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New Episode LIVE now! - At The Yard Podcast

Ventura, Calif. - The Uncommitted Spotlight Series returns as we stare straight ahead towards the 2025 CIF High School baseball rapidly approach for the '25 class as they look to close their high school careers with a bang. With than in mind Prep Baseball California is highlighting some of the top uncommitted class of '25 athletes for college programs to be following come this spring. The player featured today is one of the top players in the state of California and figures prominently in our Class of 2025 Rankings. 

We invite you to get to know them through the eyes of our Prep Baseball California staff of scouts both through our in person looks at players and/or the data-backed numbers collected at our events with our partnered companies. TrackMan, Blast Motion, and VALD Performance provide comparable data to project and evaluate players. All of these systems come together to give a clear picture at what colleges will get when a players steps onto their campus.

Today, we put the spotlight on the #232 ranked player in the 2025 class in NorCal '25 RHP Nicky Rodriguez from River City High School in Sacramento, Ca. Rodriguez was a key arm for the Vikings of River City during his JR. campaign and put together a really strong season. He fronted the rotation with 71.1 IP over 13 appearances and won 9 games against just 3 losses. His underlying numbers were very strong, as well, punching out 82 hitters on the season against 24 walks showing solid present control allowing just 1 HR over the season and posted a 1.96 ERA. In addition, Rodriguez made the trip down this past fall to SoCal to throw for Team California at the 2024 Prep Baseball West Coast Games where he put together a strong showing.

During his outing at the West Coast Games the 6'3 188 lbs. righthander showed a 3 pitch mix that was fronted by a solid present FB working at 85-88 touching 89.9 MPH on the peak side. Rodriguez throws his FB with average spin rates around 2275 RPMs and peaking at 2394 RPMs over his outing showing both ride and run in the movement profile to the arm side. He was in the zone on the FB 65% of the time with a 5'3" release height and 7' of extension. Backing up his FB is a duo of offspeed offerings in his solid SLD and emerging CHG. The SLD comes in at 73-77 MPH reaching at high as 78.5 MPH with a two plane (slurve like) shape inducing -16.1" of glove side horizontal break and -6.5" of vertical depth on the offering at the peak showing fringey control on the day with a 40% in zone rate. His CHG works in the 77-82 MPH range with a firmer shape that gets similar movement to his FB making it a soft contact and bat missing offering. He did throw the CHG in the zone with consistency at 78% over his outing. He shows better feel for the SLD repeating his delivery with a closer release point/extension metric to the FB while the CHG he tended to drop down a bit with shorter extension at release.

Rodriguez looks to have a starters profile with 2 solid offerings and a solid 3rd offering behind it and the feel to throw all 3 for strikes at a solid rate. He adds the frame and solid delivery to profile to handle a starters workload as evidenced by his strong JR. campaign and figured to be the Vikings ace again in 2025. If a move to the bullpen is needed at the next level Rodriguez has leverage relief potential and could see a bump up in life on his offerings over shorter outings.

College coaches and fans be sure to click on Rodriguez's profile to see full video and information.