David Hale

A premium athlete with a prototype pitcher's frame (6-foot-2, 195 pounds) and a lightning-quick arm, Hale has split time between pitching and playing center field in three years at Princeton, and many scouts believe he could take off once he starts concentrating on pitching full-time in pro ball. The biggest knock on Hale is that he has never dominated in the Ivy League--he went 2-3, 4.43 with 47 strikeouts and 24 walks in 41 innings this spring--or in the Cape Cod League, but his power stuff is undeniable. Hale helped himself considerably in his final outing of the season in front of a bevy of scouts, holding his 92-93 mph fastball velocity into the sixth inning and regularly reaching 95-96. He has topped out at 97 this year and pitches with minimal effort, but some scouts say his fastball is flat and easy to pick up. At times he'll flash a plus slider in the 84-86 range, reaching 88, but other times the pitch is sweeping and he struggled to command it. Hale still needs to learn to command his stuff in the strike zone, and questions about his ability to do so lead many scouts to project him as a reliever, though he'll show some feel for a changeup every once in a while.