Prep Baseball Report

Become a Member

More +

PBR ProCase - Midwest: Quick Hits

July 7, 2021
David Seifert & Tad Slowik
PBR Scouting Staff

On Tuesday, July 6, multiple Prep Baseball Report scouting staffs collaborated to host the PBR ProCase - Midwest event at Triton College in River Grove, IL. This annual invite-only event serves as a kick off to identifying the top prospects in the 2022 draft class along with select 2021 prospects. With the MLB draft moving back into July, this will be one of the first events of the summer that will turn pro scouts' attention directly toward the 2022 class.

Today, we’ll roll out a rapid analysis of standouts from the event in our typical Quick Hits piece. As the week continues, we’ll cycle through multiple other post-event pieces, such as our traditional stat story. We’ll also dive into the data at our disposal from our partners at TrackMan and Blast Motion, so be on the lookout for that as the week rolls on.

Let’s take a look at some standouts from Tuesday’s national event.

POSITION PLAYERS

Ryan Bakes, C, 2023, Huntley (IL)

South Carolina commit. Strong, athletic, compact 5-foot-10, 187-pound frame; durable catcher's body. Good catch and throw guy. Handles glove well behind plate with ability to get strikes for his pitchers. Flexible lower half and first step quickness to get in good position to block balls. Showed many plus throws with good carry. Good release, 1.87-to-2.05 pop times in workout. Plenty of arm to shut down the running game at the ML level. Advanced approach at plate. Short compact swing allows him to barrel up balls consistently. Ball jumps off his bat. Has ability to drive balls to all fields with plus power capabilities. Complete package catcher who can hit for power. With cleanup of defensive fundamentals this kid has all the abilities to be an everyday catcher at the ML level.

Estevan Moreno, 3B, 2022, Montini Catholic (IL)

Notre Dame commit. Long, loose athletic 6-foot-2, 200-pound body resembles Manny Machado. Notre Dame recruit ran the sixty in 6.58 seconds with a long, athletic stride. Easy swing with big leg lift approach. Showed plus juice to left center field in batting practice and got to it during game play with a long home run to straight away left field and another just foul down the line. Longer infield actions with sure hands and good body control. Showed an average pro grade arm at this point, with plus likely in the near future. Moreno profiles as an everyday guy at the Major League level at the hot corner.

PITCHERS

Ashton Izzi, RHP, 2022, Oswego East (IL)

Wichita State commit. Loose, athletic 6-foot-3, 175-pound frame. Live body guy with room to add strength. High ¾ delivery. Fastball sat 91-92, touching 93 mph with late tail and some sink. Ball comes out of hand quick and easy. Slider 78-80 mph with good spin and short tight late break which is deceptive to hitters. Changeup 80-81 mph with good arm speed deception and sink; projects as an out pitch for him. Plenty to project on. Arm speed is good with projected increased velocity. Athleticism gives him the ability to repeat his delivery and throw strikes. Threw some quality FB’s in the zone that got on hitters quickly. Needs to tighten up the slider which should develop into a quality pitch. Potential to have three plus pitches with plus command. Upside to project as a back-end starter at the ML Level.

Braden Risedorph, RHP, 2022, East Noble (IN)

6-foot-3, 235-pound frame. The Parkland College recruit looks the part of power arm and Risedorph delivered power stuff, topping at 94 mph with his heater.  There is effort to his operation, but with short arm action and a simple, repeatable delivery he was able to repeat his delivery and consistently find the zone with three pitches, including a hard 85 mph changeup and low-80s slurve.

Jake Swartz, RHP, 2022, Normal U-High (IL)

Illinois commit. 6-foot-1, 165-pound frame. Athletic live body that will fill out. High ¾ Delivery. Fastball sat 90-91 mph with good sink. Threw quality sinkers in the zone. Ball comes out of his hand quickly. Curveball played at  77-80 mph Good spin on a sharp hard downer plane with quality bite. Will be out pitch at the next level. Deceptive to hitters with hard late action. Changeup 81-82 mph with good arm speed deception and sink. Athleticism helps him repeat delivery and command pitches. Throws quality sinkers in the zone to induce outs. All his pitches change planes which allows him to miss barrels. Quick arm and athleticism to project more velocity on fastball.

Theo Zeidler, RHP, 2022, Bay Port (WI)

Bradley commit. 6-foot-2, 200-pound frame. With advanced pitch ability Zeidler didn’t have the top fastball velocity of the event (87-88) but was certainly the top pitcher. Moving three average to better pitches around the strike zone for consistent strikes, the righty carved hitters with a plus, low-spin (1500s) changeup at 75 mph and an average curveball in the mid-70s. With a quick arm the Bradley commit also has the athletic frame and oozes projection for more velo to come in the future.

RELATED CONTENT

Premium Content Area

This article is only available to PBRPlus Subscribers. If you wish to continue reading this article:

Login to the Subscriptions Website.
To purchase a NEW SUBSCRIPTION, please click here to go to our subscription products page.