Scout Talk?

I had hoped that you would begin a thread like that, similar to the one at the PG.org site.

X-

I never posted on the PG Forum, but I visited the board often and enjoyed your scouting insight. There are a number of websters on here that have kids playing pro ball, and no doubt there will be more in the future. Hopefully a Scout Talk Forum will be considered.

quote:

Originally posted by bsbl247:
X-

I never posted on the PG Forum, but I visited the board often and enjoyed your scouting insight. There are a number of websters on here that have kids playing pro ball, and no doubt there will be more in the future. Hopefully a Scout Talk Forum will be considered.

That would be awesome to have a forum, with as many parents, coaches, players, scouts and former players/scouts/coaches would love to read or add their info to as well.

I came across a young man from Marathon HS, Wisconsin that I saw only on video tape, but got all angles on him named Cody Hanke, he's playing football this fall and is a 2011, was All-State this spring, Div 3 in Wisconsin State High School Athletics, he was lights out, upper 80's, hard curve ball and a nice level stroke with power and bat speed, 6'4 plus and 200, seems to be still growing, I was told he was 5'9 entering HS frosh year. Very little info on him and I'm anxious to track his progress, but I won't get out to Wisconsin probably until mid to late May 2011.

If anyone has info on Cody, that would be great to see/hear. He seems very projectible to me and as I mentioned, he's very low on the radar screen from what I know at present.

Thanks for the replies!!

X

Definitely consider it.

I realize that some of you are new to the HSBBW, but one thing very different here than from other sites is that amatuer players are rarely discussed.

This really was never meant to be a scouting site, or the original intended purpose for it, IMO anyway.

I to have followed X on the pg website. He's very well respected and he can be an asset for this site if used the right way. He doesn't throw players under the bus, his many connections could help many parents and players and his cult following would generate more eyeballs which could equal more ad dollars for Julie and the site.

Last winter I sent X a video to view of my son. I was worried. My son didn't have an offer and I was looking for an honest opinion. X responded quickly and told us to hang in there. He even send a couple e-mails to some coaches he knew. We have corresponded since then and I consider him a friend. If he can guide just one more parent thru the recruiting process, then he should be welcomed aboard.

By all means there should be more experienced to help in the recruiting process!

But my understanding from what was the original post is that it would be more of a site for reporting players for the MLB draft.

Again, as stated this is not an MLB scouting site.

One thing we don't do here is post negative comments regarding amateur ballplayers as TPM mentioned. Even with pro ballplayers who are generally fair game, we try not to disparage if we know their family are members here (e.g., Zack Duke son of OPP).

That said, I kind of like the idea but not sure we need a separate forum. Why not just start a thread (like this one) in this forum and keep bumping it as you or others have new scouting ideas to post?

No problem with people posting comments or mentioning names with comments like...

Player XYZ has a nice fluid arm action and cruises mid to upper 80's. Looks like a good athlete who can definitely play at the next level.

We hope not to see comments like this however...

Player ABC appears too slow to ever play past the high school level. Also, he appears lazy and may have problems being coached. Not sure he is all that good of a student...

I think you get the idea. I think positive and constructive comments can work but I think you get the idea of what we don't want to see. Use the golden rule and assume it was your kid being talked about. If you don't have something positive to say then we prefer it be left unsaid. You can always discuss "issues" with someone (another scout) behind the scenes via PM.

All that said, I think I like the idea but again, I don't think a separate forum is warranted.

Would like to hear PGStaff's, MN-Mom and other's comments on the subject....

We have not reopened our message board because someone brought something to my attention.

There is at least one site that uses information gathered from other sites. I saw that there were several references to Perfect Game. They were not actually all directly from us, but also some things that others had posted on our message board. Some comments we actually totally disagreed with and yes there were some negative comments about players that we felt were untrue and would never have written.

What we have come to realize is that many of the people who post this expert scouting information are people we do not see at any of our events. Some reference players that we have seen play many times.

I feel that if you're going to report on players they should be players you really have seen and know a lot about, rather than use second hand information. I guess it's possible to run around the country seeing these players everywhere, but why would anyone spend the time and money doing that when they pretty much all are at one or two places each year. Even at that, we spend millions each year scouting amateur players and still make some mistakes.

Why aren't these experts in Jupiter Florida right now? Every MLB club has a bunch of scouts here. The Blue Jays alone have 34 scouts here. Most of the top colleges are here. If those people are here where are the message board scouting experts? Sitting at home waiting for information to be released? It's very expensive and time consuming to actually see them.

Personally I think they post a lot on what they read or see on television. If that is the case we already have many people who post here that can be experts.

We also got tired of being used (free of charge) to promote activities. After all, we don't know what anyone's motives are or what they even do for a living.

Example... Let's say one of these expert posters claims player A is the best thing since sliced bread and player B who we believe to be much better is mentioned as having all kinds of weaknesses. What if the person posting this message worked for the sports agency that represented player A. What if he were the father of player A or a paid instructor or the head of the travel program for Player A. These things would cause serious credibility concerns wouldn't they?

Once again, our biggest problem was having our name attached to comments made by others on our message board. This puts our credibility at risk. At least, that is the way I see things.

That said, we know that some people like XMLB have experience and knowledge. They have a lot to offer on this website. What is the need to post player reports?

I will flat guarantee that we will see or hear about posts being taken from here and posted at other sites labeled as coming from hsbaseballweb.com. And it will not be mentioned as coming from any specific poster on a message board.

If need be I can provide proof of this.

Regarding the positive example that "TheBigNasty" provided. That truly is something that pertains to this site. Anyone who can help guide people through the recruiting process will be welcome here.

I could say more, but I have to get back to work actually trying to "watch" all these talented kids here in Jupiter this week. There are well over 600 scouts and college coaches here and we have about 70 of our own staff here.

That's all, but if others here want this sort of thing, I will not stop it. I was able to stop ours though and seriously thinking about not bringing it back.

After reading PG's comments and the troubles it can cause, I would recommend we don't have a scout talk forum or thread on our site. I can see just too much mischief going on there. Either someone is going to be over-hyped, unfairly criticized, or other anomoly and none of us will actully know if we are actually hearing from a scout who has actually seen someone play. TPM was right. This is a recruiting site - not a scouting site.

I say no.

I like having perspective from a scouts view on scouting in general, what they like, what they are looking for, etc.

Naming individuals and scouting reports on individuals I can see as spiraling downward.

quote:

Originally posted by floridafan:
I like having perspective from a scouts view on scouting in general, what they like, what they are looking for, etc.

Naming individuals and scouting reports on individuals I can see as spiraling downward.

Good points. A general scouting type blog would work but we need to leave the names out imho.

quote:

That's all, but if others here want this sort of thing, I will not stop it. I was able to stop ours though and seriously thinking about not bringing it back.

-PG Jerry

Don't blame you Jerry because when the truth comes out of the mouths of the actual players on what "really happened" it kinda makes others look foolish, and deceptive.

I followed many of XMLBScout's posts on the PG message board and enjoyed them although I did not contribute myself . In light of hearing all the problems from PGStaff that many of us didn't know about, I now see some of the problems that can arise.
As there was an esteemed poster on HSBBW that was a major league scout before his untimely passing, I still feel there could be value in hearing about baseball from the perspective of a scout in general terms. Stories of interactions with players, parents, other scouts, the MLB organizations, travel tales, what a scout truly looks for, present pro players stories from a scouting perspective--all this could be interesting from a scout's viewpoint--without specific names of amateurs. How often a scout sees an 80 arm in the outfield or infield, What's truly a 70 runner?--all this would be interesting to hear from a scout or ex scout.

I like both Three Bagger's and jerseydad's points of view. They don't seem at all incompatible with each other imho.

We had a poster here who we've dedicated a forum to - bbscout. He was as close as you can get to hsbbweb royalty or superstardom and I would put PGStaff in the same category. Everyone cared what he had to say. His style was to just participate in those threads and topics he was interested in. XMLBScout - if you are a pro scout or college scout, start posting in our forums and people will be able to figure that out. It just takes time to establish credibility. Parents and players indeed want to know what the professionls think.

quote:

Originally posted by PGStaff:
We have not reopened our message board because someone brought something to my attention.

What we have come to realize is that many of the people who post this expert scouting information are people we do not see at any of our events. Some reference players that we have seen play many times.

I feel that if you're going to report on players they should be players you really have seen and know a lot about, rather than use second hand information. I guess it's possible to run around the country seeing these players everywhere, but why would anyone spend the time and money doing that when they pretty much all are at one or two places each year. Even at that, we spend millions each year scouting amateur players and still make some mistakes.

Why aren't these experts in Jupiter Florida right now? Every MLB club has a bunch of scouts here. The Blue Jays alone have 34 scouts here. Most of the top colleges are here. If those people are here where are the message board scouting experts? Sitting at home waiting for information to be released? It's very expensive and time consuming to actually see them.

Personally I think they post a lot on what they read or see on television. If that is the case we already have many people who post here that can be experts.

We also got tired of being used (free of charge) to promote activities. After all, we don't know what anyone's motives are or what they even do for a living.

That said, we know that some people like XMLB have experience and knowledge. They have a lot to offer on this website. What is the need to post player reports?

I could say more, but I have to get back to work actually trying to "watch" all these talented kids here in Jupiter this week. There are well over 600 scouts and college coaches here and we have about 70 of our own staff here.

That's all, but if others here want this sort of thing, I will not stop it. I was able to stop ours though and seriously thinking about not bringing it back.

PG - with all due respect, are you insinuating that I post information from sites and do not attend games and come up with reports from 2nd hand information? I find those comments totally out of line and it's very humorous to see things I wrote in your forum which I truly enjoyed doing for the time it was up, end up being posted on other publications' websites and other blogs, etc., well after the fact after I published that info on your "SCOUT FORUM" under whichever thread I started or commented on at the time.

I can not help that the names I post are from my own viewing, again, either by first hand on the site evaluation in which I have ran into your scouts many times PG, and I know who your scouts and PG X-Checker scouts are, and I know who BA scouts are, as well as the coaches, etc. I haven't been to a PG event other than to AFLAC in the past few years, first time when I saw Nick Adenhart a few years back and right now I'm building a new restaurant so I don't have time to be in Jupiter. I do have contacts there however and get very reliable video's on the spot and notes from parents of prospective players. I can not be in two places at one time, LOL, I only get out to games where my travels and jobs take me and most of it has to do in North Carolina, South Carolina, huge Metroplexes, like Dallas, Houston, New York City, Philly, LA, Seattle, Chicago and St. Louis and sometimes Cleveland. I know the Wood Bat tourneys in Florida are a scouts haven!! No DOUBT!! One day I will attend those and personally PG, I will say "HELLO" if I'm there, because I know alot of the PG remarks are not truly from Jerry only!!

My question was to see if a forum could be started here, but if it's going to cause that many problems, I will not start a thread for the upcoming and future drafts and keep my posts to my personal site. I don't charge for my services or for what I write about and If I do help players get a chance at a scholarship or professional baseball, because of something I passed onto a club or school, or what they saw that I wrote, that's fantastic.

I know you have to make a living at what you do PG and I enjoy what you all do. What others post on their blogs and how other competitors are out there charging for their services and copying and pasting, or whatever they are doing, that's their business and you can shout about that, but don't shout about what I do on my own time and money. Life is too short to get all up in arms about starting a forum or just talk about the upcoming drafts.

I'm sorry I brought it all up and will keep the info I find on players on my own site and you can go there too PG and see if I copied and pasted it from your site if you think my integrity is so low as to do such a thing!

Thanks for everyone's kind remarks and discussion on the topic and I'm sorry to have ruffled any feathers, so to speak, if I did, I'm truly sorry to have brought the discussion about the "SCOUT FORUM" thread up!

Take care and find those hidden gems for tomorrows diamonds!!

X

I think this site is for sharing information not promoting players. I can see every parent/scout posting reports on their son.

xmlb scout

understandable to be on the defensive if your innocent.

but maybe you should hang around, contribute a few things. you may find you'll like it here.

we all have to crawl before we walk.