How does Perfect game Rank players? on ability ? projections? numbers? why does other scouting services rank differently, I've spoke to a few Scouts and Agents and they said they follow PG numbers .
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They likely rank on all three, and probably other things as well. Which is most important is anyone's guess. Other scouting services rank differently because, well, they are different scouting services. There is no magic formula, and if there was, they wouldn't give it away.
The good thing about this site is that there is a record of every discussion and this one comes up fairly regularly. Here is a fairly recent thread (from last October) where PG Staff weighs in on the rankings and how they are made.
thx , I have to setup my searching skillz!!!
No coach or scout is looking to Perfect Game to get their recruiting list, I can promise you that.
TIM2014,
How can you "promise" that? I can promise you that if a new player shows up ranked high, he will be on most every power college program's list in a hurry. Whether he stays on that list will be determined later. Same goes for the scouting community.
As always, people can find past rankings from most any year. Compare those lists to what ends up happening at colleges and in the draft. Check and see for yourself if they have been accurate. Then after you have found they are very reliable, ask yourself, why would any college coach or MLB scout ignore those lists?
We live in a world where we communicate daily with college coaches and scouts. The communication is "always" about players. We get questions like this about players they haven't seen... Can so and so play for us? We get these from some of the top colleges in the nation. If they thought we didn't know, why would they ask us?
I've heard way too often, that scouts and recruiters don't pay any attention to the rankings. That couldn't be more wrong.
The rankings are not the end all. It is simply a reference piece. But why would anyone making a living by evaluating players ignore a list of the top players compiled by people who see more players than anyone. This year there will be over 800 players that attended PG events and went on to play in the Major Leagues. Almost anyone that has seen that many future Major League players while they were in high school should have a pretty good idea of how to accurately evaluate talent.
Anyway, to answer the question... Rankings are based on our opinion of the player. The obvious is his current talent and the rankings are heavily based on our opinion of his future talent level. So it is what we see along with what we think we will see several years later. There is no perfection when it comes to scouting. Everyone is wrong at times. Whether our events or somewhere else, every player ranked we have seen. There is no other scouting service that does that, outside of professional baseball. No one else actually sees that many players. And no one else spends the money required to get this done. PG has the largest scouting staff in "all" of baseball. Over the years we have hired former scouts and we have lost many of our younger scouts to MLB clubs.
The one thing that never happens when it comes to recruiting or scouting is PG being ignored!
I apologize if any of the above bothers anyone. But it is something we take extremely serious.
Tim2014 posted:No coach or scout is looking to Perfect Game to get their recruiting list, I can promise you that.
I can promise you that a certain perfect game profile was discussed between me and a certain college coach, recently. 
I can tell you that a certain MLB agents look at PG more than any other services , and I was told to have my son attend the PG events if we wanted to get the best looks ..and prospect out there .
As a dad who just had a "pitcher" get recruited to a D1 this year with a "ok" Perfect Game ranking/score (we knew he basically didn't have much to show at showcases, as all he does is win/get outs 86mph 6'0" RHP), but with a 12 year old on the way who is a "hitter" who will stand out at Showcases, we know that it is important to get him in front of the right people, and we firmly believe (based on results that we've seen from others) that PG is one of the best avenues to accomplish this.
I can also tell you from personal experience that coaches do indeed often look at PG profiles in making their recruiting lists. My own son saw a dramatic increase in attention the week his PG profile went up. He only threw 1.2 innings and it was during the quiet period, so no coaches saw him in person at this event. However he put up a velocity number that at least got him onto some recruiting lists he was not on before.
I need to research PG to learn more. So I have a 12U Travel ball player that has good results on the mound. Removing "daddy" goggles, I get tons of compliments on his pitching and have for a few years. This is last year pitching at 50' and who knows what 54' let alone 60'...but should I get him involved with PG at this age?
Gmnk posted:I need to research PG to learn more. So I have a 12U Travel ball player that has good results on the mound. Removing "daddy" goggles, I get tons of compliments on his pitching and have for a few years. This is last year pitching at 50' and who knows what 54' let alone 60'...but should I get him involved with PG at this age?
At that age, PG tourneys are more or less like USSSA, AAU, Triple Crown or any other organization tournament. No real advantage over anything else a 12u team would do.
Actually we would very much like to see the best 12 year olds. We don't rank them or put a PG grade on them, but we still want to know who they are. We have an interest in following the top players no matter what age they are. Will any of that actually help the young player? Maybe, maybe not. Still we have this curiosity of finding out who the best are and then tracking them to see how things turn out in the future. So along with everything else, we want to keep young kids involved in baseball as they grow older. Many end up specializing in other sports because they don't understand the opportunities in baseball.
I do know that our opinion of a young player would often be much different than the opinion of his parents. I also know that many not so talented 12 year olds will become prospects as they get older. But if you could choose the 100 best 12 year olds out of thousands of players, wouldn't it be interesting to know what happens to them? Worst case, you would be wrong about most all of them and know for sure it is completely meaningless. But we have many reasons to believe, based on experience, that you would be right about most of them. If that were true, just think about the things you can do to help guide them.
Please don't think this has anything to do with eliminating fun or taking away other sports and activities. We understand that young kids need to be young kids. Going fishing with Dad is huge!
Before anyone thinks I'm nuts, I think I will admit to it. Years ago I heard there was a young 13 year old kid that set the all time local record in sprinting. I found out where he lived and went to talk to him and his parents. My goal was to see if we could get him interested in baseball. When I got to their place it was in the poorest part of town. Big apartment building with half the windows broken and the front entry door wide open. I knocked and knocked until someone finally answered. They told me the kids mom was in jail for dealing drugs and prostitution. I said where is the young kid? They said they hadn't seen him for a week or more. So later I checked with the school and sure enough he had disappeared. They said he had moved to Chicago. End of the story, wish I had known about him a few weeks earlier. I can't help but wonder what ever happened to him. I also wonder about what might have happened had we been able to get him interested in baseball and helped him grow up. It still bothers me a little that I gave up the search.
I never even met this young boy or talked to him. I don't even know what he looked like. All I know is he was an African American and he was the fastest runner at his age ever in our city. Maybe he lacked other skills, maybe not. Guess I will never know.
Maybe someday we will run across others in his situation or others with unusual talent for their age. Maybe that kid will be in a normal living situation, but just needs some guidance. Maybe the kid has wacko parents leading him the wrong way by their example. Maybe his parents aren't experienced in baseball and need some guidance. Whatever the case, it makes me feel good if and when we can help. You see, there are much bigger rewards than just making money. I don't need more money, or compliments, I need more of those other bigger rewards. Can't ever get too many of those!
How does a top 500 list in the class of 2017 have 953? Are 453 players tied?
I knew there was not an exact cutoff at 500 (more of a rounding to 500), but cannot believe that many got lumped in. I know they have finite rankings up through maybe 100 and then start grouping them in buckets of 50 (or at least that is how it is outlined in the College Recruiting rankings - each group of fifty is awarded a different point total - that the entire bottom half on the Top 1000 gets assigned 2 points followed by High Follow getting 1 point)
How did you come up with the total of 953?
19 pages +3 of 50 players listed in the national 500. Could be they are expanding out each position.
The 2017 have not been re-ranked in 3 months which seems unusual as well. Database issues?
Tim2014 posted:No coach or scout is looking to Perfect Game to get their recruiting list, I can promise you that.
Sometimes it's better to remain quiet and thought ........
c2019 posted:thx , I have to setup my searching skillz!!!
I'm guessing you are the 2019 and not the dad. Please don't take this wrong. I'm trying to help. You're on a board with a lot of adults who can help. You would be better served, and respected if you communicated like an adult and not a teen texter. It will also be good practice for communicating with college coaches in the future. Good luck in your quest to play college ball.
Gmnk posted:I need to research PG to learn more. So I have a 12U Travel ball player that has good results on the mound. Removing "daddy" goggles, I get tons of compliments on his pitching and have for a few years. This is last year pitching at 50' and who knows what 54' let alone 60'...but should I get him involved with PG at this age?
Wait until your son is locating the ball in the 80s from 60 feet. Otherwise there's nothing to show.
PGStaff posted:TIM2014,
How can you "promise" that? I can promise you that if a new player shows up ranked high, he will be on most every power college program's list in a hurry. Whether he stays on that list will be determined later. Same goes for the scouting community.
As always, people can find past rankings from most any year. Compare those lists to what ends up happening at colleges and in the draft. Check and see for yourself if they have been accurate. Then after you have found they are very reliable, ask yourself, why would any college coach or MLB scout ignore those lists?
We live in a world where we communicate daily with college coaches and scouts. The communication is "always" about players. We get questions like this about players they haven't seen... Can so and so play for us? We get these from some of the top colleges in the nation. If they thought we didn't know, why would they ask us?
I've heard way too often, that scouts and recruiters don't pay any attention to the rankings. That couldn't be more wrong.
The rankings are not the end all. It is simply a reference piece. But why would anyone making a living by evaluating players ignore a list of the top players compiled by people who see more players than anyone. This year there will be over 800 players that attended PG events and went on to play in the Major Leagues. Almost anyone that has seen that many future Major League players while they were in high school should have a pretty good idea of how to accurately evaluate talent.
Anyway, to answer the question... Rankings are based on our opinion of the player. The obvious is his current talent and the rankings are heavily based on our opinion of his future talent level. So it is what we see along with what we think we will see several years later. There is no perfection when it comes to scouting. Everyone is wrong at times. Whether our events or somewhere else, every player ranked we have seen. There is no other scouting service that does that, outside of professional baseball. No one else actually sees that many players. And no one else spends the money required to get this done. PG has the largest scouting staff in "all" of baseball. Over the years we have hired former scouts and we have lost many of our younger scouts to MLB clubs.
The one thing that never happens when it comes to recruiting or scouting is PG being ignored!
I apologize if any of the above bothers anyone. But it is something we take extremely serious.
PGSTAFF, Thanks for the great info,
So lets say the kid is ranked high as a freshman in his state, PG gives him a AA award, would the kid be on the list(some schools)? , but I've heard the schools cannot contact him until the beginning of his JR year of High school, what does one do until then beside on improving everyday?
thanks ,
c2019 posted:PGStaff posted:TIM2014,
How can you "promise" that? I can promise you that if a new player shows up ranked high, he will be on most every power college program's list in a hurry. Whether he stays on that list will be determined later. Same goes for the scouting community.
As always, people can find past rankings from most any year. Compare those lists to what ends up happening at colleges and in the draft. Check and see for yourself if they have been accurate. Then after you have found they are very reliable, ask yourself, why would any college coach or MLB scout ignore those lists?
We live in a world where we communicate daily with college coaches and scouts. The communication is "always" about players. We get questions like this about players they haven't seen... Can so and so play for us? We get these from some of the top colleges in the nation. If they thought we didn't know, why would they ask us?
I've heard way too often, that scouts and recruiters don't pay any attention to the rankings. That couldn't be more wrong.
The rankings are not the end all. It is simply a reference piece. But why would anyone making a living by evaluating players ignore a list of the top players compiled by people who see more players than anyone. This year there will be over 800 players that attended PG events and went on to play in the Major Leagues. Almost anyone that has seen that many future Major League players while they were in high school should have a pretty good idea of how to accurately evaluate talent.
Anyway, to answer the question... Rankings are based on our opinion of the player. The obvious is his current talent and the rankings are heavily based on our opinion of his future talent level. So it is what we see along with what we think we will see several years later. There is no perfection when it comes to scouting. Everyone is wrong at times. Whether our events or somewhere else, every player ranked we have seen. There is no other scouting service that does that, outside of professional baseball. No one else actually sees that many players. And no one else spends the money required to get this done. PG has the largest scouting staff in "all" of baseball. Over the years we have hired former scouts and we have lost many of our younger scouts to MLB clubs.
The one thing that never happens when it comes to recruiting or scouting is PG being ignored!
I apologize if any of the above bothers anyone. But it is something we take extremely serious.
PGSTAFF, Thanks for the great info,
So lets say the kid is ranked high as a freshman in his state, PG gives him a AA award, would the kid be on the list(some schools)? , but I've heard the schools cannot contact him until the beginning of his JR year of High school, what does one do until then beside on improving everyday?
thanks ,
Keep mind that, while schools cannot directly contact such a kid, there is nothing that prohibits them from talking to the kid if he makes contact with them. They can make offers, kids can visit campuses and talk to the staff. There is a lot that can, and does, happen with recruiting and underclass players.
Got it, tks for advice from all. A little side track here but getting emails from baseball factory for a PREP tryout going on in Glen Allen, VA. They are asking coachs to nominate 3 players from there teams. Its a $99 tryout fee.
My interest in this would only be to get the kid used to being put under the spotlight in a tryout situation. He is shy and anxious about that aspect but he needs the experience with his aspirations to tryout for JV ball this upcoming fall.
To answer a question...
We used to rank players by exact numbers. You could go back to old profiles and see a player ranked something like 2,534. Even then we realized once you get past a certain number, say 300, it became impossible to separate players. While those players were talented, it was nearly impossible to accurately say the player ranked 2,000 wasn't better than the player ranked 1,500. We only knew they were both very good players.
So a few years ago we changed the system. Every player we saw that graded out as a top 500 type was placed at exactly 500 or better. That is why there are so many 500s. After that we categorized players into groups, top 1,000, high follow and follow.
What many don't realize is the rankings are updated often. Sometimes several times a week. Then about 5 or 6 times each year they are completely studied and updated. BTW the 2017 rankings have been updated recently. But the biggest updates will happen in June, July and August. That is when we see the majority of the players.
It's impossible, but I wish everyone could experience what happens when a player shows up high in our rankings, like top 100 or 250. That is when they would find out for sure whether anyone pays attention to the rankings..
PGSTAFF am I missing something, Class of 2017 says last updated 1/27/2016?
That is probably a mistake. Or it was the last time we announced a complete update listed on the home page. Until the draft happens in June we concentrate heavily on the current draft class. Our Schedule for 2017 events gets heavy in June.
I will say that after my 2018 RHPs first PG showcase last year where he was graded as a 9 and rated below 75 nationally and in the single digits in the state, the contacts from schools and baseball programs shot up dramatically. It even opened up opportunities (both taken and not) to guest play in some big tournaments.
To say that there is little benefit in being rated well on PG simply isn't correct.
It's basically like this, the tall kids are better and ranked higher 
Numerically
bballdad2016 posted:Numerically
Reminded me of Cliff Clavin's Jeopardy answer to:
"Archibald Leach, Bernard Schwartz and Lucille LeSueur"
Cliff: "Who are 3 people who've never been in my kitchen?"
Simple, you can not trust Perfect game rankings. I know a 2017 who played on a national ranked summer/fall team who never attended a perfect game showcase. However, he did attend perfect tournaments. He is a verbal to a major or perhaps best ACC team since his freshman year of HS. He has never been ranked very high and many of his teammates have been ranked higher. I have had any MLB scouts find this very amusing. We attended East Coast Pro and Area Code Games and at both events they down played Perfect Game. All of a sudden before Jupiter, he was ranked in the top 100 for 2017. REALLY! There are still some of his teammates ranked higher who don't even start on his team....... Very interesting!! We made a choice as a family to not attend perfect game showcase events for $600 plus after being verbally committed and yes it may have cost us with MLB but I think it was the correct decision. This is why Wilson and MLB are looking at ways to overcome perfect game. I know my son's summer/fall team want to leave perfect game. Bottom line can you believe we have pay $5 to park at the lake point--really?????????
You can just as easily say the college football rankings cannot be trusted either when Notre Dame, Stanford and LSU were all in the Top 10 at the start of the season. The PG rankings are just one part of the PG profile. I would guess the scouts and coaches are much more interested in the metrics and the write-ups than they are in where the kid is ranked in his position, state or nationally.
Players who are ranked very highly are clearly not in need of PG's endorsement to say they are elite players and will be heavily scouted. But for a ton of kids who do not get a chance to play on the top travel teams, the $600 showcase fee is money well spent to get an independent assessment and measurement of the player's skills. And the page also provides a nice link to include in coaches e-mails. There is a lot more to it than the specific rankings and I'm guessing there are more of us here that have kids who benefitted from the showcase experience than those who did not.
CAVS1 posted:Simple, you can not trust Perfect game rankings. I know a 2017 who played on a national ranked summer/fall team who never attended a perfect game showcase. However, he did attend perfect tournaments. He is a verbal to a major or perhaps best ACC team since his freshman year of HS. He has never been ranked very high and many of his teammates have been ranked higher. I have had any MLB scouts find this very amusing. We attended East Coast Pro and Area Code Games and at both events they down played Perfect Game. All of a sudden before Jupiter, he was ranked in the top 100 for 2017. REALLY! There are still some of his teammates ranked higher who don't even start on his team....... Very interesting!! We made a choice as a family to not attend perfect game showcase events for $600 plus after being verbally committed and yes it may have cost us with MLB but I think it was the correct decision. This is why Wilson and MLB are looking at ways to overcome perfect game. I know my son's summer/fall team want to leave perfect game. Bottom line can you believe we have pay $5 to park at the lake point--really?????????
Gonna have to call BS on some of this. I'm going to have to have you name me two kids ranked PG top 100 who don't start for your kid's travel team before I believe it. Do some escape PG's attention? Sure, but it's rare. Interesting that you say scuts were "downplaying" PG while they are at a competitor's event. They sure flock to these useless PG events in droves, don't they?
CAVS1,
You have stated some things that are untrue. My question is WHY?
Please don't make anymore stupid comments about players ranked in the Top 100.
Obviously a guy who's disappointed with his kid's PG ranking or coverage (or who doesn't want to pay $5 to park a car). Though I'm sure PGStaff will be the first to admit they aren't perfect, they are by far the best organization at what they do. Ever been to Jupiter? I have with my son - twice. Sure doesn't look like MLB is trying to get away from PG at that event.
All of a sudden before Jupiter, he was ranked in the top 100 for 2017. REALLY! There are still some of his teammates ranked higher who don't even start on his team.......
Maybe he was talking about state/position rankings - BHP out of Montana? That said, he was accurate on the Lakepoint parking fee, but not sure why that is his closing argument as it relates to rankings. I've posted on here before about illogical rants - find it funny that he dismisses PG rankings from MLB's perspective and comes right back and says they may have missed out on MLB exposure by not attending PG - which is it?
CAV - Baseball is a very small community. If your kid is good, baseball people know about him. Don't get wrapped up in rankings and commitments..................it's all "eye wash" until they're 18+ years old.
Scouts may talk amongst themselves, but I can assure you, they will never spout off to a random "dad" about anything they disagree with in baseball.
My '18 is not ranked anywhere. For good reason, he's never showcased. PG is the first place he will attend, likely spring of '17. I live within 2.5 hours of 5-D1programs, in an area that is not supported by PG events, that happens to have 50 plus area scouts. I can promise you, they know my kid and if they feel he is worthy of putting on their board, they will.
Even, I can see the relevance to attending a PG event, when the time is right. You don't get extra credit for attending multiple events. I'm from the camp, you need to create something worth seeing.
Sorry, PG......I don't mean that in a negative way as I know you do track progression and improvement!!
My son went to a PG showcase the summer prior to his Soph year. It was run very well and it served the prupose to try and rate the players there. We had no idea what schools would be there ahead of time to scout the event but we knew to expect college scouts. He performed well and made the top performer list but we have not had the chance to get back to an event. It is necessary to be evaluated in order to get an invite to the All Star event. He has grown bigger faster and stronger and has developed much more in the past year and a half. We would love to get him to do another showcase but financially it is difficult when you have other showcases advertising what colleges will be present as well as a plethora of college camps.
The new Dead Period brings into questions the validity of third party events to showcase talent during that period when D1 colleges can not attend. Why would the NCAA make this change?? It does not help the recruiting process. In fact it further condenses the already short time frame. Does PG expect only D2 and D3 schools to attend during the Winter? Are these camps just to post the scouting notes and numbers on the website in hopes of getting attention from D1 schools that way?
The ranking system is impossible maintain without any errors, because kids grow and develop continually. The scouting must be exhaustive. I , for one, am glad that PG does this. It allows you to have a measure your kids ability against other kids in the same graduating class across the country
Jupiter this year was the first time we have attended a PG event with my 2017. I'm glad we went, was very well run and the attendance by scouts was unbelievable. I'm not sure how many were there, but I asked two of the area scouts that I know- Yankees and Marlins- and they both said they had 15-18 guys there. I think PG tweeted that the Padres had 32. It seemed to me that there were many more than either AC or ECP. It was a great experience, It was not particularly well attended by college recruiters- there were some there, but not a ton, which makes sense as most of the kids were 2017, and, for the most part were already committed.
I've resisted the urge to ask this question because I'm fairly certain it's been asked before. Unfortunately, I must not be asking it in exactly the right way to get the search feature to help me out, so I'm going to tiptoe out here and ask anyway.
If you're pretty sure your kid is a high academic D3 prospect are PG events among those you should consider? I'm well aware of the advantages/disadvantages of Stanford, Headfirst, and individual college camps, and I completely get that Perfect Game is great for the best players out there. However, because of our location Perfect Game has not been a significant factor for kids from our area. I don't know if that's because there's a dearth of talent here or because of ignorance or some other reason.
PABASEBALLDAD,
Over 300 college coaches in Jupiter this year. Those are just the ones we know of. The usual, U of Florida, Virginia, Oklahoma, Ole Miss, TCU, Arizona State, UCLA types, many send two or three coaches, but it was nice to see a lot of DII, DIII and Juco coaches this year. Also, pretty much most of the top agents are there as well.
Actually with that many kids committed, it draws a lot of colleges just to follow their own recruits. Not to mention some of the very best non committed players/pitchers are there. And there are a large number of the top underclassmen.
Many scouts and recruiters at this event don't wear their logo. It allows them to move around without being bothered. Most have complete trust in TrackMan, so they don't even have to carry a gun.