THT draft primer

For loyal THT readers, you may remember the “Breaking Down the 2007 Draft” articles written by Carlos Gomez close to a year ago. In the upcoming weeks, I plan on replicating this series for the 2008 Major League Baseball Draft. Of course, there will be a few slight differences.

Instead of solely analyzing a player’s mechanics, we will expand our analysis to include evaluations on the kind of stuff a pitcher possesses and other attributes that could affect a player’s future.

I also won’t be breaking down some of the highest draft picks (specifically, seven of them) because of the number of excellent scouting reports that have already been created on these players. I will link to them below. But first, lets talk about what to expect going forward.

The series will feature profiles of players take within the first 50 picks (again excluding the seven below). In addition, at my own site (Baseball-Intellect) I will be profiling some of the sleeper prospects in the draft as well as breaking down some of the players drafted outside the top-50.

I will also be compiling a list of 10 – 14 players that the readers wll decide. So please send your requests of players that reside outside the top-50 that you want to see profiled to the e-mail below:

draft.request@gmail.com

Disclaimers

To properly evaluate a player, there must be video that accurately reflects a player’s stuff, swing, mechanics, etc, so I won’t be able to profile players where video is not available to use.

Most of the clips used will come from video provided by the MLB Scouting Bureau. It should be pointed out that my opinions are mostly formed on the small amount of footage the video provides, so there are sample size issues and those issues should be noted.

Now, here are some scouting reports for seven of the top prospects in the draft (listed alphabetically)

Pedro Alvarez

Saber Scouting Report

Gordon Beckham

Baseball-Intellect Report
Dugout Central Scouting Report

Tim Beckham

Baseball Digest Daily Profile
Camden Depot Scouting Report

Aaron Crow

Chris O’Leary Report
Saber Scouting Report

Brian Matusz

Sox Prospects Report
Baseball-Intellect Profile

Buster Posey

College Baseball Prospects Report
Camden Depot Scouting Report
Brewer Fan Scouting Report
College Baseball Blog Report

Justin Smoak

Baseball-Intellect Profile
College Baseball Blog Profile

Expect this series to debut at some point next week. I also remind people to send me requests for players to profile.