The weekend of September 27 – 29 saw some of North Carolina’s top talent converge on Ting Stadium in Holly Springs, NC for the South Atlantic Border Battle (SABB).  The Border Battle features players from up and down the eastern seaboard, allowing players to play for MLB area scouts, representing Major League Clubs.  Players are assigned to teams by area, for the most part, with several North Carolina players playing for different areas that needed to continue to fill out their roster. 

Prep Baseball Report was on hand for all three days.  The first night featured underclass players in the 2022 and 2023 graduate years, facing off in a controlled scrimmage after an elongated batting practice and infield/outfield segment.  On Saturday and Sunday, players from the 2020 and 2021 classes were featured.  For these players, again they took an elongated BP, followed by an infield/outfield workout.  The position players also had the chance to run a timed 60 yard dash.  Each of these teams played two controlled scrimmages, one each day.

Below we begin to breakdown the South Atlantic Border Battle with a look at North Carolina pitchers in the 2020 class from the event.  Most of these arms threw two innings.  PBR was able to put evaluations on each arm including statistics on velocity and spin rates of each pitch.  The spin rate data was gathered from the new Stalker Pro SII radar gun and stalker has verified their spin rates with TrackMan data.

 

Statistical Analysis: 2021 - 2023 North Carolina Pitchers at the SABB

 

Top Fastball Velocities

Each arm threw live to hitters in controlled innings that the MLB Scouts managing the teams would roll after 5-6 hitters.  This allowed scouts to get a full look at each arm while limiting some of the stress on the pitchers throwing. 

Four of the eleven arms worked at 89 mph or above with the top bolts coming from Caleb Ketchie and Brandon Hudson.  Both Ketchie and Hudson not only touched 90, but showed an ability to work at 90 mph.