The Sporting News Ultimate Baseball Scouting Guide
This very simple magazine has brief scouting profiles of “more than 800 players.” Hey, I like seeing proper grammar on the cover.
It’s something of a revival of the Hawes’ Ultimate Fantasy Guide (or whatever the title was), because it is full of the edited comments of two major league “scouts.” who aren’t identified. These are readable, not very entertaining in and of themselves, but informative in a general way. You learn what pitchers throw, some of what gets particular hitters out, all with a scouts sensibility, meaning there aren’t a lot of eye-wearying numbers.
For the best players there are breakouts for offense, defense and outlook. These are the players for whom we actually need less info, but you can understand why they would do it this way. And they don’t skimp on the other guys. Here is the comment on JD Closser: “Closser is a converted catcher who has a chance to hit. Is a switch hitter with a compact stroke and good bat speed. Is a better lefthanded hitter with more power than from the right side. Likes the ball up and out over the plate. Defensively, he needs work on his release and footwork. His arm is average at best. Throws don’t have good carry and his hands are a little stiff. Could be the starter for a young Rockies team.”
This isn’t radical stuff, but it seems a little useful. And it reminds me of the wildly colorful Hawes magazine, though it has a much more circumspect look. I haven’t scoured it for bum steers, but I write about it here because it’s a little different than your other fantasy magazines.
Reasons it doesn’t threaten the Guide? No stats at all, other then a dense little box with last year’s numbers for the top guys at each position. So while it’s decent for looking up what “scouts” are saying, you don’t get a real player profile. The other problem is it is organized by position rankings, which means to find those who aren’t stars you have to look them up in the index and then look them up in the front.
I imagine they did this to protect their Scouting Handbook franchise with Stats. I’d be interested to hear comments from anyone with a bad reaction to this thing, with some damning quotes. Until then, if you have a rather pricey $8 to drop (a lot when you can get the Stats/SN book for about $18) it’s a title to look for.