PG questions

I'll let others answer some of your questions, but...

My son was also asked by his coach to start making a list of colleges. He has no idea where to start aside from a few...

Great advice by your son's coach!  That was one of the best pieces of advice we got 10 years ago from our older son's coach too.  I would start from a list of where he would want to go to school if baseball wasn't in the picture.  Share it with the coach.  If he shot too high or low, the coach will advise.

baseballmomx4- PG events are excellent and provide a very good indication of a player's skill level. However, I wouldn't take the grade you receive from the showcase as the be all and end all focal point of evaluation. That grade is a framework- a piece of the puzzle- one of many. Let's not forget that the "8" is the opinion of just a few scouts, and that could change based on who is watching your son play. 

 

I agree with justbaseball, your son's high school coach provided great advice. It's completely OK, and very understandable, that as a 2015 you don't really know where to start with respect to making a list. To expand further upon justbaseball's thought, I assume that in the next 12 months your son's eyes will be opened up to a brand of baseball he better resonates with, and that will enable him to get a better gauge of where he feels as though he belongs on the field in the future.

 

Congrats to your son for receiving a good grade during his first PG event. As I said, it is a very good indication. But don't put all your eggs in one basket. I've seen several instances in which PG undershot or overshot a player's actual future production. They are the best in the business, but no scout is perfect. I'm sure if PGStaff chimed in here, he'd echo that sentiment.

One regret I have is that we didn't go see any college games when my son was a freshman and sophomore. It is late in the season now, but you might be able to catch some post-season play. It is one more tool to use to see where he might fit.

 

Visiting a few campuses, even if you are just walking around, can also help.

 

Good luck and enjoy the ride.

If he goes to another showcase just to pitch, he'll get rated again, though of course only for his pitching this time.  Whether he comes in higher or lower will depend on how he performs.  Bear in mind the bar gets raised every year, so you have to show improvement just to keep up with your peers.  (They are all getting stronger and better, too.)

 

My thoughts on putting together a college list:  It's early for a 2015 and so you don't need anything in stone, but it's absolutely right to understand the need to start thinking in this vein.  The average HS student sends out 4-6 applications in late December of his senior year, waits until the end of March to see who accepts him, and then chooses from those who do.  Given that most D1 college programs now strive to have their recruiting classes close to done by August prior to senior year, and given that we're seeing more and more kids committing over the summer before, or during the fall of their junior years, it is very smart to understand that a baseball player needs to start getting serious about making choices well ahead of his classmates.

 

Most students choose where to apply by stratifying their "reach" schools, then those they think they would most likely go to, and then their "safe" schools.  For a baseball player for whom recruiting aspirations are realistic, in my mind the kid should aim to use baseball to get into a school that is maybe a reach for him but not so tough he'll flunk out or anything.  All of his schools should share the same academic level and the same non-baseball characteristics -- size, type of campus, availability of his likely major, etc.  The stratification comes not in terms of academic level, but rather in terms of baseball level. 

 

In Virginia, for example, a strong student would look at UVA (high academics, highest level of baseball), Va. Tech (high academics, also in ACC, competitive program but not yet proven to be at the CWS level), William & Mary (high academics, mid-major conference).  A more middle-of-the road student would be looking maybe at VT as his high point, then maybe also at places like Madison, Mason, ODU, Radford, Longwood.  From those he'd get an idea of what he likes and maybe doesn't like in terms of each type of school and campus.

 

On-field performance will then determine which baseball programs come into play, but if you do it this way, the academics don't get short-changed.

 

What I hate to see is when someone throws all this out and just goes with whoever offers the most money.  That is short-term thinking and it tends to come back to bite you.

PG is loaded with players who scored 7 or 8 on first shot, then 9 or 10 later. It even has players who are in the MLB today who never scored higher than a 7.

 

I love PG ... but no one can predict the future with 100 percent accuracy.

 

Bottom line: PLAY HARD AND ALWAYS GET BETTER

It would scare the hell out of me if we were right every time.  I've said it before, I absolutely love it when we under rate a player and he proves us wrong. It happens and it just goes to prove you can't always judge human beings accurately. Everyone in baseball scouting and recruiting knows we are right a lot and they also know we are wrong some times.

Thank you all so much for the advice. I was not so concerned with his pg grade, I was just wondering if you could use that to infer what level he could play at. Guess not, lol.  We actually are going to see a few local games in the area in the next 2 weeks (2 d1 and a D2). Schools that he is interested in if he decides to stay local.  His grades are good, he is in all honors classes, and will take sat's and act's in the fall. He has no clue what he wants to major in. He has a few ideas but nothing firm which is not making this easier.  I guess at 15 I can't blame him, I switched my major in college.  He does work hard on and off the field and is always trying to get better, so I guess that's all I can ask for.  

PGStaff- do you know if it's a 2 day showcase do the players that are pitcher's only pitch the first day or do they need to be there both days?  

We have pitchers do it both ways. Sometimes they just show up the second day.  BTW, when I mentioned we are sometimes wrong... I didn't mean we are always wrong. Usually it turns out that we are right! LOL

So yes, the grade should give a player a good idea where they stand.  However remember, that the grade is based on one event only.  What we see on one day might be different the next time. It is important to know the grade is just an unbiased opinion,  it doesn't dictate the players future all by itself.