Looking Ahead to the 2025 Draft

A way too early look at who may go 1-1 next year

If this had been a few years ago, the draft would have happened a month ago, and we would be well on our way to looking at prospects for the new class. That’s changed now that the Draft is tied in with the All-Star Game, but that doesn’t mean we can’t look at players for next year already. Here’s a player from each of the four basic demographics: prep hitter, prep pitcher, college hitter, and college pitcher, that I think will end up being the best of their group around this time next year.

Prep Hitter - Ethan Holliday (Stillwater, OK)

Similar to his brother Jackson, Ethan Holliday is a top prospect in his draft class. Unlike Jackson, who wasn’t really seen as a top prospect at this point in the draft cycle, Ethan has been relatively famous for awhile now and is regarded by many evaluators as a Top 5 pick in the 2025 draft. Ethan is a physical guy, standing 6’4” 190, which gives natural concern that he may have to move off of shortstop at some point, despite his present smooth actions at short. That’s a minor concern at this point, because Holliday projects to be a plus hitter with double plus power. He is extremely polished as a hitter at this point, which you might expect from someone with an older brother like Jackson and a father like Matt, but it’s impressive, nonetheless. There is some amount of swing-and-miss, but right now Ethan Holliday is the favorite to be the number one pick next year in my opinion, and honestly would probably be 1-1 in this year’s class as well.

Prep Pitcher - Jack Lafflam (Scottsdale, AZ)

It’s unlikely that Lafflam will be a top 5 pick, just because prep pitchers are notoriously fickle, but amongst this demographic Lafflam is who has caught my eye the most. Standing at 6’6’’ 175, his frame oozes projection, and he has a really smooth arm action to go with it.