The thing I thought was interesting was as I read your scouting report and then went back to compare it with mine and my feeling was that the reports were remarkably similar minus a couple small points…scouting/mechanical talk I think is extremely subjective so I thought too much was being made out of what were small differences. The style was different of course with two different perspectives, but the conclusions were mostly the same.

And I agree completely about the reports Carrasco. Too optimistic in my view. I did a little analysis on Henry Sosa, and I remember reading from BA a long while back how hyped up he was about the Future’s Game and wanting to show his best stuff, so I do realize the flaws in using that one game (or any individual game in general).

I personally wasn’t that impressed by Carrasco during the Futures…it was de los Santos, Sosa, and Frankllin Morales (especially) that really caught my eye. But he does have a lot to work with.

Anyway, I love the different perspective on this kind of topic…there are relatively few sites that do this, so I’m looking forward to the content you put out in the future.

Going back to Carrasco, I’m just not seeing what the year-end report types are saying about him and the FSL stats back me up on it. Then, of course they see him touch 96 in the Futures Game and think all is well. The whole groupthink prospect ranking game has me a bit jaded, hence the 31st team’s area scout approach I’m taking to the FSL this year.

To clear up a couple things:

1. The scouting report is based off what I saw of his Future’s Game outing, so there is definitely a small sample size to work with and that is certainly acknowledged. But I do use second-hand sources to verify I saw something that was not out of the norm with him and I use different sources to supplement what I see from those videos.

A scouting report like the one above is more in-depth and can go into much more detail than one based on just one inning of work, obviously, but the video report can still give you a general feel for his mechanics and stuff…the one advantage I would have is the ability to go back and look more closely at his mechanics by seeing Carrasco in slow motion. The video did have a couple pitches that gave me a side view as well.

2. The curveball/slider thing I agree is completely semantics. When I researched Fautino de los Santos for the article I did on him, I saw his plus breaking pitch classified as both a curve and a slider.

3. The overall scouting reports seem roughly similar. I was a bit more optimistic on the fastball partly because I believe he has the ability to pick up a couple of mphs.

The change-up and breaking ball breakdowns are mostly the same though…he shows flashes, but overall is inconsistent and arm speed is a factor there.

I think he needs minor mechanical adjustments but he absolutely has to refine all his pitches and part of that comes with fixing his mechanical problems.

The one part I disagree with is about the speed of his wind-up. He could still technically rush through his delivery, but his tempo is actually on the slow side out of the wind-up. He comes in around 28 or 29 frames from the point his knee reaches his upper most point and release.

However, Carrasco is much faster out of the stretch and probably more susceptible to rushing through his delivery. He had problems last year out of both the wind-up and the stretch, but his numbers have been pretty horrid from the stretch over his entire career.

But the overall conclusion of both scouting reports is roughly the same.

I peg his upside as a #2 with a #3/4 label being more likely. Basically the same as Kiley, though his view is more pessimistic (and I suppose rightly so given the track record of pitching prospects).

In any case, I thought I would offer my perspective. Keep up the great work!!

The grading discrepancies, well that’s what you get with two different approaches. This writer (appears) to be grading the video from behind Carrasco from the Futures Game. A valiant effort, and not that far off from what I saw in his assessment, but a flawed source to scout from.

Not only is he grading video, but from a bad angle, and from a game where he only threw an inning or two. The Futures Game is a prospect showacase in the middle of the season with each pitcher going no more than 3-4 outs. Each guy is going 100% the whole stint (starters never can in a real game, and that’s actually the source of Carrasco’s problems) and in the middle of the season, their stuff is at it’s best since they haven’t faded yet and have already hit their stride. To me, it’s very sketchy to make scouting conclusions based on that video.