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2020 MLB Draft Video Roundup: Rays first round draft pick Nick Bitsko throws eye-popping stuff

Watch the Rays new prospect in action!

By Daniel Russell
/ new
The Identity TB

When the baseball season was cancelled, the vast majority of teams were caught offguard when HS junior Nick Bitsko decided to graduate early with an eye to jumpstart his career.

Tabbed by Baseball America as 2021’s top prospect, Bitsko was a mystery to many, but not to the Rays who had followed the top prospect out of Pennsylvania closely, particularly last season.

Previously:

While the season might have been shipwrecked, Bitsko is a player who has been easy to find on social media, often sharing his eye-popping Rapsodo numbers to twitter and instagram.

I asked Bitsko if he thought his willingness to share those numbers helped his draft position:

That’s a good question, actually. I would say a little bit.

Even if we had a season, I don’t think anybody would have got those numbers. It’s an interesting point you make, because — obviously — I don’t think anybody is putting a trackman up at my highschool field or anything like that, putting a box on the field. So, I don’t think anybody would have seen those numbers before I got into pro-ball or went to Virginia.

So, I think, from that standpoint, yeah it might have helped me a little bit, and I think it’s good that I had advanced stuff other than just, ‘Oh, here’s velo,’ or ‘Here’s break on the ball,’ here’s actually — like — an analytic that proves that this is actually a good pitch.

Here are three examples of Bitsko putting that content online, one of which was shared by the team account after he was drafted:

As there may not be an easy way to see much of Bitsko pitching online, we’ve collected various tweets and videos highlighting his stuff.

Beyond Rapsodo, here are a few more videos that show Bitsko in action:

^^^ My favorite video of the bunch

Oh, and like all good high school pitching prospects, he can hit too...

Those were just for fun...

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