2026 Prep Baseball All-American Game: Data Dive, Position Players
September 19, 2026
The fourth annual Prep Baseball All-American Weekend brought the country's best juniors and seniors back to loanDepot Park for its Workout Day on Sept. 18, where the best-of-the-best Class of 2027 and 2028 talent participated in a showcase setting to help onlooking professional and college evaluators get a glimpse at the players ready for this kind of stage.
In its fourth edition the official Workout Day hosted several record-setting performances, which we'll analyze thoroughly below. We've assembled position player leaderboards from Friday's workout containing data collected from VALD athletic testing, TrackMan batted-ball data, Blast Motion swing metrics, and defensive velocities. From there, we cross-referenced every mark against our all-time AAG database to help us better compare and contrast how both classes in attendance stack up to the players who have gone on to become stars in pro ball or college who also took part in the Prep Baseball All-American Game from years past.
Here are our findings.
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Dylan Seward obliterated the event's all-time 60-yard dash mark when he raced to a 6.07 time at the start of the event. Last year, both he and Eric Booth Jr. (MS, 2026; Orioles, 1st round) broke the previous record and finished neck and neck with Booth Jr. running a 6.25 and Seward running a 6.26. This year, Seward shattered that record and he comfortably led the event, as just one other runner recorded a time below a 6.40. Seward's the No. 1-ranked player in the '27 class for many obvious reasons, but it isn't necessarily because of the elite speed, per se, it's how the motor and explosiveness as a runner seems to translate to every other part of his game.
Dylan Seward
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+ Full leaderboard (23)
Seward's 1.52 split out of the gate matched the fastest 10-yard time the AAG has ever recorded, and his 3.42 to 30 led too. Behind him, the 2028 class flashed premium twitch as well: Jesse Covington (NC; 6.38, 28.3-inch vertical) and Jakob Groeschel (OH; 6.48) were the only other players under 6.50, while Lio Garcia (GA) and Jeremiah Hall (UT) gave the junior class four of the top six times overall. On the jump mat, senior Sebastian Castillo (TX) paced the field at 29.1 inches, explosiveness that plays in a very fast right-handed swing too.
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Drake Hawpe (TX, 2027) was an attention-getter when he stepped into the box each round. His 98.4 mph average EV is the third-highest in All-American Game history – trailing only Beau Peterson's (KS) all-time mark (100.8) and Broder Katke's from last year – and it pairs with the kind of repeat-barrel consistency that scouts dream on in a left-handed slugger. Hawpe separates himself from his peers with an electric, short path that lands consistent on-the-barrel contact to all fields, and his huge, innate strength turns doubles into home runs already. He was launching balls in BP, swatting nine total homers, earning a semifinals appearance in the event's home run derby. Hawpe was rightfully one of the day's most notable performers as a result.
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+ Full leaderboard (33)
Jake Turner (NV, 2027) topped the max EV board at 107.0 mph, with Hawpe (106.4) and Brogan Witcher (106.3) right behind. Hawpe's longest ball traveled 429 feet, the third-longest in AAG history and just shy of the all-time record (431). Meanwhile, Alec Cabrera (106.0 max EV) and Cullen Scott (403-foot blast) offer some of the best bat strength on the 2028 roster.
Raw exit velocity tells you a hitter is strong while Blast's bat speed and rotational acceleration data helps capture how that raw power can translate to game swings. Last year, we framed the elite zone as the 'Impact Band', which is 75-plus mph bat speed paired with 18g-plus of rotational acceleration. This is the torque profile Blast associates with BP power that shows up in games. Here's where the 2026 field landed:
Bubble size scales with average exit velocity. Dashed gold box = the “Impact Band” (75+ mph bat speed & 18g+ rotational acceleration).
Just one Prep Baseball All-American checked both boxes: Jake Cueto (FL, 2027). The Miami commit recorded 78.7 mph average bat speed and an event-best 28.3g rotational acceleration. He backed it with a 94.7 mph average EV and a 100.9 max, which signals that while the engine here is excellent as is, his lean 6-foot, 180-pound build suggests his in-game results may yet have another level of production in store as he naturally matures and adds strength. Cueto has all kinds of indicators that there's next-level ingredients here, whether that's in college or pro ball.
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Brogan Witcher (CA, 2027) generated the biggest raw engine at the event, and in AAG history, averaging 83.9 mph of bat speed, with the massive right-handed bat strength (106.3 max EV; 420-foot max distance) to match. With that said, Witcher's 6-foot-4, 210-pound physique might even be more exciting as a pitching prospect. Though if that's the case, then Witcher has arguably the brightest future on the field in Miami, considering just how good the bat looked on Friday. Jake Welch (UT, 2028; 80.3), meanwhile, looks like a junior ready for liftoff. Game-ready bat speed like this is certainly noteworthy, and it feels like he's only scratching the surface physically. Utah's rising juniors look like one of the most talent-packed in the country, honestly, and Welch is the headliner.
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Behind Cueto on the torque board, Jakob Groeschel (OH, 2028; 26.4g), Leo Nockley (PA, 2027; 22.4g), Landon Bonner (TX, 2028; 22.1g) and Lio Garcia (GA, 2028; 22.0g) all cleared the 18g bar, a threshold that's helped preview players who continue to break through at the next level. These are players with twitch and athleticism that look primed for a breakout before they graduate high school, if not soon there after.
So, if bat speed and rotational acceleration tell us how much engine a hitter brings, let's take a look at the additional data Blast provides that can help us really get into the weeds on which buckets these players' swings currently fall into, using metrics like attack angle, time to contact, as well as the device's connection scores. Broadly, hitters have historically been placed into one or two profiles (sometimes both): Contact (quick and compact to the ball, on-plane, barrel in the zone early with a stable connection); or Impact (steeper lift paired with big rotational torque).
What we did is map each swing below using launch window and connection quality. Even though these were players swinging in a BP setting, it's still interesting to see how their swings are shaped and in order to forecast how they might evolve over the next few years.
Each bubble is a hitter's average Blast swing. Inside the gold band = launching in the 10–16° window; higher up = a more stable connection through contact; gold = quicker to the ball; bigger = more bat speed. The most complete swings live high, inside the band.
A tight group flashed the Contact-first blueprint, which you'll find high up and inside the gold band. Malachi Butler (GA, 2027) sat right in the heart of the 10-16° window (12.0° avg.) with a quick 0.136-second time to contact from a clean, repeatable, barrel-first look that aligns with his all-fields, low-chase reputation he came in with. Elyjah Mason (CA, 2028; 10.3° attack angle with one of the event's best connection scores) and Tyce Johnson (CA, 2028; 12.8°, quick 0.135-second trigger) both fit the same mold, and left-handed-hitting catcher Jack Rhodes (TN, 2028) joined them with an 11.9° attack angle dead in the window, an on-plane bat, and a 102.5 mph max EV that traveled neary 400 feet.
No swing graded out more complete than Leo Nockley's (PA, 2027). The undersized but loud lefty paired a 16.4° attack angle at the top of the productive band with the field's best connection grades, and there's natural lift here as well.
On the Impact path, Jake Cueto (FL, 2027) separates himself yet again. Beyond the engine we described previously, Cueto has the quickest bat to the ball in the group (0.122 seconds) attached to a lofted 20.7° attack angle and a genuinely elite rotation score. This is a rare quick-with-lift combo that you don't see often, not even at events like this one. Jakob Groeschel (OH, 2028) brings a flatter, line-drive plane with elite rotation and quick timing, while Theo Swafford (CA, 2028) is pure lift and torque: a 17.9° attack angle, a quick 0.136s time to contact, with explosive rotation. It's a glorious left-handed swing and he launched some high and far left-handed homers on Friday that were simply fun to watch carry into the upper deck here in Miami.
Lastly, while Alec Cabrera (FL, 2028) didn't lift quite as many balls over the fence on this day, his rounds of BP were definitely among the loudest of the day. His left-handed swing averaged a 13.0° attack angle right in the optimal window along with high-end EVs (106.0 mph max). He looks like a certified middle-of-the-order bat at the next level, as is.
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