Both Kiley and I will be posting in-person scouting reports on draft prospects we see throughout the spring. Well, summer and fall, too. Here is another dump of notes from Arizona.

Typically, these draft-related posts are designed to provide updates on multiple amateur prospects all at once — and I’ve included shorter notes on some other players below. Today, though, I’d like to dwell a bit on a specific collegiate athlete — namely, Oregon State 2B Nick Madrigal.

Madrigal is the best player I’ve seen so far this spring. He was electric for a weekend and a half during the Beavers’ first two series in Surprise but fractured his wrist on a play at the plate during a win against Ohio State. He was 14-for-25 with two doubles, two homers, three steals in three attempts, and no strikeouts when he went down.

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Both Kiley and I will be posting in-person scouting reports on draft prospects we see throughout the spring. Well, summer and fall, too. Here is my first dispatch from Arizona.

Grand Canyon RHP Jake Wong was on the periphery of our preseason top 30, as scouts pegged him as a second- or third-round prospect entering the year. He dominated top-10-ranked TCU on Friday night, allowing two hits and two walks over six inning, striking out nine.

Wong was 94-96 in the first inning before settling into the 92-94 range, touching 95 here and there throughout the rest of his start. The fastball missed bats up above, and within, the strike zone and induced weak ground-ball contact when located down. It’s a plus fastball and easily Wong’s best pitch.

His secondaries were pretty generic. He has an upper-70s curveball that has some depth to it when located beneath the strike zone, but it lacks bite and he babies it into the zone when he wants to throw it for a strike. His changeup ranged from 84 to 89 mph. He has feel for locating it in competitive locales, and it occasionally has bat-missing movement, but it isn’t consistent right now.

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To answer your first question: no, there isn’t a slam-dunk, generational talent among the prospects ranked below. We’ll have to wait a little longer, it seems, for the next Bryce Harper to emerge. Nevertheless, the 2018 draft class is generally seen as deep and strong, particularly in prep pitching. There isn’t a player yet on whom we’d currently put a 55 FV (that is, the lowest grade received by the first 42 prospects on the recently published top-100 list), but almost every draft class ends up with a couple of those, and obviously these names will shift around during the season.

For reference, last year’s draft ended up with one low 60 FV and five players with 55 FV grades by the time the offseason arrived. So expecting three to five of the following prospects to emerge in the top 50 of next year’s Top 100 seems reasonable. As you might guess, the top 10-15 prospects are pretty tightly packed. With most of the early-season action occurring in Arizona, Florida, and SoCal, we’ll both be out to get lots of early looks this spring to quickly start sorting more out.

It’s too early to do a mock draft that would amount to anything much greater than a collection of guesses (here’s the draft order, for reference), but something to monitor is the presence of those clubs that lean risk-averse/analytic/etc. in the top half of the first round. In light of certain trends within the game — and, in particular, what appears to be a greater interest in near-ready, low-end-regular types — this could push college players (and, specifically, college bats) up into the high first round. Both Oregon State and Missouri State have TrackMan units at their home parks, so clubs will have multiple years of data on Madrigal and Eierman to aid their evaluations. Hitters from Virginia have benefited in much the same way from strong, large-sample TrackMan data in recent drafts.

Just as the recent minor-league top-100 list prominently featured the sons of Dante Bichette, Vladimir Guerrero, and Fernando Tatis, the lists that follow also feature quite a bit in the way of bloodlines. We have the sons of Jeff Conine, Troy Percival, David Weathers, and Bobby Witt, along with the younger brothers of Pirates Triple-A RHP Nick Kingham, Rays Double-A 1B/LF Joe McCarthy, Padres Double-A 1B Josh Naylor, and Blue Jays Triple-A CF Dalton Pompey. Kumar Rocker’s father, meanwhile, is Tracy Rocker, a former NFL defensive tackle and current defensive line coach for Tennessee.

We could have ranked more players or included more names for each list (especially projectable high-school arms), but we chose to limit ourselves in this preseason installment. Things will obviously expand as we get more information. We’ll have a slightly different presentation of the list than in years past, to more closely resemble the sort of information at what clubs are looking in draft rooms. We’ll both be at games starting this week and will keep you guys updates with tweets and InstaGraphs posts (along with longer posts when warranted) and updated rankings a couple more times leading up to the draft.

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With or without the new CBA, Rhett Wiseman was going to be a difficult sign. The top high school prospect from New England has a commitment to Vanderbilt, and his academic credentials are every bit as impressive as his tools. As driven as he is on the diamond, he is equally committed to his education.

Scouting directors do their homework. Going into the draft, they knew that Wiseman‘s stance was, ”First round or Vandy.” They were also aware that he wants to play professional baseball. The prep outfielder was signable beyond round one — but only to a point.

In previous years, Wiseman would have been taken on the second day of the draft. The high-upside teenager was viewed as anywhere from a second- to a fourth-round talent, and big money has historically been available in that range. Last year, nine players selected between rounds two and four were individually given $1 million or more in bonuses, and 19 second-round picks received over-slot money.

Thanks in part to the new CBA, Wiseman went to the Chicago Cubs earlier today in the 25th round. Anything is possible, but the chances of him signing now seems remote.

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