HS Batting Averages: Is .300 good?

The BA is relative to the competition the player is playing agaginst---how tough is the league?

Is it a "soft" league" ?

What is the pitching like in the league?

For me .300 at the HS level is not a good thing. I like to see a kid increase his BA every year against the same competition in HS--that tells me more than just the BA--this shows that the player is improving


As for comparisons w you can only compare BA's if they are playing against the same competition otherwise I think you are just spinning your wheels

GREAT CEASER'S GHOST!!!!!!!!! Amazing as it is TR I agree with you [for the most part]. What is the world coming to.

Shep:

Batting average is relative to the competition. Not only the quality of the pitching as TR suggests but the quality of the defense. That said, .300 might be a good average for a freshman in any High School League. Likewise, .400 might not be a good average for a senior in an average High School League.

However, BA should not be the only thng examined by the coach/scout in his evaluation of a potential hitter. What is the players on base%? What is his slugging %? How often does he strike out per at bat? How many walks does he have? How many extra-base hits does he average per 10 at bats?

In other words, I don't believe BA average alone and not placed in context with other factors and stats means much at all.

TW344

I keep the book for my son's HS team and I don't pad the stats, I assure you.

We had a pretty good season, and we are deep in pitching. We had a .357 avg. as a team. Our opponents were held to .253 against us. So we had several guys hit over the team average, but then again, those guys were all first or second team All District, too.

Because we were a top team, we alway saw the other teams' best pitchers. Often, our opponents would thus see the other teams' lesser pitchers, then run into us. On the other hand, our own guys never had to bat against our own pitchers, which was something of an advantage.

Generally, in our district, I think someone hitting .250 is unlikely to play much. In the .300-.350 range, you can play but will bat in the lower half. In the .350-.400 range, you are in the top half of the lineup. Above .400, you are a stud and likely college level player. No more than 3 guys out of 7 teams hit an honest .450+.

Anyone claiming to hit over .500 in our district plays for a team that doesn't keep an honest scorebook, IMHO. This area is too deep in top pitchers and I haven't seen anyone get to .500 for a full season in some time.

There are districts in the area where you might see some higher averages. One district in particular has 4-5 top teams, but also 3 hapless teams and thus, you get to feast on weak pitching and weak fielding for 6 of your 20 games. Also, you will see some private school players run up some bigger numbers, for much the same reason. There is a lot of talent on those private school teams, but they just aren't as deep, and some of their opponents have trouble just finding enough players to fill all the positions.

You can't compare apples to apples from one district to another, even one team to another. Best you can do is, some teams have web sites that post box scores. Look only at how a hitter fares when he faces the top pitchers.

Our team's top hitter hit .469 for the season, but also was .429 against the top 3 opposing pitchers (all on their way to top D-I programs), including several extra base hits. That tells me he can hit anybody.

quote:

Originally posted by Midlo Dad:
I keep the book for my son's HS team and I don't pad the stats, I assure you.

I have witnessed all levels of high school ball, and usually if the lower levels are weaker at pitchng, they are at hitting as well. Here in Florida, we have 1A (low) up to 6A (high). There are some 1A programs that can play with anyone in the country. Pitching here is not just quality, it is quantity also. Some programs have 3 solid starters, that will move on to big college ball or the draft, then they have 2-3 others who will probably play Juco to D-1 or D-2. During 1 season I witnessed our team place 4 pitchers in Juco, D-2 and D-1. In our 2A district, 5 others went on to D-1, D-2.
As for the hitting, with all that pitching, no team in our district hit below .275. We hit .337.
IMHO, at the high school level, the pitchers will get out 65-70% of the hitters, but the good ones will always shine thru.
We lost a game once 5-4 to the second place team. After checking the stats, only 2 of their players had all 7 hits. One kid, a Fl State starter these days, went 4-4 with 3 bombs and a 2b. He drove in all 5 runs. We had our usual 10 hits from 6 hitters and only pushed across 4. Their 2 hitters are now good college players while our 6 hitters became 3 good college players.
In conclusion, I believe that good high school hitters will always hit high school pitching,(exceptions of course) and those hitters will hit .350 to .550. Those at .300 or less will probably not advance very often.

Just remembered this one from this past spring.
State ranked Sarasota against State ranked Boone High. Sarasota throwing an absolut stud, 91-93 with good cb. Boone throwing absolute stud with 90-92 and very good cb.
After 1, Sarasota leads 10-0. After 2, Sarasota 10, Boone 6. When said and done, Sarasota 16, Boone 11.
Both pitchers were drafted, will probably end up in good college programs.
Both teams had several hitters hitting over .350 and up to .400. Some of those kids will move up, some will move on.

Just as another data point, my son's high school team had a team total of 970 at bats with 371 hits - .382 team batting average. Now this team won its league going away - and also did well in the sectionals (California does not have a state championship.) They play in a very hitter friendly home field with limited foul ground and short fences.

So would .300 be a good average on this team - not by a long shot. .300 is probably a back up or a very good defensive player.

In my neck of the woods, .300 will get you playing time but not much else. You figure during a typical varsity season one would yield 60-80 AB's. So, unless every hit is a monster HR, you won't get notice with that kind of BA. I live in NY though, I don't know the procedure and level of talent in like Florida, Texas or California

Where I'm from .300 will get you playing time, but by no means will you be considered an all star unless you have rediculous power. The best player on the team this year hit around .510, second best was .450. I think the worst was around .250.

nd943- same thing around here. This past year we had hitters like this (in 20 games played):
Leadoff- .412, 32 runs scored
2- .443, 4 HR
3- .515, 36 RBI

yet still if I remember correctly the team average was down near .350, despite those gaudy numbers from the top of the order. The 3 hitter was ranked fourth in the entire section in batting average, with the leader having a .536 BA. Our league is the highest level of play (Class AA), so on most teams you'll need to hit around that team average to produce for your team.

I think it has to do with toughness of the overall competition you play, and the fields you play on. My son's league (4A - the states largest) was a middle of the road 4A league. Had three strong teams, one OK, and one weak. Our team finished second in the regular season and won the conference tournament with the closest game being 6 runs. We only had two players over .400 while three other teams had 4 and five. The reasons; we played the toughest non conference schedule - maybe the toughest in the state, our coach would only let the varsity play 1-2 innings against a weak team - one game he played mostly our JV against another teams varsity; and our field is 330 down the line and 370 in center and plenty of foul area. Some of the other local fields are 300 down the line, 350 in center and no foul area. These all added up to lower averages for our team. In the end it made the players better and the team stronger as there were few "cheap" hits - but it may have cost us an all conference spot or two.