Joey Bart Stats & Scouting Report College Baseball, MLB Draft, Prospects

Track Record: Coming out of Buford (Ga.) High in 2015, Bart ranked No. 183 on the BA 500 but fell to the Rays in the 27th round in large part due to his strong commitment to Georgia Tech. In Atlanta, Bart was following in the footsteps of former major league backstops Jason Varitek and Matt Wieters, who also attended Georgia Tech. A career .321/.407/.544 hitter for the Yellow Jackets, Bart led the Atlantic Coast Conference in hitting (.359) as a junior in 2018, when he was named ACC player of the year, ACC defensive player of the year and was selected as a first-team All-American. Bart became the highest MLB draft pick in Georgia Tech history when the Giants selected him with the No. 2 overall pick and subsequently signed him for $7.025 million--the largest signing bonus for a position player in draft history.

Scouting Report: Bart is the Giants' clear No. 1 prospect, and he has the chance to impact the game in a myriad of ways. At the plate, Bart projects for plus, all-fields power. Scouts were impressed with Bart's ability to tap into his raw power without completely selling out in games, and he hit 13 home runs and 14 doubles in just 45 games in the short-season Northwest League. With Bart's track record of hitting in the ACC, and then his successful, albeit brief, pro debut, evaluators feel confident grading his hit tool as at least above-average, with the potential to become a plus hitter. Defensively, Bart has a plus arm, and it grades out even better for its accuracy than it does pure arm strength, of which there is plenty. He routinely records sub 2.0-second pop times, and the Georgia native was lauded by scouts throughout his collegiate career for calling his own games behind the plate. Bart has just fringe-average speed, but he showed the athleticism and lateral quickness needed to be considered an above-average receiver with the ability to routinely block tough pitches in the dirt.

The Future: Bart will likely start his first full season of pro ball in high Class A San Jose. Bart will forever be compared to Buster Posey, the catcher the Giants drafted the last time the organization had a top-five pick. Even if the Giants decide to move Bart along slower than Posey, it wouldn't be a surprise to see Bart in San Francisco by the end of the 2020 season. If all goes well in San Jose at the beginning of 2019, Bart could be promoted to Double-A Richmond by midseason.

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