CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa – This is all about opportunity. This is about learning experiences. And mostly, for a kid from the Lake Country in east-central Wisconsin, this is all about exposure.
This weekend’s 14th annual Perfect Game Spring Top Prospect Showcase at Perfect Game Field-Veterans Memorial Stadium offers all three and much more to a top prospect like 2017 left-handed pitcher Austin Mihlbauer, a junior at Mukwonago (Wis.) High School. He arrived here late Saturday afternoon as the No. 121-ranked overall prospect in the national class of 2017 and the No. 2 overall prospect in the state of Wisconsin. Only right-hander Nathan Burns (No. 119 nationally) of West Bend ranks ahead of him.
Mukwonago High is one of about 50 Wisconsin high schools that opts to play a summer schedule, leaving a top gun like Mihlbauer with limited options when it comes to getting his work in and remain relevant during the spring. The Spring Top definitely fills that void.
“This is our way of exposure, and these events are really good during the spring,” Mihlbauer said Saturday. “It’s good to get out and start playing again and get some exposure. I was here a year ago and it was just a really good experience. We got to come here and play with some of the best guys in the Midwest and it got me ready for the summer season and playing against some better competition.
“Being able to pitch on such a beautiful field and everything, it was just a fun time; it was good to come down,” he continued. “All of these guys are out here to play and out here to get exposure. They’re all playing hard so it’s fun to play along with them.”
Mihlbauer came in feeling like he had been “off the radar” for too long, having not participated in a PG event since the Underclass All-American Games showcase in San Diego last August. He and his dad, Brad Mihlbauer, felt like it was important for Austin to climb back on that screen and get his name and face back into the forefront.
“With us being in Wisconsin and with us having summer baseball there’s really not a lot of exposure in our community,” Brad said Saturday. “It’s very important to come out and try to show well in front of the talented kids he’s playing against. All of these guys are trying to play at 110 percent and pitching against a kid who wants to hit you and is at 110 percent is going to be a feat.”
The village of Mukwonago must be an absolutely wonderful place to live and grow up. It sits about a half-hour drive southwest of Milwaukee, about an hour-and-15-minutes southeast of Madison and right around a buck-40 northwest of Chicago for those residents seeking urban thrills.
But it also boasts a “quaint, small-town lifestyle” according to online literature, and resides “at the intersection of life, leisure and economic leadership,” a place “where open spaces, parks and waterways converge with academic development.” It sounds lovely, indeed, but it’s just not the ideal place for a young man who one day hopes to pitch in the major leagues to get noticed.
“There’s good baseball in Wisconsin, there’s no doubt – these last couple of recruiting classes in Wisconsin have been historic,” Mihlbauer said. “But you really have to branch out to get better exposure. There’s not a whole lot for me to do in Wisconsin (baseball-wise) beside summer high school ball … so our way of exposure is to branch out.” Enter Perfect Game.
The PG Spring Top was Mihlbauer’s seventh PG event since the fall of 2014 and he’s been impressive at every stop. His fastball topped out at 81 mph in his two 2014 appearances and then hit 88 mph during Top Prospect List performances at the 2015 PG Spring Top here at PG Field and the 2015 PG Junior National Showcase in Fort Myers, Fla. He also hit 88 while pitching six four-hit, shutout innings with six strikeouts and earning all-tournament recognition while pitching for the EvoShield Canes at last year’s 16u Perfect Game World Series in Cartersville, Ga.
Mihlbauer topped-out at 86 mph at the PG Underclass A-A Games and hit that number on the gun again here on Saturday. Through it all, he has developed a curveball and changeup that complement his fastball very effectively. A PG scout blog from Saturday’s outing read: “(Mihlbauer) pitched at with a loose quick arm action. He has a clean delivery and projects for more velocity. He showed good pitchability and repeated his delivery well. He threw his curve ball for strikes and showed some feel for it. He's a very interesting arm for 2017 …”
“I feel like there have been some key events that have helped me climb the ladder in the recruiting world,” he said Saturday. “I feel like I’ve been progressing at a pretty good rate and I’m pretty happy with the way it’s been going. I like at the showcases the way they throw us on teams and then we play games, and that’s the way to do it. … You’ve got to get out on the field and play and I think the way they set it up is perfect.”
Mihlbauer stepped away from specific baseball activities during the winter – he went without throwing at in the early winter before starting back up with some long-toss in the late winter– but continued to work-out on an almost daily basis in an effort to stay in shape and increase his strength.
In an effort to further maximize his training, he has started working with Brooks Braga, the co-founder and director of BRX Performance, a sports performance training center located in the greater Milwaukee area. Braga’s personal athletic background is in baseball and Mihlbauer feels a natural connection.
“He’s a baseball-specific guy and he’s working with some of the top guys in the state; he really knows his stuff,” Mihlbauer said. “He’s a real great guy and he knows what he’s doing; I trust him and I know he’s doing the right thing.”
Doing the right thing seems to be Mihlbauer’s mantra and it’s easy to see where he receives much of his guidance from: “I’d have to say this guy right here; he taught me how to play the game,” he said, pointing to his dad, when asked who had the biggest impact on his baseball career. “I’ve always wanted to be a big league baseball player – that’s always been the dream – and he’s always been there to support me; my mom (Cindy), too. They’ve always been there and I’m thankful for that.”
Brad Mihlbauer listened to his son’s response and then offered one of his own: “It’s important to us to let him figure out his own paths that he wants to follow. We’re not the type of parents that are forcing our kids to do this or are forcing our kids to go this way, it’s more of, ‘Here’s an opportunity if you want to take it.’ He can take it and maybe not excel and learn from it, or he can take it and excel and then learn and continue with it.
“We want him to grow as a player and grow as a person,” Brad continued. “If he goes out there and he struggles, I hope he learns from that and if he does well, I hope he learns from that as well. We just want him as a person and as a player to continue to raise the bar.”
The soon to be 17-year-old Mihlbauer (his birthday is May 25) presents himself as very even-keeled and level-headed young man and his strong work ethic both on the field and in the classroom (3.2 GPA) led to a scholarship offer Texas Christian University in Fort Worth (currently No. 4 in the PG College National Top 25 Rankings). He committed to the Horned Frogs and head coach Jim Schlossnagle without hesitation, calling it a “dream come true.”
“(The TCU coaches) came up to see me last spring and they liked what they saw and I made a visit (to Fort Worth),” Mihlbauer said. “Everything was just insane there – beautiful campus, the coaches were just great guys and so down-to-earth and you know they’re there to get you better and get you into the big leagues. Everything was just perfect and it was exactly where I wanted to be.”
Both Austin and Brad think it was at the PG Jr. National Showcase that coaches from the TCU and the EvoShield Canes first saw Austin pitch, and both made overtures shortly thereafter. The Canes invited him to join their underclass team at the 16u PG World Series in Cartersville, Ga., in late July and Mihlbauer responded by earning all-tournament recognition during the Canes’ 6-3-0 tournament run.
His performance in the north Atlanta suburbs resulted in an invitation to play with the Canes fulltime this summer, which he readily accepted. He is expected to be part of the head coach Jeff Petty’s powerhouse upper-class team which has won three straight titles at the prestigious PG WWBA World Championship in Jupiter, Fla. “I’m pretty excited about that,” Mihlbauer said. “There are a lot of great guys, a lot of talented guys (with the Canes) and they have a great coaching staff. I’m just really looking forward to it; it’s going to be a lot of fun.”
Just playing the Canes’ schedule promises to keep Mihlbauer busy this summer and fall but he’s also looking forward to being involved in another showcase or two while being careful he doesn’t over-extend himself. He calls these PG showcases “learning experiences” and noted they have made him become more aware of his surroundings.
A young prospect like Mihlbauer might notice the PG or MLB area scout perched behind home plate with his radar gun cocked and loaded but he might not see the scouting director or assistant GM sitting a little farther down the first baseline or up in the press box. “You never know who’s in the stands watching and it might be someone who down the road can benefit you,” he said.
That’s why this is all about opportunity. This is about learning experiences. And, mostly, this is about exposure.
“To put opportunities in front of your kids and to watch them succeed, as a parent there’s nothing better,” Brad Mihlbauer said. “Austin has a talent in baseball and we try to put things in front of him, and he absorbs them and always excels well at them. We just try to put opportunities in front of him. … There is definitely a ton of exposure at these events. We’ll continue to do them; this certainly isn’t our last one.”