draft 2008: Top 100 College Seniors Posted:
1/9/2008 10:00am |
| |
| Top 250 College Prospects |
| Draft 2008: Top 250 College Prospects Posted:
1/7/08 4:00pm |
| |
| 2008 State-By-State Follow List
(UPDATED!) |
The 2008 draft is still about six months away, but it's
never too early to highlight all the top prospects in the Class of 2008.
Perfect Game Crosschecker has done that--and then some--in its extensive early
preview of the top prospects in this year's draft.
We've identified not only the top 500 prospects, but provided a comprehensive
state-by-state follow list of more than 3,000 college, junior college and high
school players. We're also in the process of assembling comprehensive scouting
reports of the top 400 prospects.
|
| A comprehensive list of all the top college, junior college
and high school prospects. |
| 2008 State-By-State Follow List Posted:
1/7/2008 4:30pm |
| |
| Top 500 Prospects(Raw
List with Biographical Information)
|
| | 1 - 100 |
101 - 200 |
201 - 300 |
301 - 400 |
401 - 500 |
Posted:
11/15/2007 9:00am
|
| |
| Top 400 Prospects
(Complete with Scouting Reports) |
| 1 - 25 | 26 - 50 | 51 - 75 | 76 - 100 |
| 101 - 125 | 126 - 150 | 151 - 175 | 176 - 200 |
| 201 - 225 | 226 - 250 | 251 - 275 | 276 - 300 |
| 301 - 325 | 326 - 350 | 351 - 375 | 376 - 400 |
Updated:
12/19/2007 4:00pm
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|
| Eric Hosmer - A Special Hitter |
| By David Rawnsley |
According to the Perfect Game data base, the 2007 World
Wood Bat Association Fall Championship in Jupiter, Fla., from Oct. 24-28 will
be top prospect Eric Hosmer’s 16th PG/WWBA event dating back to June 2005, when
he attended the Sunshine East Showcase just after completing his freshman year
at American Heritage High. At that point, Hosmer was 6-foot-1, 185 pounds and
while an impressive young prospect, he was not a sure thing by any means. Here
is the report I wrote after that event:
Eric Hosmer is a 2008 1B/LHP from American Heritage HS in Cooper City, FL, with
a 6'1", 185 lb. frame. He has a very good baseball body and still has years to
mature. Defensively he has ... |
| Eric Hosmer - A Special Hitter Posted:
10/18/2007 1:40pm |
|