Shooter Hunt Profile

This is the start a new series leading up to the draft in which I'll take a close look at some of the most interesting, controversial, or just plain best prospects in the draft. We’ll start with Steven Daniel “Shooter” Hunt - he gets the nickname from Dennis Hooper’s character in the movie “Hoosiers”.

History:

Hunt came onto the prospect scene, like so many other high school studs, at national showcase games. After his junior year in high school (2004) Hunt was No. 1 prospect at the South Showcase and No. 1 prospect at the SelectFest Showcase.

He drew high marks for his good fastball, promising curve, and knowledge of the game – his dad, Mickey Hunt, was his high school coach. After his senior season, Hunt was named the New Jersey state Player of the Year by both Gatorade and Louisville Slugger.

Shooter Hunt was rated as the 81st best prospect in the 2005 draft by Baseball America but due to a strong commitment to the University of Virginia and signability issues, Hunt lasted until the 34th round when he was selected 1,029th overall by the Texas Rangers. The Rangers could not come to terms with the tall, lanky right-hander who had led both the Ramapo High School (Wyckoff, NJ) baseball and basketball teams to state titles.

In the 2006 season, Hunt appeared in 17 games for Virginia getting 3 starts (34.1 innings). Hunt transferred to Tulane University for his sophomore season. In 2006 – and again in 2007 – Hunt pitched for the Falmouth Commodores in the Cape Cod league. Hunt was Tulane’s Saturday starter in 2007 and after a fantastic season in which he struck out 104 with just 30 walks he looked poised to secure a spot near the top of the 2008 Draft class.

Stats:

TBF K% BB% BABIP PF SoS

2006: 152 21.7 9.87 .302 89 84

2007: 411 25.3 7.30 .253 114 84

2008: 229 34.1 14.0 .152 114 74

* 2008 stats are as of 4/22/08

Looking at Hunt’s stats one gets the sense of a pitcher with great stuff who has gotten better over the years and has a high degree of volatility. In 2008, Hunt has already walked more batters (32) than he did in all of 2007 (30) and has given up as many home runs (3).

There are always conflicting goods and bads with Hunt. He has posted dominant strikeout numbers that have gotten better as he has progressed and grown as a pitcher, but his walk rate is regressing and is to the point now of being a major concern. While at Tulane he’s done a very good job of limiting long balls in hitter-friendly home parks but he has never had to consistently face elite competition. He has been totally dominant this year, but his BABIP rate is unsustainable. Even with as far as the baseball community has come, I still find it hard to believe that Hunt would have as much buzz if he was 3-4 with a 3.85 ERA instead of 6-1 with a 1.59 ERA, even if all of his peripheral and defense independent stats were the same.

His work in the Cape Cod league shows a similar portrait of a flame-thrower (32.34 K% and 30.77 in '06 and '07 respectively) with control problems (17.96 BB% and 12.82) even though both sample sizes are rather small.

Scouting:

Editor's note: This section is based on Lincoln's own observations.

At 6-foot-3 and an even 200 pounds, Hunt is a wiry, strong, athletic kid who still offers some room for projection on his frame.

His fastball sits in the low-to-mid 90’s with big, late-boring action. It has good run in on righthanded hitters. The combination of plus velocity and plus movement make Hunt’s fastball close to unhittable at low levels of competition and good enough to confound even the most polished of professionals. His fastball is his single greatest strength. Command is lacking, inconsistent release point.

Breaking ball is a very good (curve). Because of his excellent arm strength he gets great rotation and late very sharp break. When it’s on it’s almost impossible to hit mixed with his fastball. Velocity can vary from 77-78 to 83-84. He keeps it low with 12/6 break but he sweeps some of them and the break becomes more 11/5 or 10/4. Command suffers when horizontal break increases. Command overall is better of curve than fastball.

Hunt is pretty much a two-pitch pitcher at this point in his career. He does have a change in his repertoire but it is far less advanced than his 1-2 combo and isn’t much more than a show-me pitch right now.

Hunt’s mechanics are, like him as a prospect, a combination of the very good and the scary. He has beautiful arm placement with virtually no recoil and he finishes with slight pronation (the act of rotating the thumb, in this case, down towards the ground). However there is a lot of effort – wasted effort – in his delivery as well. He drops hard on this back leg then is forced to rebalance himself before his drive to home. Hunt drops with inconsistent force on his back leg, changing the angle of his torso as he starts to throw home. He wastes energy throwing uphill sometimes.

I believe it is these mechanical inefficiencies and inconsistencies are the cause of Hunt’s control problems.

Overall:

Hunt’s combination of stuff, arm strength, impressive strikeout totals, makeup and pedigree give him a ceiling that few prospects in this draft can match. If he were to improve upon a third pitch and master his command, he could be a legit front-of-the-rotation pitcher on a championship staff.

The MLB Draft has gotten to the point where mistakes at the top have become extremely costly, not just in terms of dollars but in terms of wasted production from an extremely valuable and scarce resource (first round pick). There is not a General Manager in baseball who wouldn’t take 10 Shooter Hunt’s in a second. Problem is you only get one and the combination mechanical issues and lack of command make Hunt extremely risky – no matter what the upside. One of the principles of Project Prospect’s methodology is that a prospects floor is just as important as his ceiling – this is often overlooked in the industry. Hunt’s floor means that whichever team selects him will be in for a very expensive gamble.

Lincoln Hamilton can be reached at lhamilton@dentonoutlaws.com.