This year's Under Armour All-America Game, run by Baseball Factory and played at Wrigley Field, featured a number of the top high school prospects for the 2020 draft ... and also mirrored a lot of what we're seeing in pro baseball right now, with good velocity, a ton of strikeouts and not that many balls put into play. Here's a rundown of some of the more notable names and looks from Monday's event.
• Right-hander Jared Jones (La Mirada HS, La Mirada, Calif.) -- whom I saw back in April at USA Baseball's NHSI tournament -- started the game on the mound but was not at his best. He struggled to throw strikes in his two innings of work and probably should have been pulled, given the trouble he had. He was 93-96 mph and threw some good, tight sliders for strikes, but he was all over the place with his fastball and showed more head violence in his delivery than he did last time I saw him. His changeup was way too firm as well. He walked three and hit a batter across two innings, and he threw just half his pitches for strikes.
• Austin Hendrick (West Allegheny HS, Imperial, Pa.) won the pregame home run derby -- which was unusually entertaining because the wind was blowing in and across toward right field, favoring the left-handed hitters -- but then struck out three times in the game with a lot of swing-and-miss.
• Zac Veen (Spruce Creek HS, Port Orange, Fla.) had a groundball single, grounded out on a broken bat and struck out, but he still has one of my favorite swings in the entire class, a smooth left-handed stroke that looks like it'll produce power in time.
• Jared Kelley (Refugio HS, Refugio, Texas) was 93-96 mph with very good life on his fastball but missed a lot to his glove side, perhaps because of how he cuts himself off with his landing. He showed an adequate slurvy breaking ball at 79-82 and has a really good build to develop into a workhorse kind of starter.
• Dylan Crews (Lake Mary HS, Longwood, Fla.), whom I saw in the spring against Matt Allen, was overswinging all day and punched out three times, all on offspeed stuff.
• Nate Savino (Potomac Falls HS, Sterling, Va.), the sole left-handed pitcher in the game (out of fifteen), was 92-94 mph with what looked like good spin on a 75-78 mph curveball, and he repeated his delivery pretty well, getting his pitching hand up early.
• Victor Mederos (Pace HS, Miami) was 93-94 mph and threw what looked like two distinct breaking balls -- and threw them both for strikes, using the curveball against right-handed batters and the slider to backdoor a lefty.
• Blaze Jordan (DeSoto Central HS, Southaven, Miss.) hit three balls hard -- one for a single right back up the middle on a 92 mph fastball, one a lineout to center on a curveball and another resulting in a lineout in the ninth inning -- as well as a popup to the center fielder. Games like the Under Armour All-American showcase can be particularly helpful for players like Jordan, who hails from Mississippi (near Memphis) and likely won't see velocity anything like this during his high school season.
• Nolan McLean (Garner HS, Willow Springs, N.C.) was 91-95 with a traditional curveball at 73-75, on line to the plate, dropping his arm slot a few times for reasons I couldn't quite figure out.
• Joseph Gonzalez (Leadership Christian Academy, Humacao, PR) was 89-90 with some two-seam action, but the pitch was more interesting because he was so willing to throw it inside to right-handed batters. He also showed some promise with a mid-70s curveball.
• The game included two underclass pitchers: the tall, lean, projectable Andrew Painter (who did not) and right-hander Christian Little (who is not). Painter (Calvary Christian Academy, Pompano Beach, Fla.) was 89-92 with a promising but too-slow curveball at 69-71, coming from a high three-quarters slot that gave him depth on the breaking ball. Little (Christian Brothers College HS, St. Louis) was over his head, 87-89 with no command, with a 72-74 mph curveball. I'm fine with bringing a few of the most promising underclassmen to this kind of event, but the pitchers have to be ready to throw strikes.