Sumrall and Purvis are playing for the MHSAA South 4A championship. I know we have a commit from JoJo Parker from Purvis. Are there any other d1 recruits on either of these teams?
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Sumrall and Purvis are playing for the MHSAA South 4A championship. I know we have a commit from JoJo Parker from Purvis. Are there any other d1 recruits on either of these teams?
Parker's twin brother is committed to MSU.
Sumrall I think has a pitcher committed to Ole Miss.
Funny thing about Leo. I've known his dad for years, he played at West Jones. Leo should've been at fcahs but somehow wound up at sumrall,lol(for folks that don't know sumrall has "recruited" for years). We had a catcher from west jones several years ago, that somehow wound up going to sumrall, because we were changing coaches and his pops didn't think we'd be any good. Allowed my son to step in and start as a freshman and start all 4 years and we wound up winning a state championship and the best sumrall could ever do when that kid was there was runnerup.
My son's school (Briarcrest) has a player that has signed, Jack Gleason. Great kid! But they also have a left-handed sophomore pitcher named Phinn Waters that I think is going to be a MAJOR prospect. It's my understanding State is already on him pretty good, along with many other SEC schools.
Richardson at South isn't bad either. Also from that area I watched Moffett from Taylorsville throw this weekend for LSU. He ate A&M up! He's got three pitches now and is going to be legit next season. Topped out at 98 with some really wild run and a nasty slider.
My favorite Sumrall baseball story was when they were going undefeated and claimed that then 6A champ Madison Central was scared to play them.
So, Madison Central scheduled them and beat the crap out of them. LOL.
Moral of the story- don't tug on Superman's cape.
CC what are your thoughts about the Griffin kid from Prep? He's been THE name in high school baseball for two years. I didn't watch him this year because Magnolia Heights didn't play Prep, Prep didn't want to travel, but the other games I've watched of him I just have never seen the far and away no. 1 HS player in America.
He's arguably got the most up side of any highschooler in the county. He has every tool you would want. Extremely projectable. There are some kids that are probably more polished at a certain position or as a pitcher in highschool but Konnor has the tools to be an upper 90s arm off the bump, can hit for average/power and can run exceptionally well for his size/physicality.
I don't believe there is another highschool guy out there as versatile as he can be.
What are the chances he sticks with LSU and goes to college?
All the scouts say the 2024 class is really down. One of the weakest drafts in a long time.
I like Konnor as an OF in the pros but it will come down to his ability to hit high level pitching. If he can't, he can fall back on his pitching ability. Great tools and makeup.
There's no doubt he's a high end talent and he's gonna become very wealthy, very soon. HS kids are becoming more of a crapshoot. He's very similar to Jacoby Jones(he did go to lsu first) to me. If you compare the way they play and tools they're very close comps and while Jones has had a solid mlb career he's never become a star.
My daughters go to Sumrall so I shed some insight.
Parker twins at Purvis are legit. They?ve got a couple more D1 quality kids as well but no SEC kids.
Sumrall has Leo Odom who?s committed to Ole Miss (his parents bought a house and moved family from FCAHS couple years ago). He?s very talented but I?m glad he?s not going to State.
Sumrall has another couple juniors who will likely sign top level juco or smaller D1 schools. They also have Drew Davis who?s a freshman that will be a big recruit in a few years.
Decent comp, I came through when Jacoby was in highschool. Jocoby wasnt as physical as Griffin and didn't have the arm griffin has coming out of highschool.
Griffin also runs better than Jacoby did and probably has 20+ pounds on Jacoby coming out of highschool. Honestly, I see more Bryce Harper type tools than Jacoby. Griffin runs a 6.4 60 at 6'4 210 pounds and has been up to 95/96 on the bump. A 6.4 60 is absolutely stupid especially at that size. Think Jacoby was closer to a 6.6-6.7 runner.
He maybe somewhere between the 2. The scouts ive talked to this year have mentioned Jones as a comp. Jacoby mlb scout card had him as 6'2" 195 out of hs with a 6.55 60 time and 94 mph top velo. Konnor is a tremendous talent no doubt and he can be special, if he has the focus and drive necessary. No disrespect on Konnor at all because he's a great talent, but I've seen so many "can't miss" high school kids in my 59 years that i take it with a grain of salt when i hear people say "far and away the best hs baseball player in the country". He definitely has the tools but so does everyone drafted in the first round. Time will tell for sure.
This is the truth. Only one of the high school guys that we had committed and signed with an MLB team in the last 5 years has made it higher than A ball as of yet and that's James Wood. Blaze Jordan has bounced between A and AA. Heck even Blaze Jordan is probably progressing a little slower than the Red Sox had hoped. And all of this is showing in the draft, most mocks have between only 2-5 high school players going in the 1st round. 10 years ago that number was double. There's just so many misses in the high school ranks and these kids are asking astronomical numbers. I mean if I'm a GM and I have a choice between say Cjintje and say, Cam Camnitti, I would take Jurrangelo. I know what he has done against HIGH level competition for two years. What's Caminiti going to do when he has to face a Charlie Condon or a Braden Montgomery? Add all that into the fact that I do not know how one of these high schoolers is going to react the first time he is shelled.
For so long the thinking was to draft the best hs players(that was my thinking too), and put in your farm system and develop them, because college baseball was considered less than even rookie ball. That has changed in the 21st century, the kids go to college are more developed, more mature and have faced excellent competition, especially in the sec. I also know that so many hs kids drafted with big bonuses and have all this money for the first time and away from mom and dad have squandered the money and the talent. Not saying that can't happen with college players but they are older and more mature(hopefully, lol). Times change.
I agree completely both were/are tremendous athletes. It will be interesting to see how well he does and best highschool baseball player doesn't necessarily transfer over at the next level. In my opinion the toughest challenge for highschool kids coming out early is you don't get the training wheels college provides on how to live life away from your parents/home and how to deal with failure. A lot of these kids have never really struggled, they have always been the best for the most part.
College is a lot more structured than minor league ball. I went from college to rookie ball never could throw enough strikes but we had several highschool kids that were relatively high picks that didn't make it 3 years simply because they weren't ready to be on their own and had never experienced failure. Failure for the first time breaks a lot of the highschool kids and they never get over it. Couple that with having to learn how to live on your own outside of the facility and it's a much bigger transition compared to going to college and then signing.
That would be my biggest fear as a GM. How is this 18 year old who's used to all the comforts of mom and dad going to adjust to being on the road, unsupervised, and a thousand miles from home for the first time in his life. Granted, like CC said, a college kid can worry you in those same ways. But at least I know they've been away from parents and have had minimal supervision for at least 2 years. I have a better idea of how they'd react to Minor League life.
I've seen Konnor Grififn compared to Kris Bryant. I have to LOL at his 78 steals on the season. He must want the state record in that category.
He's better than Jacoby Jones IMO but we'll see what his future holds in the pros.