How pro scouts evaluate baseball pitching talent

This article originally appeared in Baseball Parent magazine. It's part of an eight-article series on pro baseball tryouts and pitching in college.

For baseball pitchers, scouts look at a few things, some of which you can control (for instance, your attitude, your work ethic), others you cannot (for instance, your height, your hand size).

Pro scouts generally use a grading scale by which they rate skill on a curve from 2 to 8. Two is "poor," while 7 and 8 are "very good" and "outstanding," respectively.

Most baseball players who score around a 5 have a shot at getting drafted by a big league team.

In pitching, some or all of the following garner high scores on the 2 to 8 grading scale: fastball velocity, fastball movement, off-speed pitch movement, overall command of the strike zone, command of pitches, poise on the mound (called mound presence), and baseball instinct (for instance, does the pitcher know where to go and what to do on the mound?).

However, pro baseball scouts also want to know if you wear glasses or contacts (which they rate poorly). They want to know about previous injuries (which, again, they rate poorly). Are your parents married or divorced? Has anyone in your family been drafted professionally by a baseball team before? And finally, scouts want to know if you'll sign easily. (If so, for how much?)

Do you have what it takes to go pro?