Project Prospect is still a pretty small publication.
Though we've had 1.4 million page views over the last year, more than 40% of our visitors only came to the site once. Our weekly audience is about 7,000-10,000 unique visitors.
I get emails from people all the time who want to know more about how we get our information, what our approach to ranking propsects is, and what our goals for the future are. While we get lots of support, there are also lots of skeptics.
I try to be transparent and accessable. We aren't affiliated with any major publication or backed by any investors. We try to provide as much free content as possible and hope that our prospect information is among the highest quality of what's available to the public.
Those of you who have been reading us for a while -- the site was launched in September of 2006 -- know that we were very statistics-heavy when we started. Those of you who have just started reading the site may think of us as more of a scouting-heavy site.
We're as passionate about finding a balance between scouting and statistics as anyone. We've done some innovative college and minor league studies that have caught the attention of MLB front office members. We've also met dozens and dozens of scouts out at minor league and college games. When it comes to understanding and applying advanced statistical and scouting knowledge, I think we are in the running for being one of the most balanced national prospect website out there. That's our objective.
Because Project Prospect is not a full-time venture for myself or anyone who contributes to the site, we are limited in the amount of minor league games we can see. I tend to do most of my scouting at minor league spring training and the Arizona Fall League, where I can see a large number of prospects in a short period of time.
Recently, I received some good questions and comments from some long-time posters in our forums. I decided to make the conversation more visible, as I've been seeing many similar questions and comments pop up all over the internet. Let's dive right in:
How do you know that you caught prospect X on a typical day when you saw him two years ago. How many of these prospects have you only seen in spring training when all players are working through offseason rust? How do you rate a prospect that wowed you when you saw him once vs a bunch of prospects that you haven't seen? And a million other questions related to a small sample size of scouting. - Poster 1
I think these are extremely pertinent questions. I make it clear that I'm reporting on how a player looked the day I saw him, and try not to be definitive about velo, stuff, command, etc. Generally there's an expectation and context based on previous scouting reports going in, so a game report may contrast against those. - Poster 2
While we have gone more in a scouting direction lately, we haven't completely stopped looking at stats. I think we're still pretty progressive with quantitative analysis of minor leaguers. I keep in contact with a number of people who do statistical analysis for MLB teams and we've gotten feedback that our statistical approach isn't out of line with what teams are doing.
Our lists used to be 90% numbers and 10% scouting. We'd take whatever scouting info we could get but mainly go with numbers. I try to be 50/50 now.
And I know you can't get a complete look at a player from a glimpse or two. I also know that teams are forced to do the best they can with draft prospects sometimes when they do only get a glimpse or two -- showcase events. When I see a guy at minor league spring training, I'm seeing as much as, if not more than, what I'd imagine scouts can pick up at showcase events. Seeing something is better than seeing nothing.
I think the rust and small sample stuff with scouting at spring training is overplayed by some people. When you've done a lot of scouting, you learn to pick things up quickly. And I see scouts at opposing team's minor league spring training games all the time.
You can't get the same level of detail and accuracy in spring training as you can from seeing a guy multiple times during the season, but you can get a basic idea of a pitcher's mechanics or a guy's swing mechanics. You can see foot speed, bat speed and arm speed, attributes that are some of the most important in scouting.
I saw Jason Heyward take a few rounds of BP last year at Braves camp. From just that, it was clear that he was a special talent. Same thing with Bryce Harper and Mike Trout.
I saw Stephen Straburg throw a flat-ground side session at the AFL two years ago. Had I never seen him before or never seen him again, you wouldn't have needed to show me anything else to convince me he was a special talent.
Billy Hamilton, Tyler Matzek and Michael Choice were all guys who stood out to me this spring as players who are going to have some difficult adjustments to make.
If I'm tweeting up a storm of observations that are far away from the norm, I'll hear about it from scouts. I keep in contact with a number of them who read our stuff and will let me know when they think I'm way off. I've heard from scouts on my thoughts on Teheran. I've heard from them about my initial impressions of Billy Hamilton and Brett Lawrie.
I tend take strong stances and go out on a limb with prospects. I like probable big leaguers, but I also like upside as much as anyone. I just tend not to like rolling the dice on prospects who are very raw, even if they have one elite tool.
We gave out Digital Prospect Guides to a lot of scouts. The overwhelming response was that it's clear that we're putting the time in to educate ourselves. They agree with some of our perspectives and disagree with others. I think we have an idea of what we're talking about and I know that we're passionate. We try to back our opinions with sound logic that can be revisited down the road. We try to be open-minded and make adjustments to improve our approach.
As far as ranking guys we haven't seen versus ones who wowed us, that's another area where I'll turn to a small circle of trusted scouts. I'll check in with them about guys I haven't seen. I'll also ask if they have seen guys I've seen and to compare the ones I haven't to those guys. I spent about 100 hours on the phone last offseason having those types of conversations with scouts.
Reporting on what you saw and noting that it is from ____ date is fine. Taking that info and using it to make an educated guess about where a player's career is headed is much more difficult. But it's what our readers want. The most read content in Project Prospect's history is easily the prospect lists. Around 95% of the people who visit the site do so to view our lists.
If I published one-game scouting reports and limited lists only to guys I've seen multiple times, I'm sure I'd gain respect from a lot of people. But we'd also only reach a fraction of the prospect fans on the internet.
With what we're doing now, we're reaching a lot of prospect fans. I enjoy being challenged to back up opinions and improve the quality of our work. I try to be transparent and go about things with integrity. My hope is that our words are interesting, informative and as accurate as possible and that anyone who sees any of us at a game can see the passion in our eyes.
Got questions? Want more? Hit me up on Twitter @AdamWFoster or shoot me an email at adamf@projectprospect.com.