re: 10 Total Baseball Commits for 24&25 seasons from Louisiana.

quote:

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The real problem is these guys tend to take 3-5 years to make a real impact.

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Not always. I can list numerous non-mlb prospects (out of HS) that played and contributed quickly:

Mason Katz
Antoine Duplantis
Mikie Mahtook
Matty Ott
Mark Laird
Andrew Stevenson
Zach Watson
Josh Smith
Austin Nola

All of these guys are Louisiana born and contributed in their freshman and/or sophomore years. None of these guys (to my knowledge) were real MLB risks coming out of HS either. These were "under the radar" guys that might not get a spot in a Jay Johnson class. Instead of taking Zach Watson, we will take some kid from Kansas.

I am not saying that we shouldn't take national prospects either, I am saying though that there are good college ball players in this state and we should be filling out the bottom of our class with these guys.

The other issue is the "Beth Torina" issue and I am speculating here because I don't know that its true for Jay at this point BUT it seems like the national recruits get more a shot a playing than the under the radar guys. Brady Neal is a great example. Its clear to everyone that Milazzo is the better catcher but Neal still plays as much, if not more than Milazzo when healthy. I get that Neal has a higher ceiling but he is not there yet. Is the decision to play him coming from the fact that Jay wants to be able to show the next national recruit that they will play if they come to BR? In the outfield, there is zero reason the Zeb Ruddell shouldn't have gotten at least a crack at one of the spots. It just seems like the higher recruited guys have a longer leash than the local, lesser recruited guys.

In the same vein, Jake Brown started opening day and Josh Pearson has gotten every opportunity despite being average so maybe I am being overly sensitive to that point. But it is something that I have noticed.