Friday Five Tool Five (Jan. 21)

In today’s installment of the Friday Five Tool Five we recap this week’s episodes of the Five Tool Podcast, talk about the upcoming first annual Five Tool 55 HS Draft, recap the THSBCA convention,  and talk about the spring schedule.

1. Episode 37 of the Five Tool Podcast: Part 2 of the 2023 Five Tool 55 Follow List

Dustin and I spent some time covering some guys that stand out to us from the second half of the 2023 Five Tool Follow List. There are some really good players in this group that we feel have the ability to make a jump as they continue to develop. A couple guys mentioned that star on the gridiron and on the diamond are:

IF Joe Jefferson, Twelve Baseball, Katy Taylor (TX) 2023

RHP/IF Tyler White, Five Star Performance, Southlake Carroll (TX) 2023

2. Episode 38 of the Five Tool Podcast: Recapping the release of the Re-Ranking of the 2022 Five Tool 55

With Dustin publishing the re-rank of the original Five Tool 55 list for the 2022 class, we spent a little bit of time discussing some of the movement on the list. Overall, there was not a ton of movement for a couple reasons. First, there hasn’t been that much baseball played for some guys on our list since the initial rankings came out. Second, we feel pretty good with where most guys landed and where they fit. There was one player making his debut with infielder Christian Salazar (Cy Ranch/Trosky Texas/Rice commit) sliding into the list in the 54 slot. Two big jumps were made by outfielders Jeric Curtis (Tomball Memorial/Hunter Pence/Texas Tech commit) and Max Belyeu (Aledo/Dallas Tigers/Texas commit). These jumps were simply made because these two had huge falls and really stood out in ways that warranted a jump into the top 10.

We also previewed our first annual Five Tool 55 High School Draft. Which leads us to…

3. First Annual Five Tool 55 Draft

We are really excited to announce our first ever Five Tool 55 High School Draft. Next Tuesday, live on episode 39, Dustin and I are going to take turns drafting players with the following parameters:

  • Every player has to be selected from our 2022 or 2023 Five Tool 55 list
  • Each team will consist of 16 players with the following roster construction:
    • 2 catchers
    • 1B, 2B, 3B and SS
    • 3 OF
    • 1 DH
    • 2 UTL
    • 4 Pitchers

From there, the people will vote on social media for who has the better team between #teamdustin and #teambish to decide who will buy who a hoodie of their choosing. To close the episode, we flipped for first pick with Dustin incorrectly picking tails leading to Drew having the first pick. And with the first pick in the 2022 first annual Five Tool 55 High School Draft, #teambish selects…

4. THSBCA Convention

The Five Tool staff was out in full force for the THSBCA Convention this past week at the Gaylord Texan in Grapevine. Thousands of high school coaches across Texas were in attendance for the event that served as a great kickoff to the 2022 season. With a star-studded list of speakers including college baseball coaching legend Ron Polk, Texas A&M Recruiting Coordinator and #friendofthepod Nolan Cain, and sports psychology guru Brian Cain (no relation). One of the most anticipated sessions was Thursday’s night’s panel of 2021 State Champion coaches. Having pitched for Greg Harvey when he was at Rockwall and having been on staff at Texas when David Denny’s son was on the team, this group was fun to listen to.

We got a good chance to spend time with so many coaches and baseball people across the state that we have relationships with. At Five Tool, we rely heavily on our partnerships with the high schools across the state as they routinely provide us first class facilities and staff to help us run our events. This event always serves as a fun reminder that the season is just around the corner and I immediately went home and started trying to put the finishing touches on my spring viewing schedule…

5. Five Tool News: Spring Schedule

I got fired up this morning as I began really digging into my schedule for the spring. Things are starting to come into focus as schedules keep rolling in and tournament pairings are set. Dustin and I’s goal is to see all 110 of our 2022 and 2023 Five Tool 55 members. We may be crazy but we think we can pull it off.

Some of the early tournaments we are looking to hit include the Georgetown and Rock Hardball Central Texas First Pitch Classic February 24-26, the Flower Mound tournament March 3-5, the Highland Park tournament and the Tournament of Champions in Frisco both of which are March 10-12.

Once we get our feet wet, we will make choices on the district schedules based on pitching matchups and as always will be picking our Five Tool Texas DFW Game of the Week to cover as well.

Drew Bishop
Five Tool Baseball
National Scouting Director
@drewhbishop
[email protected]

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