Perfect Game CA Underclass Jan 19-21

SoCal08,
No idea how long it takes to get the top prospect teams up. When I click on top prospects for most showcases going back a ways nothing comes up. The ones that have a link for top prospect teams do come up with something.

I think it takes a week or two to get the profiles up, then another week or two to get the reports. It probably depends on the size of the event. Of course PG is probably the right person to answer this one.

CASon played in the CA Underclass. He got the chance to play against a lot of good players. He led their first game off against Tony Calhoun who is a 90+ type who is far more than just a hard thrower. I was happy when CASon fouled off the first pitch, but Calhoun got him on 3 pitches. At one point their coach told them Calhoun was throwing 90% strikes so they'd better be swinging. CASon also faced several other good pitchers during their games.

CASon was the starter this morning for the Royal team and got to pitch against some good hitters. He also had several very good players on his team. His catcher was very good behind the plate, he made a great play on a passed ball to throw out a runner at first when he called for a low outside pitch and CASon threw his fastest pitch of the game high and inside for strike three. Their shortstop made a spectacular play to almost get a runner on a hard hit grounder up the middle while CASon was pitching. The shortstop was also their final pitcher of the game and he was also a very good pitcher. Those weren't the only good players on his team by any means. One of their best players pitched on Sunday and wasn't there today. I think that player may have been the only player to get a hit off Calhoun.

In the past it has taken many weeks to get profiles up.... I wouldn't worry about even looking to check for a month to 6 weeks or so...

Now there is the an another PG event called...
2008 CALIFORNIA ALL-STAR GAMES which is occuring this next weekend.... I'm not sure if it is a true invite only based on previous events or what the criteria is.... but I would imagine it is most of the top talent from this last weekend's event.

There were an incredible number of players at the National Underclass events and a fair number at the world showcase. Then there was the Hawaii showcase the week before the CA Underclass that they don't have the profiles up for yet. It will probably take a bit longer than usual to get the CA Underclass profiles and reports up as a result.

CA,
My son was also on the Royal team with yours in the CA Underclass SC. He started the game on 1/20 pitching against Calhoun and was the one that got the lone hit off him. Though only listed as a pitcher, Jon actually had quite a good overall day for himself (2 for 3 batting, 1 SB, 1 run, 1 RBI in addition to 4 shutout innings). I also thought the talent level at the event was top notch. I believe that the time to post reports is directly related to how many kids attended as well as the quality of the "field". So although the profiles are already posted, it may take another 3-4 weeks before they sort out the reports, with the Top Team soon to follow. As you say though, PG Staff would be the definitive source here.

SDBB,
The Cal All-Star event is indeed invite only, though I think as time goes on, they go down several tiers of invitation lists dependent on who is available to play. My son was there last year, and we got an invite this year, but having just done the CA Underclass, we weren't that excited about heading back up to Arrowhead Stadium...time to start focusing on prepping for our HS season. The weather has also been a factor. The event was washed out this past weekend, and looks pretty iffy for this one.

The All-Star Games will be heavy with 2008 grads (60%) with about 30% 2009's and about 10% 2010's. Format is the same as any showcase - skills followed by simulated games. Usually about 3 teams of 20 kids. Very top quality talent. Fair number of pro scouts in attendance (fairly high in their respective organizations). Probably almost up to the talent level you'd see at the National.

GasMe,
You might also might want to look at the showcase eval's thread I posted where I indirectly mentioned your son. I was impressed by your son's at bats and his pitching skills. My son actually posted a bit higher max velocity but your son worked at 2 or 3 mph faster than mine with nice location and pitch selection and I'm sure could have hit a higher number if that had been his intent.

I asked my son to pitch rather than throw for the gun and then to look for situations where he could put a little extra on a pitch like 0-2 counts or if he walked a batter and had to throw the ball down the middle. He managed to do just that working mostly 78-81 with probably more at 78-79 and only two or three pitches over 81. He had thrown an inning on Saturday against weak competition and worked 82-83 on a JUGS, which would have been 80-81 on the Stalker and really didn't have good command at that speed so I thought he'd make a better impression by pitching well than just throwing hard as long as he showed he had the ability to throw a bit harder when he needed to.

Funny thing is that the thing I was proudest of was how hard my son worked in the outfield.

Yeah, I agree with that approach too. Jon has hit up to 85 (Jupiter) and worked pretty steady at 83-84 at other showcases. But we (Mom & I) know that his ticket to the next level (which will be college, not the pros) is his control/command, pitch selection, and other intangibles. Not velocity. He might be able to hump up to 86 or 87 if that was his sole purpose in life, but it would come at the cost of "pitching performance", for lack of a better term, and he'd probably end up with less future opportunities as a result. He may suffer a bit in the rankings/ratings for this approach, but it seems the college coaches we've talked to appreciate the success he's had doing what he does best now.

Plus I know he gets a kick personally in striking out several "Top 50" guys, of which there were many at the CA Underclass, without having to throw 90+ (maybe someday, we'll see...).

Liked your comment about your son's outfield work. For us, it was Jon's at-bats that we were proudest of, since he seems to have fewer and fewer opportunities to shine offensively as he gets older.

SoCal08,
They've posted the top prospect teams from the CA Underclass. CASon, SDBB's son and GasMe's son were all named to the team. To be expected I think for SDBB's son and GasMe's son, who are top players, but a big thrill for me and for CASon.

Congrats!

I'm loving all of the information on these boards.

SoCal08

CA: It is a very satisfying recognition for any kid. Congrats to Evan and we'll look for him in the future. You wouldn't by any chance be coming to play in the Lions Tournament in San Diego next month?

It will be interesting to see how the player ratings for the Showcase work out. I heard reports of some inconsistent gun readings for the pitchers (one of the PG Stalkers was confirmed off by 3mph...low). I know that numbers don't tell the whole story and hopefully they account for it.

I did like the fact that they had a separate venue for skills versus games. Seems like things ran a bit more organized this year, and they kept to schedule like clockwork.

Kudos to PG for a great event!

Interesting, I don't think the gun they used for my son was off. I was anticipating a bit higher working velocities but no higher max reading. It did look like they got much lower readings than they anticipated for Lemke. I noticed they had multiple guns at times. Perhaps the other gun was being used to gun catchers.

We attended this event and our son's velocity was about 3 - 4 mph lower than we expected. Is the velocity posted on the profile the max reading or a working velocity? Just curious, CADAD did you ask for the velocities or did we miss where they posted that information (working velocities vs max). Thanks!

rhp18mom,
I sat behind the gun while my son was pitching and I have good eyes for seeing at a distance. The velocity posted on the profile is the max velocity they hit. It was interesting because when he hit a higher velocity one of the scouts would point to it to make sure that it was seen. Before we left I mentioned to one of the scouts there what range of velocities my son threw and he told me they'd report a velocity range he worked in and the max velocity. The way he told me gave the impression that he remembered who my son was and knew exactly what he had done.

It is pretty typical for velocities reported on a Stalker to be a couple mph below those reported on a JUGS, but 3 or 4 mph difference would be unusual although I've seen a JUGS that reads consistently higher than mine. My son was working 82-83 on my JUGS on that Saturday during a winter ball game and hit 84 a couple times during just one inning and had worked at 80-81 on a Stalker at a college camp a month previously. As much as I'd like to think that the fact that he worked 78-79 on the Stalker much of the time was due to the gun being off I think it was more likely he was simply not overthrowing and that the readings were consistent with what he's done previously and given the max velocity perhaps even a small improvement. His reading throwing from the outfield was just about what I would have expected, assuming a couple mph less than a JUGS, given that he told me he threw hard but not as hard as he could.

CADad,

Thanks for your reply. I honestly don't know what to think. We were totally shocked at the velocity posted as was his HS coach, especially now that we know it is the Max. We were aware of the differences between the Jugs and Stalkers, so we always take that into account. Oh well, what can you do? It just bugs me a little to hear that there was a "confirmed problem" with one of the guns.

I went through the profiles of the pitchers and a couple position players I knew had also pitched and looked at the velocities of the pitchers who had showcased recently. With only a couple exceptions the velocities they posted at the CA Underclass were within 1 mph one way or the other of the velocities they had posted previously. I made a point of checking a couple pitchers who would have been on the same gun as my son and their velocities matched up pretty well with what they had done recently.

I have talked to all our people and in most cases there was more than one gun used. Not one on our staff "confirmed" any problem with the Stalkers we were using. Often one gun will read a MPH different than another, but if that's the case we use the higher reading.

If we could ever "confirm" a gun was three miles off, we would simply switch to a different gun. We had six Stalker radar guns at that event. Not very smart, but if we could confirm one was not working properly, we'd simply switch guns.

It does happen at timnes thjat any pitcher will throw well under his previous velocity. But our job is to accurately report what happened on that day. We never expect to see a player or pitcher on his very best day. Percentages are against that, especially at this time of year.

Anyone that has a problem with these things should contact our office. It is much more likely that there would be an error in posting than an error in the gun. We have made mistakes before, no matter how hard we try not to.

From our main office... Here are the scouts who were working that event...

Kentaro Yasutake... yasutake@perfectgame.org
Jim Arp... jarp@perfectgame.org
Steve James... sjames@perfectgame.org
Kyle Noessen... kyle@perfectgame.org
Greg Sabers... gsabers@perfectgame.org

These guys can answer any questions. And if someone has thrown much better previously, we want to know that. It would be entered in our notes on the database, for future reference. However, all that can be posted is what we actually saw.

I'm fairly certain that the people above would have "confirmed" to me if there was a faulty gun.

GasMe,
I think our school is headed up to central CA for spring break.

They tried one of the big ones the year after they had a strong team and took a mediocre team down there. The results weren't too pretty.

SoCal08,
The ratings and reports have been posted.