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Tournaments  | Story  | 7/17/2016

17u BCS Finals Day 6 Scout Notes

Brandon Hohl     
Photo: Perfect Game


Day 1 Notes | Day 2 Notes | Day 3 Notes | Day 4 Notes | Day 5 Notes
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On Saturday for the BCS Finals we have all hitters being written up. You might be saying to yourself, “Wait, didn’t D.L. Hall throw today against EvoShield?” Yes, he did, and he was very impressive, nothing new. If you would like to read notes on D.L. Hall from day one of the 17u BCS Finals they can be found here. Moving on, we’ll begin Saturday morning at Terry Park with the Tri-State Arsenal Louisville Slugger.

In the opening round of the 17u BCS Finals Tri-State Arsenal Louisville Slugger faced off against 59ers Baseball. Standing out at the plate for Tri-State was Charles Mack (2018, Williamsville, N.Y.), a lefthanded hitting second basemen. At the plate Mack has an open stance, stands upright and holds his hands below the shoulder with the bat vertical. To begin his swing he has a slow drawn out gather in to the rear leg, a slight leg lift starts his linear stride, and while striding he loads his hands up and back behind the shoulder. He creates a strong, torqued position, with elastic tension throughout the body, while maintaining the torque through as he strides. The bat falls below below his shoulder with bat speed and his body works up to the ball with a positive attack angle. In short, he has really advanced actions at the plate and runs well on the basepaths, and in this game he went 2-for-3 with an RBI triple.

Playing concurrently on Terry Park Clemente I finally got to see the offense of the Georgia Jackets. We’ll start with their leadoff hitter, top 500 ranked PG prospect and Georgia commit Tucker Bradley (2016, Chickamauga, Ga.). He stands in the box with an upright stance, hands high by the ear with a high back elbow and his barrel flat and in a loaded position behind the head. Beginning with a simple load and stride that creates a coiled front side, Bradley generates bat speed and a positive attack angle to the ball. He showed his ability for pitch recognition as he adjusted a to lefty-lefty curveball for a line drive triple to right-center field with the bases loaded. He finished the tournament hitting .458 with two triples, 11 runs scored and nine RBI.

The Georgia Jackets No. 3 hitter, Perfect Game’s 150th ranked player in the class of 2017 and a Georgia commit, Chaney Rogers (Ringgold, Ga.), impressed at the plate. He has an upright stance with his hands set back and high above the shoulder and active rhythm in the barrel. Chaney has a small shift in to the rear leg synced with a leg lift while the hands and barrel stay in that same launch position from his stance. I like his lower half mechanics throughout the swing but I think he lands too upright with his upper body, making it difficult to drive low pitches. He can get away with it in high school but this may be an area of exposure for him in the future. Until then Rogers continues to hit and produce runs for the Jackets, and he finished the event with two doubles, two triples, 12 RBI and nine runs scored.

Finally for the Georgia Jackets is the 113th overall prospect in the class of 2017 and a Georgia Tech commit, Jason Rooks (Marietta, Ga.). The righthanded hitter stands open and upright with a lot of weight in the rear leg with his hands held high above the shoulder and his barrel held at 45-degree angle. He starts his swing with a high leg kick, keeping the rear leg loaded before striding forward while separating the lead leg from the hands as he drops the barrel to path. Rooks generates a lot of bat speed and showed that he was able to get to inside fastballs, driving them foul. He finished the tournament hitting .471 with three doubles, two triples, a home run, 10 RBI and six runs scored.

Both Rogers and Rooks were walked multiple times in the first game and what impressed me about both prospects was their demeanor when taking a base on balls. In my opinion, the heart of the order is designed to score runs by driving the ball in play. Taking a walk should be the last way to get on base. Rogers and Rooks showed through their body language that they wanted to hit and were not happy with being pitched around. The good hitters will always want to hit and that was evident.

Carlos Perez (Hawthorne, N.J. 2016) is a physically mature athlete that plays third base and hits third for the Jersey Mudcats. He stands with an upright torso and wide stance, with his hands high above his shoulder. He begins his swing with a knee-to-knee gather to engage the rear leg while tipping the barrel to a loaded launch position. A long stride creates elastic tension resulting in bat speed, landing with weight going into bent front leg loading the hips, level path with a high lower half finish. I’ve seen Perez throughout the week, but on Saturday in the playoffs he tripled to deep center field and registered a 12.89 second home-to-third time. Perez finished the BCS Finals with two doubles, a triple and five runs scored.

Another stand out for the Jersey Mudcats is shortstop and cleanup hitter Joseph Castellanos (2017, Nutley, N.J.). He stands at the plate with a wide stance and high back elbow with his hands behind the ear. With a quick, simple load and stride, he picks up the heel and puts it back down in nearly the same spot. Using good lower half mechanics, Castellanos gets the back knee low in power L locked out lead leg. I’ve seen him hit in multiple games and he always seems to be making hard contact. On Saturday he doubled to deep right field on an outside fastball, scoring Carlos Perez from third. Castellanos finished the tournament hitting .353 with three doubles.

I saw a lot of Chain National-Dobbs this week and another interesting prospect was catcher and top 1,000 prospect, Ben Jackson (2017, Savannah, Ga.). Jackson is undersized with room to grow, but shows tremendous athleticism for a primary catcher. At the plate, he has an open stance with a knee-to-knob load. As he strides forward with the body his hands stay back, creating separation and elastic tension between the hands and lead leg. He finishes with good lower half mechanics and bat speed. After contact, he gets out of the box really well averaging 4.3 to 4.4 seconds down the line and 4.5 with a turn on a single.

I got to see Mission Team Baseball again after seeing them on day one. Donald Perteet (2017, Grayson, Ga.) is a physical utility player, with a similar makeup to teammate Jecorrah Arnold, only with a smaller frame. At the plate Perteet has an upright and open stance, holding his hands above the shoulder with slight rhythm in the hands while holding the barrel flat. At times he swing with a barrel tip, a simple gather in to his rear leg, as his stride separates and swings with bat speed. He showed that he was able to recognize off-speed and still make hard contact on a curveball. I think Perteet would be a player that would benefit from junior college. The time there would allow him to develop a position and the rest of his skills. He already has an athletic body with potential for growth, but 1-2 years might be exactly what he needs before he goes to the next level.

Another athlete on Mission Team Baseball with a similar athletic make up is to Perteet is Akira Mitchell (2017, Buford, Ga.). Akira stands upright with an open stance, holds the bat shoulder height, keeping the barrel vertical. He uses a slow gather to the rear leg, taking a long stride while keeping the hands back, swinging with a positive attack angle to the ball. When Mitchell swings he really tries to keep his hands as close to the body, which can cause a hitter to inside-out the ball. To inside-out the ball is often a positive term but it can also lessen the power potential of a hitter. In order to inside-out the ball there is a lot of bat lag required which makes it hard to get the barrel out for solid contact. Akira shows tremendous bat speed and athletic potential on the field, and he finished the tournament hitting .375 with four RBI.
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