One of, if not the most vital aspect of a scout’s role in today’s game is painting an accurate and complete picture of a prospect’s “makeup”. There’s no doubt that every scout’s definition of “good makeup” differs to varying degrees, but having familiarity with a prospect’s off the field attributes can save a club a lot of headaches and also identify valuable information for development purposes.
As I just mentioned, every scout looks at and values attributes of a prospect’s makeup differently, and I’m no exception to that. For me, good makeup on a player is more about checking boxes on questions like “does this player have the respect of his teammates and vice-versa?”, “do I think this player has the potential to cause rifts or isolate themselves and/or teammates?”, and “how well does this player absorb new information and are they coachable?” I respect young athletes who use ‘sir’ and ‘ma’am’ when addressing people, but I’m not someone who is going to hold it against players who aren’t as polished with their vernacular, nor am I going to completely write off a player who may have a single incident in their recent history that may or may not be indicative of a larger underlying issue.
Now, if there’s a player who I’m in on enough to be comfortable drafting or signing, it’s also important to note how important it is that a scout does their due diligence on a player who does have an incident on their record (legally or word of mouth related) to determine if it was just a blip that can be written off as “kids will be kids” or if it’s indicative of a more serious, long-term issue, and that is a scouts task to uncover more information and ultimately make a determination on.
AMATEUR vs PRO
Amateur and Pro Scouts have far different access to the players they’re scouting, so the routes they have to go in order to track down makeup information is also vastly different.
PRO SCOUTS
Pro Scouts are obviously dealing with players already under contract with a club, so in-home visits and in-person conversations rarely happen. The avenue I used most to obtain makeup information in the pro ranks was to establish relationships with video interns, radio broadcasters, and any auxiliary staff members who are around the players on a daily basis.
As someone who started their professional baseball career as a Minor League Video Intern, I was able to find common ground with those individuals and establish enough of a level of trust and solidarity that they’d be comfortable telling me the good and bad things they may see from the players they’re around every day. It’s also a great way to form a new relationship with someone just beginning their career in the game and offer some advice I would have loved to have when I was in that same position.
Finding out if a player is in the process of learning a new pitch, tinkering with a new swing, etc. are valuable pieces of information, but just as important is finding out how a player fits in with their teammates and goes about their business off the field – whether that’s how committed they are to training on their own time or what they’re likely to choose to do on a night off. The daily routine of a professional player is very different from that of even a major D1 student-athlete, and finding out how the players who are new to the professional ranks have adjusted is another example of worthwhile information that can help give the most accurate overall evaluation of a prospect.
AMATEUR SCOUTS
On the amateur side, Area Scouts really are the front-lines for MLB clubs when it comes to providing the first bits of makeup information on a player. If their portrayal of a prospect’s makeup is wrong or absent, that makes the already tough task of projecting that players on-field value 3-6 years down the road even tougher for that club.
Being able to identify amateur prospects who have off the charts baseball IQ, work-ethic, or drive in general can be a real separator in drafting players who have the best chance to reach or even exceed their ceiling when it comes to on-field production in future years.
Even though there’s no objective way to quantify it, you’d be hard pressed to convince me that identifying a player who is a real sponge at absorbing new information and instruction doesn’t have tremendous value in and of itself. This is the type of information a scouting department can take into account when putting together their pref-lists.
Amateur scouts having the ability to conduct something like an in-home visit is hugely beneficial in being able to find out what drives a player, the family structure they’re coming from, and determining if a player has the emotional maturity to handle the transition from amateur baseball to professional baseball. All of these are pieces of information a good Area Scout will be able to provide on-demand about any notable prospect from their territory.
BUG OR FEATURE?
Here’s an example- when I was a college coach, one of our best players (who later was drafted and made it to the ML level) was caught drinking in the parking lot at the school when he was underage. To this day I’m still shocked as to how many scouts completely wrote this player off citing “makeup concerns” when in reality, the player was a fantastic kid who made a dumb decision on a weekend night. If I would have been an Area Scout at the time, I would have absolutely gotten in touch with a trusted member of the coaching staff, college, and the player himself to make my best determination on if it was just a “dumb decision” or if it was likely to be a trend in bad decision making.
Now, there are certainly players who encounter an incident similar to the one I just described and it’s the first indication that they may have serious underlying issues such as an addiction or just bad decision making skills in general. It’s the Area Scout’s job to be able to relay the most accurate and neutral assessment of the situation, and the best Area Scouts are extremely good at doing just that.
I believe one of the best attributes an amateur scout can have in today’s game is to set whatever biases they have aside and judge every single player and their situation on a case by case basis. An amateur scout should be able to identify players as human beings who may or may not have “makeup concerns”, as well as find players with unique, positive traits, such as being a sponge for taking in new information and methods which could contribute to their overall development.
It’s so vital for scouts to nail players’ makeup because it plays such a big role in what that player becomes in the future. Identifying players with the physical ability and also the drive, acumen, and human being skills to handle the journey through the ranks of pro ball still truly is as much of a hunt for a diamond in the rough as it’s always been.