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VENTURA, CALIF. - The Uncommitted Spotlight Series returns after a jam packed summer of Prep Baseball California events, summer travel baseball, and other opportunities to evaluate players we will be recognizing some of the top remaining uncommitted players around the state. We will be looking at players from the 2026 class and 2027 classes across the upcoming weeks/months. 

We invite you to get to know them through the eyes of our Prep Baseball California staff of scouts both through our in person looks at players and/or the data-backed numbers collected at our events with our partnered companies. TrackMan, Blast Motion, and VALD Performance provide comparable data to project and evaluate players. All of these systems come together to give a clear picture at what colleges will get when a players steps onto their campus.

Today, we put the spotlight on a talented 2026 player who is coming off a strong spring and impressive summer. We are looking at NorCal '26 OF Willem Loveless from Albany High School in Albany, Calif..  The Cougars OF was a key performer on their 2025 squad in his JR. campaign helping them to a CIF-North Coast Section D4 playoff berth. A LH hitter Loveless posted a .307/.350/.466 slash line across 27 games, 103 plate appearances and 88 official at bats. He posted 27 hits, five doubles, three homers, drove in 27 runs and scored 13 runs while stealing four bags on the year. His 88 at bats were most on the team while finishing second on the squad in RBIs, homers, total hits and batting average. 

Loveless made his first appearance of 2025 on the Prep Baseball California platform prior to his JR. campaign at the Bay Area PSID and then during the summer with a standout showing at the Bay Area Summer ID event which combined with his strong spring performance brought him a 2025 California State Games invite where he had a solid overall performance over the three days of the event (workout + three games). 

Loveless has been consistently very good his offensive metrics across all events. A LH hitter Loveless starts from a taller posture with a medium length forward stride to the launch position while staying taller in his posture during the turn. He shows consistent quickness in his hands averaging around 21 MPH of hand speed  while generating quality bat speeds of up to 68.2 MPH with flashes of torque in his turn to produce 13.4 Gs of rotational acceleration on average. The quality of his swing profile plays at a high level during batting practice sessions to peak at 95.7 MPH on his exit velocity at the Bay Area Summer ID while averaging a strong 88 MPH on his exit velocity at the same event with a max batted ball distance of 355' at State Games and an average batted ball distance of 268' at the Bay Area PSID. His more in-depth data provided by Trackman from his batting practice sessions at all three events shows the quality of his present offensive profile. Loveless has produced 43% hard hit rate at Bay Area Summer ID, 65% sweet spot rate at the Bay Area PSID from a swing that has shown a solid feel to consistently get the ball in the air with authority (averaged right around 60% fly ball/line drive rates across all three events).

Loveless is athletically built at 5'11 166 lbs. presently and has room for future strength gains as he continues to mature. His athletic profile is solid for a corner OF profile having posted a top end 60 time at 7.2 seconds and strong present OF arm strength at 89 MPH where he has the potential to handle RF long term and would be sound in LF.

With a solid JR. campaign, strong overall offensive and defensive metrics, sound performances this summer and room to continue getting better with maturity Loveless is a quality follow for the 2026 recruiting classes of college programs LH bats which have the profile to impact a collegiate lineup.

College coaches and fans be sure to click on Loveless' profile to see full video and information.

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