[SPEAKER_01]: Hey everybody, JJ Cooper, Jeff Ponce and as a full time baseball American play, I'm proud to say I'm happy to say Ian Kunderl, I'm the show, first time as a B.A.

[SPEAKER_01]: Staffer and we are going to talk all about prospects today.

[SPEAKER_01]: We're going to talk about big league prospects, our top three prospects,

[SPEAKER_01]: On the top 100 right now, they have a graduate yet, or on the big leagues, that's Connor Griffin, that's Kevin Maghannacle, that's JJ weatherhole, but they're not the only ones.

[SPEAKER_01]: It is a loaded rookie class, but we also obviously are not going to ignore the minors because we have James tips and other players having monster first weeks of the viral exseason.

[SPEAKER_01]: We're going to touch on a lot of it.

[SPEAKER_01]: We also want to touch on whatever you want to talk about.

[SPEAKER_01]: Feel free to share questions.

[SPEAKER_01]: We love entering your questions.

[SPEAKER_01]: If you put those in the YouTube chat, we try to get to those.

[SPEAKER_01]: But we also do want to remind you, speaking of YouTube, that all the prospect profiles are now live at Baseball America's YouTube channel.

[SPEAKER_01]: And you can check out our looks at the number one prospect in each and every major league baseball organization.

[SPEAKER_01]: There's a lot there.

[SPEAKER_01]: So let's go to the first move.

[SPEAKER_01]: Kind of griffes us up.

[SPEAKER_01]: Magadogal's been up since day one.

[SPEAKER_01]: Weatherhold's been up since day one.

[SPEAKER_01]: South Stewart, Justin Crawford, Baba Chan, LaRouquette, Nolan McClain, we could keep going.

[SPEAKER_01]: There's a long list of guys.

[SPEAKER_01]: But we had a question we wanted to kind of start with.

[SPEAKER_01]: Conrad Griffin came up obviously over the weekend.

[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, he's had kind of that highlight moment in the debut to have some good plays defensively.

[SPEAKER_01]: It hasn't been the loudest start to Connor Griffin's a, you know, big league career.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's okay.

[SPEAKER_01]: He's a teenager still.

[SPEAKER_01]: He's the first teenager position player since 1, so to in 2018.

[SPEAKER_01]: But the question I kind of want to start with here, and then we'll kind of look at all three of them, but start with you Jeff.

[SPEAKER_01]: not we we obviously think that Connor Griffin's going to have the best long-term career.

[SPEAKER_01]: He is younger, significantly younger than any other of these prospects were up in the big leagues.

[SPEAKER_01]: But if you're talking about the 2026 season and you say, okay, seasons over who's going to have to have the best season?

[SPEAKER_01]: Is it Griffin?

[SPEAKER_01]: Is it mechanical?

[SPEAKER_01]: Is it weather whole?

[SPEAKER_01]: And I'll let you also go wild card.

[SPEAKER_01]: If you want to make an argument for South Stewart or Carter Jensen or someone else feel free.

[SPEAKER_01]: But who are Carson Bench?

[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, you know, I think it's I think I would probably go with with Kevin McGonagall.

[SPEAKER_04]: Um, I just think in terms of being MLB ready as a hitter, um,

[SPEAKER_04]: it's there.

[SPEAKER_04]: And that's certainly not to say that I don't think it's there with Griffin.

[SPEAKER_04]: It's been a few games and, you know, I think the underlying stuff has been fine and he's in notoriously slow-started.

[SPEAKER_04]: We saw that last year where he struck out four times in his first game and then never did that again for the rest of the season.

[SPEAKER_04]: So it takes some time to adjust.

[SPEAKER_04]: He's obviously very young, huge expectations.

[SPEAKER_04]: But, you know, I think I would bet on

[SPEAKER_04]: of the bat that I think it's a plus majorly bat already, probably was at the end of last season, was a guy that, you know, if it was a, you know, break glass in case of emergency situation in the playoffs, McGonagal could've, you know, joined that line up, and I think given them some really quality at bats and maybe even some highlights.

[SPEAKER_04]: But we talked about it in the off season, we broke in him down a bunch over the last year.

[SPEAKER_04]: He passes the I test number one,

[SPEAKER_04]: In person, he's not physically imposing, but just how quick the bat is, how easily he adjusts to different locations and pitch types.

[SPEAKER_04]: And that shows up in the data, the data backs the eye test as well as anybody.

[SPEAKER_04]: Maybe he's not the defender that whether a halt is, if whether a halt I think is maybe the dark horse to potentially actually have like the highest more season.

[SPEAKER_04]: some of that is because of how good of a defender he is.

[SPEAKER_04]: I think he's and maybe not an equal defender long-term biconographin, but maybe right now probably is.

[SPEAKER_04]: He's really polished.

[SPEAKER_04]: I think that part of his game gets a little bit undersold.

[SPEAKER_04]: But when I look at the lineup, I look at the home park and just the type of hitter, mygonical is versus whether I'm going to lean mygonical a little bit.

[SPEAKER_04]: But I think there's a case for all of him JJ.

[SPEAKER_01]: What about you Ian?

[SPEAKER_02]: I also would have taken McGonagall, but I'm actually going to go off the board from the top three.

[SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to go just if we're talking about pure offensive impact and ability this here, I think it's south steward.

[SPEAKER_02]: He's off through a great start and sits an atty.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's a great ballpark to hit in and you look at his underlying data, he hits the ball extremely hard.

[SPEAKER_02]: He's got a good approach strikeout rate so far this year.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's only a 42 plate of here in sample, but it's just above 14% takes walks.

[SPEAKER_02]: Like, I think that his pure hitting ability is just going, it's more polished.

[SPEAKER_02]: I would say he's obviously older a little bit than some of these other guys too.

[SPEAKER_02]: But I just think that he's going to end up when we look back at the end of the year.

[SPEAKER_02]: I don't think he'll produce the highest work as the defensive impact's not going to be there, especially as a first baseman who

[SPEAKER_02]: is just work a progress over there, I would say, but just in terms of pure offensive ability, I think South Stewart has a very good case in this rookie class.

[SPEAKER_01]: I think that's a good one.

[SPEAKER_01]: I think the reds were also very smart.

[SPEAKER_01]: They basically moved him across the diamond.

[SPEAKER_01]: He's throughout his minor league career.

[SPEAKER_01]: He played second.

[SPEAKER_01]: He played third.

[SPEAKER_01]: He's been really stretched at both of those.

[SPEAKER_01]: He really doesn't have the arm for third base.

[SPEAKER_01]: Move him to first base and say, here you go,

[SPEAKER_01]: by letting him do what he does best.

[SPEAKER_01]: It's really kind of given a big boost to a arresting that really just needed a kind of a professional hitter.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's the thing that stands out about you mentioned about it, mechanical, Jeff, like these are mechanical and weather hold.

[SPEAKER_01]: Or I think right now, among the better pure hitters in the big leagues as rookies, mechanical grinds out at bats, that are like the at bats of a 10-year major league veteran.

[SPEAKER_01]: But I do want us to also say like with Connor Griffin,

[SPEAKER_01]: I don't think any of this is us saying like I think that Connor Griffin being up makes a whole lot of sense, and you can look at his batting average ago, oh no, he's not ready or whatever, and I would point out to that that Josh Nailer is hitting 114 right now, and no one's saying that Josh Nailer is not ready, Josh Nailer was ready last year and was a key player for the Mariners and the playoffs, but you can have a bad stretch.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's that's okay.

[SPEAKER_01]: The thing that Griffin is going to do that Jeff kind of talked about here is,

[SPEAKER_01]: you would expect him just to keep getting better.

[SPEAKER_01]: And there are lessons that will be learned in the major league, so he probably wouldn't get if he sent him back to triple A for a while.

[SPEAKER_01]: He's already providing better defense.

[SPEAKER_01]: They didn't have a true shortstop on the team.

[SPEAKER_01]: Connor Griffin is that.

[SPEAKER_01]: Although even there, it is worth remembering that he was kind of splitting his time between centerfield and shortstop.

[SPEAKER_01]: much of last year, especially early last year.

[SPEAKER_01]: So there will even be a little bit of a learning curve as a short stop, but the other part of this is, and this is what I do think kind of lead to long-term greatness is when you look at what age he is.

[SPEAKER_01]: Teenagers don't play in the major leagues, but think we have a piece up at baseball America right now.

[SPEAKER_01]: And it's looking at the youngest players across the miners.

[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, this is the stat that just jumped out to me more than any of this is is that okay.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yes, he is a teenager.

[SPEAKER_01]: He's still not turned 20s 19 and he's in the big leagues

[SPEAKER_01]: If you sent him down to the low A Florida State League, which is where he started last year, but if you sent him down to the Florida State League, he would be among the 20 youngest players in the FSL at the start of the season.

[SPEAKER_01]: Now, there's low A, high A, double A, triple A, and then the major leagues.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's how young he is.

[SPEAKER_01]: And that's where I would say that even if there are some bumps in the road this season, you have to remember.

[SPEAKER_01]: He's doing this two, three, four years younger than most players who reached the major five years in some cases.

[SPEAKER_01]: And the thing about that is that

[SPEAKER_01]: you can just keep stacking growth and development.

[SPEAKER_01]: Because this is the age at which players are exponentially developing and growing.

[SPEAKER_01]: And he's doing that in the big leagues when most players are doing that.

[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, when we talk about, we love Rock Chalowski.

[SPEAKER_01]: We talk about Rock Chalowski.

[SPEAKER_01]: Rock Chalowski is a good bit older than Connor Griffin.

[SPEAKER_01]: And he's still a ways away from being drafted.

[SPEAKER_01]: So, do remember, your college drafts are generally around 21.

[SPEAKER_01]: around, you know, right, but you know, a little younger than 21 or 21 or older, it's pretty amazing.

[SPEAKER_01]: We talked about weather halt.

[SPEAKER_01]: The other way I was point out is this Carter Jensen already homework again today.

[SPEAKER_01]: We are seeing in the, you know, if you talk about the AL rookie of the year race, I think we could have some fun in the AL central issue with the Maganical Carter Jensen battle potential.

[SPEAKER_01]: And there's a lot of other guys there too.

[SPEAKER_01]: Anyone else before we move on, any other rookies that have really caught your eyes so far.

[SPEAKER_01]: Jeff, I'll start with you.

[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I know I think this is probably a little bit of a technicality because he's not prospect eligible, but I think more a commie has been kind of what we thought he would be, right?

[SPEAKER_04]: Like we've seen the power, we've seen a lot of strikeouts, it's lower batting average, but it's a 353 ISO right now, very small sample size.

[SPEAKER_04]: He's getting on base at a high clip.

[SPEAKER_04]: more on the positive side of what we had anticipated and if that badting average comes up a little bit, let's strike out, let's go down.

[SPEAKER_04]: The white socks are a much more watchable team than I think we would have thought they would be six months ago.

[SPEAKER_01]: So, who knows through that?

[SPEAKER_01]: What about you, Ian?

[SPEAKER_01]: Any other rookies who really stand out?

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I'm really surprised, Jeff, didn't pick this person.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's Chase the Later, who got off to that really strong start, obviously home-oriented and what was it?

[SPEAKER_02]: Three or four?

[SPEAKER_02]: I think it was about four consecutive games.

[SPEAKER_02]: Um, you're you're rookie home run leader right now with five.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I was just about to say that yeah, he's leading leading rookie some home runs and I think what makes him exciting is just his swing is just very unique the way he cuts it off and just it looks so effortless when he Homers and his ability to turn on the ball he's someone who I know we've liked for a long time.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's just health has always been the question with him and

[SPEAKER_02]: Now, you know, it's at the point where when he fouls a ball even off his leg, it's like, oh, no, like, what could go wrong here?

[SPEAKER_02]: But so far, he stayed healthy and it's been really exciting.

[SPEAKER_02]: He's been a really big boost to that Guardian's lineup.

[SPEAKER_02]: So I think he's you're talking about a loaded Ailes central rookie class.

[SPEAKER_02]: I don't think you can talk about those other two without mentioning him in there.

[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, I'm going to go really deep cut.

[SPEAKER_01]: I just want to say we see you TJ Rumfield, the Rock These First Basemen, who I just want to point this out because I don't think that TJ Rumfield is going to keep hitting 360 like he is right now.

[SPEAKER_01]: But this is where the new Rockies regime can do the quality to be deep pedestrian regime can do their best work, which is we have talked about, we have complained about the amount

[SPEAKER_01]: not just bad performing players that the rocket had in the majors, but players who really do like drag you down.

[SPEAKER_01]: And especially first space, they have been kind of this never-inning turn of, you know, Michael Toglia was a not just a zero or he was a negative war player last year.

[SPEAKER_01]: They've had a number of these.

[SPEAKER_01]: This is the kind of move.

[SPEAKER_01]: The, hey, we don't, we think that the Yankees are kind of stacked at first base.

[SPEAKER_01]: We can get TJ Romfield for dirt cheap.

[SPEAKER_01]: These are the kind of moves that the Rockies should be making because these are the kind of moves that give them a chance to basically

[SPEAKER_01]: Just raise the floor.

[SPEAKER_01]: It's not, yes, the Rockies are not going to be a team that is able to raise the ceiling of their players.

[SPEAKER_01]: They don't have a whole lot of star players.

[SPEAKER_01]: But what you can do, when we see the white socks do this a little bit too, if you can just stop playing players who are going to basically be negative one and a half, negative two war players, it makes a big difference.

[SPEAKER_01]: We're gonna take a quick break

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[SPEAKER_01]: looking at some of the top performers.

[SPEAKER_01]: Before we get there, I'd actually want to start with something.

[SPEAKER_01]: We just talked about the fact that Griffin, McGonagall, Weatherhold.

[SPEAKER_01]: That is our top three prospects on the baseball America top 100.

[SPEAKER_01]: They are all going to graduate before too long.

[SPEAKER_01]: We are looking at probably May 10th for McGonagall and Weatherhold, if they don't hit that bass before then, they'll hit service time then.

[SPEAKER_01]: Kind of Griffin, not that long, a week basically after that.

[SPEAKER_01]: So,

[SPEAKER_01]: This is a question with, I think, a pretty clear answer, but Ian, who are we thinking will be our number one prospect when those three graduate?

[SPEAKER_01]: Is there, is there a big debate?

[SPEAKER_02]: I don't really think it's going to be a big debate.

[SPEAKER_02]: I think it's going to be Haseo's mod A, who's off to a very strong start in AA as one of the youngest players in that league.

[SPEAKER_02]: We were talking about how young Connor Griffin is for his league.

[SPEAKER_02]: Haseo's mod A is right up there with him.

[SPEAKER_02]: You know, he checks all the boxes.

[SPEAKER_02]: We saw him a lot in spring training.

[SPEAKER_02]: The date is there, the age is there.

[SPEAKER_02]: And we've seen Milwaukee's been aggressive with their prospects too.

[SPEAKER_02]: So I think he's someone that if he continues to perform like he is, might get up to AAA and relatively short order.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I think that he's just he has that combination of tools up the middle potential that you look for in a number one prospect.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I think almost by default he's going to be there because

[SPEAKER_02]: it's it's so going to be so quick in the season.

[SPEAKER_02]: I don't think you can take away enough from anyone that much further down the list.

[SPEAKER_02]: So it's a very limited number.

[SPEAKER_02]: I think that would be a consideration.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I think by default, it's just going to have to be him.

[SPEAKER_01]: I would say Jeff, it's not just by default.

[SPEAKER_01]: It will be by total and complete acclamation as well.

[SPEAKER_01]: Because mod A, again, the other fun.

[SPEAKER_01]: The fun stuff we have kind of Griffin, I've got a more fun version of that with mod A. mod A is 18 point.

[SPEAKER_01]: Nine, 18.89 years old, if you use decimals for his age, I do that because I was working on this in a spreadsheet.

[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.

[SPEAKER_01]: That makes him the not just the youngest player in AA by far.

[SPEAKER_01]: Leo de Vries and Ethan Sals are the only two other teenagers in AA.

[SPEAKER_01]: That would make him the youngest player in basically all three high-a leagues, so a level below him.

[SPEAKER_01]: And then, if you said, well, what about a few is in low-a?

[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus' mod A would be one of the four youngest players in the Florida State League.

[SPEAKER_01]: and he's in double A and he's the 17th youngest player in the full season miners and he's playing in double A and like Ian said now he's already had a four hit game the other part of this is as I think that we have to also acknowledge is he's a switch hitter usually switch hitters it takes a little bit longer you've got two swings this guy's a switch hitter that four hit game he had on Sunday

[SPEAKER_01]: Left side, single, single.

[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, lefty's in, I'll flip over the right side.

[SPEAKER_01]: Home run, oh, now I rise back in left side.

[SPEAKER_01]: You know, another single, four hits.

[SPEAKER_01]: Jeff, win mod a gets to that level.

[SPEAKER_01]: We talked about Connor Griffin last year and what he kind of met as a number one.

[SPEAKER_01]: He was not just a number one prospect.

[SPEAKER_01]: He was one of those kind of that special tier of, oh no, this is not someone has to rank number one.

[SPEAKER_01]: Is it fair to say that mod A may fit in that grouping as well before the season gets too old?

[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I think so.

[SPEAKER_04]: I actually think, you know, this is probably the error parent for the newborn prospect and baseball because that top three more than likely knock on wood is probably going to graduate over the next couple of months.

[SPEAKER_04]: Um, you know, once that trio was gone, body slides in, um, you know, very easily.

[SPEAKER_04]: And I think when you look at Hazard's body, the quality of the baths, it's beyond just contact having power, having tools.

[SPEAKER_04]: He grinds out at bats from both sides of the plate.

[SPEAKER_04]: He's a tough out.

[SPEAKER_04]: He makes pictures work.

[SPEAKER_04]: He gets deep into counts.

[SPEAKER_04]: And he punishes mistakes.

[SPEAKER_04]: And I just think, like, you see hitters like this that are doing that at such a young age and doing it against more will be an older, more advanced pitching.

[SPEAKER_04]: And you see it in AA at, you know, as a teenager, it's just so rare.

[SPEAKER_04]: This is a guy that wouldn't shock me if he's in the big leagues.

[SPEAKER_04]: Maybe not the end of this year, because I don't think there's any reason to kind of push him that aggressively, unless he really, really kind of pushes the envelope.

[SPEAKER_04]: More than likely, this is a guy that could break camp with a brewer's next year and could be in the middle of that in field, whether it's second, whether it's short, whether it's third base for a really long time.

[SPEAKER_04]: And could be another potential franchise level prospect that they're developing.

[SPEAKER_04]: And, you know, guys like Modet and Jerio simply don't come around all that often in any organization, but two within four or five years is.

[SPEAKER_04]: pretty outstanding.

[SPEAKER_04]: You just, you don't see that.

[SPEAKER_04]: So I think you're talking about, you know, a true number one caliber type of a prospect, and he's only gone out this spring and further kind of cement to himself and answered some of those questions already, adding some mass onto the frame, think there's more power to come even, especially as the angles from both sides of the plate, kind of get fixed.

[SPEAKER_04]: They're still stuff to improve here, and he's as good as he is, as young as he is.

[SPEAKER_04]: I think that's pretty exciting.

[SPEAKER_01]: I kind of lasted before I move on on that.

[SPEAKER_01]: You said he's gotten bigger, he's added muscle.

[SPEAKER_01]: I do think that there's a chance that this makes it even more likely that we're talking about a third basement in the long term.

[SPEAKER_01]: Is that what, you know, I think I've seen a agreement from both of you all as well.

[SPEAKER_01]: Like he, I'm not saying you can't play short stuff, but when you look at,

[SPEAKER_01]: what the brewers do as hard as they value value defense.

[SPEAKER_01]: And by the way, they value versatility.

[SPEAKER_01]: They like to have short stops playing everywhere.

[SPEAKER_01]: Bryce Tarang would be a short stop for a whole lot of teams.

[SPEAKER_01]: He's their second basement.

[SPEAKER_01]: They just signed Cooper Pratt to a long-term extension.

[SPEAKER_01]: If you said, what is Cooper Pratt's best asset?

[SPEAKER_01]: I would say, yes, I'm really good hitting ability, but it's his defense.

[SPEAKER_01]: And especially with Cooper Pratt being sign-long term,

[SPEAKER_01]: I think that this makes my day more likely, if you say, well, where is he gonna fit?

[SPEAKER_01]: This is your third basement of the future and the not too distant future.

[SPEAKER_01]: And by the way, watch out when he gets there, but we also want to take a look at the best performers across the minor leagues.

[SPEAKER_01]: And it is time for our look at the top performers of the minor's, which is presented by Game Changer, more on Game Changer in a moment.

[SPEAKER_01]: We had the first hot sheet of the year and James Tibs III,

[SPEAKER_01]: Dodgers outfielder, the well-traveled Dodgers outfielder, he was a first-round pick of the giants, not that long ago.

[SPEAKER_01]: Just two years ago, 2024, he was already traded to the Red Sox, and then already traded from the Red Sox to the Dodgers.

[SPEAKER_01]: Jeff, have the Dodgers done it again.

[SPEAKER_04]: Potentially, and I think it's kind of, it's kind of funny that

[SPEAKER_04]: they're going to indirectly kind of snake bite the giants their chief rival will also kind of pull in one over on the red socks again which is obviously something that

[SPEAKER_04]: they did, you know, five or six years ago in that mooky bedstrad, since they won three world series, since that trade has taken place.

[SPEAKER_04]: So I think you've got a couple of fan bases here that are just really sick and tired of the Dodgers.

[SPEAKER_04]: So yeah, I mean, I think it's possible.

[SPEAKER_04]: I don't want to get too far ahead of myself.

[SPEAKER_04]: But I think it was more surprising the player that we saw as a giant and as a red sock

[SPEAKER_04]: few weeks.

[SPEAKER_04]: Then the guy that we've seen with the Dodgers.

[SPEAKER_04]: This was one of the top hitters in college baseball.

[SPEAKER_04]: He was drafted in a really talented draft class near the top of that draft.

[SPEAKER_04]: because of his blend of bat's ability, strong swing decisions and on base ability and power at pretty good angles.

[SPEAKER_04]: He was one of the better power hitters in the cape.

[SPEAKER_04]: So I know that he can hit with wood bats as well.

[SPEAKER_04]: So I think that struggle was a little bit surprising.

[SPEAKER_04]: Him landing with the Dodgers, them sort of figuring out what was wrong in terms of the angles, timing that sort of thing very quickly, because he performed at the end of the last year too.

[SPEAKER_04]: It's not a huge shock.

[SPEAKER_04]: I also don't think this guy is chased a lot or

[SPEAKER_01]: I see that customer, the GM question, wonder if James tips is gonna need to be traded again in order to get playing time in the bigs this year?

[SPEAKER_01]: No room in LA right now.

[SPEAKER_01]: You're right, you're not wrong.

[SPEAKER_01]: You are not wrong when you say that.

[SPEAKER_01]: And James worries, sounds like they've got good souts, you know what they're doing.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yes, by the way, the Dodgers have one of the, the Dodgers have one of the largest everything.

[SPEAKER_01]: They have one of the largest analytics departments are indeed departments.

[SPEAKER_01]: They have among the most scouts.

[SPEAKER_01]: You cannot turn around without running into a Dodger scout.

[SPEAKER_01]: They scout in numbers as well.

[SPEAKER_01]: They do it all very well.

[SPEAKER_01]: I do think Tibbs actually is going to it's going to be hard to figure out where he fits in.

[SPEAKER_01]: He's the first spaceman corner out builder.

[SPEAKER_01]: They're kind of good.

[SPEAKER_01]: They're especially one spooky.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's gets back.

[SPEAKER_01]: But Ian, we don't want to just focus on Tibbs.

[SPEAKER_01]: Who is your favorite prospect for horns or standout prospect performance of the first week of the season?

[SPEAKER_02]: There were a lot of great performances, but I think one that really caught my eye because it was kind of an extension of what we saw both in the WBC and in spring training was white socks outfield there same intonacci he went out was nine for twenty six with triple a Charlotte he had two home runs and eight walks Three strikeouts and four stolen bases so doing a little bit of everything and I think the thing that really stood out with me was the impact the two home runs one of them came off Brody Hopkins who's one of the top right hand in pictures and minor league baseball

[SPEAKER_02]: really nasty stuff.

[SPEAKER_02]: You know, you're talking 70 fastball, a couple of plus second areas.

[SPEAKER_02]: And Ants and Otchi took him out deep to right field.

[SPEAKER_02]: And he 105.1 EV on that.

[SPEAKER_02]: And the thing with him last year was the approach was really good.

[SPEAKER_02]: The contact skills were there.

[SPEAKER_02]: The EVs were okay, but they were nothing to stand out.

[SPEAKER_02]: His 90th percentile eggs of velocity so far this year and it is a small sample but is up several miles an hour and if he can continue to impact the baseball without trading off any swing decisions or contactability which so far in the first week he has I mean as I said he ate walks and three strikeouts comes a really interesting piece for this white socks team that has Jeff mentioned earlier is kind of a fun watch and they've kind of he seems like he's playing mostly outfield too which when you look in their outfield there's plenty of room for him to come up at some point and make a difference on that team and

[SPEAKER_02]: I think that's not worthy, because this is a guy who's played a lot of infield in the past, and so far this year I believe he has one game on the infield in the rest of the outfield.

[SPEAKER_02]: So, seems like the white socks see similar things and are getting him prepared for a call.

[SPEAKER_02]: Might not be, you know, this month, but I would be very surprised if we don't see him up in the major leagues at some point this year.

[SPEAKER_01]: Right.

[SPEAKER_01]: We don't want to over-react a small samples, but at the same time, 9-gift EV is something that generally stabilizes relatively quickly.

[SPEAKER_01]: I think if I remember correctly from the studies on it, we're not there yet.

[SPEAKER_01]: We're not to the number of battle ball events, but it is something where there's a likelihood that that may be real and not just a little bit of a fluke of the ways on the first week.

[SPEAKER_01]: So that was our look at the top performance prospect performance of the week, which was presented by GameChanger.

[SPEAKER_01]: The number one use sports app that helps you coach smarter, connect live, and replay the action.

[SPEAKER_01]: Learn more at gc.com

[SPEAKER_01]: And we're going to head to the final sprint, a quick final sprint, but we don't want to forget also about something pretty remarkable that's happening, which is UCLA is our number one team on our college top 25 again this week.

[SPEAKER_01]: And we bring that up this week because they just had their biggest, their likely biggest test of the remainder of the regular season, they face Southern Cal.

[SPEAKER_01]: match up of two top 25 teams and they swept that series, which means now 23 straight wins for UCLA.

[SPEAKER_01]: Jeff, when you look at this, at this point, having cleared that hurdle, UCLA could, is there a chance at UCLA?

[SPEAKER_01]: Well, I'm not going to talk about Omaha, yet, but regular season.

[SPEAKER_01]: What do you think the likelihood is that UCLA could be our number one team basically pull to pull from the start of the season to the end of the regular season,

[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I mean, barring a, there's still a few weeks left in the season, right.

[SPEAKER_04]: Looking at who's behind them, how strong the ACC honestly is this year, especially up at the top and some of these teams have series against each other.

[SPEAKER_04]: Some of the schedule that that Texas and Georgia have down the stretch now, where there's some.

[SPEAKER_04]: some head-to-head matchups with other top 25 teams in the SEC.

[SPEAKER_04]: I think you kind of look at that big 10 schedule.

[SPEAKER_04]: The gauntlet for UCLA is already passed.

[SPEAKER_04]: I would be shocked.

[SPEAKER_04]: I don't want to say 100% because that's goofy to say.

[SPEAKER_04]: But I really would be shocked if it's not 90%.

[SPEAKER_04]: And I think Jacob will probably back me up on this.

[SPEAKER_04]: It's the best team in the country.

[SPEAKER_04]: They've played like the best team in the country from wire to wire so far, each week, they're getting good pitching performances.

[SPEAKER_04]: They're a really strong defensive team.

[SPEAKER_04]: They can kind of play that SEC style of baseball if you want to slug with them.

[SPEAKER_04]: They can play some small balls, some West Coast baseball.

[SPEAKER_04]: So really any kind of game you want to play with them, they can play that game with you and they can beat you with that.

[SPEAKER_04]: And I think that's really the sign of good teams in any sport where it's baseball, football, basketball.

[SPEAKER_04]: and be really, really versatile.

[SPEAKER_04]: And I think that's what makes UCLA so unique is that they have the starters, they have some firepower, random and other guys that are coming out of the bullpen that can match any SEC school pound for pounds and they could slug with them, they got the defense, they got the hitting ability.

[SPEAKER_04]: Kind of check all the boxes.

[SPEAKER_01]: I will point out, so they have coming up.

[SPEAKER_01]: They have rockers this weekend, I'm coming up, then Minnesota next weekend, Sacramento State, Michigan State, they do have Oregon,

[SPEAKER_01]: and then Washington.

[SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, Oregon is the one I would say left there where you're like, okay, that's a little bit- That's the tournament team.

[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's a dangerous one.

[SPEAKER_01]: But the rest of that, it would be hard to say that, yes, anyone could trip up.

[SPEAKER_01]: It's rare you have a team that has a flawless, basically weekends every week.

[SPEAKER_01]: But,

[SPEAKER_04]: But even even like a weekend loss to like if they they lost two games to Oregon I don't know if that's enough to sink them just simply because of like what we're looking at for these final Six weeks seven weeks in the terms that got later in the SEC and in the ACC and they're playing

[SPEAKER_04]: A lot of the top teams are playing each other and I think that's going to probably, you know, lend itself to more losses, some drop weekends.

[SPEAKER_04]: So I think UCLA might have even bought themselves enough leeway that if they drop a weekend, it may not drop them out of that top spot.

[SPEAKER_01]: Well, we appreciate it, and thank you for joining us this week on the baseball America Hot Sheet Show.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's Jeff Ponds.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's Ian Kunder.

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[SPEAKER_01]: I'm JJ.

[SPEAKER_01]: So long, everybody.