For MLB Draft Prospects, Spring Season Performance Is Critical
Image credit: (Photo by Eddie Kelly / ProLook Photos)
A quick glance at the 2020 draft class goes a long way in highlighting the importance of a complete spring season for amateur players. In our redraft of the class five years after the fact, not a single top pre-draft 10 player in the class went top 10 in hindsight.
Yes, every baseball draft is a bit of a crapshoot at some level, but that sort of miss rate seems indicative of the unusual conditions of a 2020 covid season that ended after just four weeks of Division I baseball.
You don’t need a global pandemic to illustrate the movement that happens on draft boards over the course of a spring season, however. As we draw closer to the start of college and high school play, it’s probably worth emphasizing just how much players can move on draft boards in five months.
A look at the 2024 draft class is instructive. Below are the top 30 players from the 2024 class with preseason February 1 top 200 rankings included:
| player | position | school | final rank | february rank | movement | drafted |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Charlie Condon | OF | Georgia | 1 | 8 | 7 | 3 |
| Travis Bazzana | 2B | Oregon State | 2 | 3 | 1 | 1 |
| JJ Wetherholt | SS | West Virginia | 3 | 1 | -2 | 7 |
| Chase Burns | RHP | Wake Forest | 4 | 15 | 11 | 2 |
| Jac Caglianone | 1B/LHP | Florida | 5 | 4 | -1 | 6 |
| Hagen Smith | LHP | Arkansas | 6 | 16 | 10 | 5 |
| Braden Montgomery | OF | Texas A&M | 7 | 9 | 2 | 12 |
| Nick Kurtz | 1B | Wake Forest | 8 | 2 | -6 | 4 |
| Konnor Griffin | OF/SS | Jackson Prep, Flowood, Miss. | 9 | 11 | 2 | 9 |
| Bryce Rainer | SS/RHP | Harvard-Westlake HS, Studio City, Calif. | 10 | 19 | 9 | 11 |
| Trey Yesavage | RHP | ECU | 11 | 48 | 37 | 20 |
| Christian Moore | 2B | Tennessee | 12 | 78 | 66 | 8 |
| Vance Honeycutt | OF | North Carolina | 13 | 6 | -7 | 22 |
| James Tibbs III | 1B/OF | Florida State | 14 | 109 | 95 | 13 |
| Carson Benge | OF/RHP | Oklahoma State | 15 | 60 | 45 | 19 |
| Cam Smith | 3B | Florida State | 16 | 32 | 16 | 14 |
| Seaver King | SS/OF | Wake Forest | 17 | 7 | -10 | 10 |
| Caleb Lomavita | C | California | 18 | 21 | 3 | 39 |
| Slade Caldwell | OF | Valley View HS, Jonesboro, Ark. | 19 | 39 | 20 | 29 |
| Walker Janek | C | Sam Houston State | 20 | 86 | 66 | 28 |
| Cam Caminiti | LHP | Saguaro HS, Scottsdale, Ariz. | 21 | 17 | -4 | 24 |
| William Schmidt | RHP | Catholic HS, Baton Rouge, La. | 22 | 43 | 21 | N/A |
| Theo Gillen | SS | Westlake HS, Austin, Tex. | 23 | 75 | 52 | 18 |
| Jurrangelo Cijntje | SHP | Mississippi State | 24 | 138 | 114 | 15 |
| Kash Mayfield | LHP | Elk City (Okla.) HS | 25 | NR | 176+ | 25 |
| Ryan Sloan | RHP | York HS, Elmhurst, Ill. | 26 | 88 | 62 | 55 |
| Kellon Lindsey | SS/OF | Hardee HS, Wauchula, Fla. | 27 | NR | 174+ | 23 |
| Brody Brecht | RHP | Iowa | 28 | 25 | -3 | 38 |
| Billy Amick | 3B | Tennessee | 29 | 63 | 34 | 60 |
| Tommy White | 3B | LSU | 30 | 10 | -20 | 40 |
Among the final top 30 ranked players, nearly half (13) started the year on our preseason top 200 outside of the first round. Another six were outside of top-two rounds consideration, while two college players didn’t rank inside the top 100 (Jurrangelo Cijntje and James Tibbs III). Two pop-up high school players didn’t rank at all on the top 200 list (Kellon Lindsey and Kash Mayfield).
Some players are ranked low simply because we enter the season too light on them. Others use their draft season to make legitimate improvements to their tools or skills.
- Christian Moore cut his strikeout rate from 24-25% to 14.5% in his draft year and jumped 78 rankings to earn a top 10 selection in the draft.
- Kash Mayfield went from a command-over-stuff prep lefty who topped out around 91 mph to a pitcher with that same command profile who now sat in the low 90s and touched 97. He went from unranked to being a first-round pick.
- Kellon Lindsey was an under-the-radar, two-sport athlete who showed significant progress on both sides of the ball early in the spring in Florida to boost himself into the first round.
- Jurrangelo Cijntje was always a fascinating switch pitcher, but in 2024 he added power and command from the right side, lowered his ERA from 8.10 to 3.67 and cut his walk rate from 14.3% to 7.9%. He wound up being the third pitcher drafted.
- Even Charlie Condon—who we probably had too light entering the year—showed better athleticism to go with his excellent hit/power combination during his draft year to push him from clear first rounder to near-consensus top-two player in the class.
- Both of the top pitchers in the class, Chase Burns and Hagen Smith, had clear, high-end pure stuff but needed excellent seasons in starting roles to push themselves from middle first-round talents to no-doubt top-of-the-first-round territory.
Our goal is to have our preseason top 200 draft list look as good as possible when it gets released in February. Ultimately, players grow and develop and change at a rapid pace. The spring season is crucial for draft-eligible players. Those eligible in the 2020 class had an unlucky draw.
But following all of the movement that’s sure to come in 2025 is half the fun.
