Allan Simpson, who started Baseball America in the garage of his home in Canada 25 years ago and was the driving force in making Baseball America the nation’s foremost and most respected baseball publication, has joined Perfect Game USA. He will head up PGcrosschecker.com, the newest product in Perfect Game’s growing family of baseball ventures.

Crosschecker, a web-based product, will begin operating May 1 and cover amateur baseball in depth at all levels. It will focus on the draft and top prospects ranging in age from high school freshmen to college seniors.

“While I will always cherish my 25 years with Baseball America and take a great deal of pride in building it from scratch into what it has become today,” Simpson said, “I relish the opportunity and challenge to join forces with Perfect Game.

“I enjoyed a great working relationship with Jerry Ford and the entire Perfect Game staff when I was with Baseball America, and I greatly respect all the strides that Perfect Game has made in becoming the industry leader in identifying, showcasing and reporting on the nation’s top high school prospects. In a lot of ways, Perfect Game’s evolution has closely paralleled Baseball America’s.

In his 25 years at Baseball America, Simpson oversaw the publication’s extensive draft coverage, as well as much of its college, high school, summer league and youth baseball coverage. He will do the same with PGcrosschecker.com.

“We’ll take advantage of the huge volume of player information that Perfect Game has at its disposal,” Simpson said. “We’ll also fully utilize Perfect Game’s existing scouting department to gather, analyze and disseminate that information and a lot more. It’s apparent from the huge number of players that attend Perfect Game showcase events and tournaments each year that there is a lot of interest in rising baseball talent from scouts, college recruiters, parents and the public at large.

The new Crosschecker site will work hand in hand with Perfect Game itself and other PG entities, including the World Wood Bat Association, Baseball Championship Series, PG Baseball Academy and Baseball Web TV, as it develops its player rankings and scouting reports, and covers events. Perfect Game has scheduled more than 50 national and regional showcases and many of the nation’s highest level tournaments throughout the country this year and will have access to more than 50,000 players. The Perfect Game database is the most extensive in all of baseball with biographical information and scouting reports on more than 250,000 players.

Perfect Game partners with Sports America in selecting each and every player for the nationally televised Aflac All-American Classic. No company in baseball can come close to the number of draft picks and elite college players that have attended PG events. A total of 823 draft picks from 2005 attended PG events.

“Whenever I would talk to the highest level major league scouts or college coaches, the praise for Perfect Game was unanimous,” Simpson said. “The common thread has always been about Perfect Game’s integrity, hard work and the fact they just do things right. I am elated to join this highly respected group of true baseball people.”