College Baseball Daily continues our countdown to the start of the 2012 College Baseball season by checking in on the Top 100 Players in the country. We will be providing one player per day until we reach number 1.
We continue the countdown today at number 75 with Arkansas Dominic Ficociello. The sophomore switch hitting infielder hails from Fullerton, California where he attended Fullerton Union High School. He was a four year starter for the school. His best season came as a junior when he hit .495 batting average, 10 homers and 36 RBI. The Detroit Tigers selected him in the 23rd round of the MLB Draft in 2010 but he decided to attend Arkansas.
He made an immediate impact with the Razorbacks with 61 appearances including 59 starts as a freshman in 2011. He finished the year with a a team-best .335 with four homers and a team-leading 50 RBI. Dominic was named a Louisville Slugger Freshman All-American by Collegiate Baseball and a member of the SEC All-Freshman and All-Defensive Teams.
He spent the summer of 2011 with the USA Collegiate National Team. He appeared in 13 games (12 starts) with a .283 average and nine RBI. Baseball America named him the 14th best pro prospect after the summer was over.
You can check out the rest of our Top 100 by clicking here.
Photos courtesy of Arkansas Media Relations
15 comments
Why would a scouting video for Dominic include 2 strikeouts and two flyouts and a number of bad swings? What are you trying to show, that he was overmatched playing for Team USA?
Our staff was at those games so that is why that video was included.Â
Good point. Now that’s funny. I guess bad video is better than none. What?
How is this list selected anyway? Some of these players on here have dubious stats, like their last college season they hit .280 and low .100s in the summer?
The list is based on personal observations from CBD Editor Brian Foley, CBD Assistant Editor Mark Rafferty, CBD Senior Writers Kat Cornetta and William Knox.
Do you think you could catch him a prolonged slump next time?
Sorry about the tone of my email, I am glad to see you selected an Arkansas player, but at first after watching the videos I suspected an Ole Miss fan was actually behind the video selection.Â
I would think the top 25 might be a relatively easy list to compile, but hundeds of players could realistically fill the #25 to -#100 slots. Must be difficult to narrow it down.
I enjoy your site, and check it frequently, you are posting lots of good information. I know of some very good seniors that went undrafted that I am hoping to see on your list, very good baseball players and high baseball IQ but maybe not as athletic as some.Â
I was disappointed to see Ficociello rated at only 75th. Not to belittle any of these fine athletes but Dom was a 4 time All-American, SEC Freshman Player of the Week twice, had the highest batting average on the 2011 Razorback team, most RBI’s (tied for highest in Arkansas history) and made many game changing plays throughout the season. Yet he is lower than Ryne Stanek who is a great kid with loads of potential, but wasn’t at his best last season. This just puts the whole list in question.
Elaine, last season Dominic finished 363rd in the entire country in batting average. So I should have at least 150 or so (lets say half the players graduated or moved to the minors) guys ahead of him ALONE just on batting average.Â
He also finished 145th in RBI and 132nd in Sac flies in the country. He did NOT get into the Top 150 in any other category.
Dominic hit .283 in 13 games with Team USA and obviously struggled when we saw him play as you see with the video above. Remember, Team USA played a joke of a schedule in the summer of 2011 playing against NECBL teams, one game against a Coastal Plains League team, two games against the U-18 squad (HIGH SCHOOL KIDS), and five games against a Japan team that had one decent pitcher that could play SEC caliber baseball.Â
Oh and two more things. You might want to tell the staffer talking loud enough to be taped that Fic does work out every day. As past scouts have all mentioned, he has not reached his full projection yet, but judging by his exceptional batting skills, when he does, who knows how far that ball will go? If your staff had been at Fenway Park for practice, they would have seen Fic hit one out of the park. And second, how did he get to Arkansas? They asked him.
A home run in PRACTICE?? Wow, that is amazing. Noone ever hits homers in practice.Â
I was at the USA game at Fenway also in which they actually LOST to the NECBL All-Stars in front of 75 people.Â
Please reread the comment – never said he hit a home run, I said he hit one out of the park in practice. If you want confirmation, ask Coach Van Horn. Also I appreciate your recitation of national comparison statistics for this player, but you didn’t use those for the other players I mentioned. Of course pitchers aren’t expected to bat, so there’s no comparison there, is there? Just based on your info for each player, the rankings aren’t justified by the past year’s performance. You put alot of stock in high school/old performances while totally ignoring more recent accomplishments (again, please see above).  And as I said, your comments and the comments of the two men taping the 2 bits of practice (which were not representative of his day to day performance) did not mesh with what many other scouts and coaches have said. As for the loss to NECBL at Fenway, they lost that one and one against the Japanese team. Since each team they played did so at parks close to them while the Collegiate Nat’l Team travelled almost daily, the team played a more gruelling schedule than any other team including pro teams. And, unlike Stanek who was asked to sub in for a couple of games, Fic played the whole summer series as a starter. And by the way, he could have gone pro after high school (Cincinnati and Detroit wanted him).Â
I realize you don’t have the time or manpower to look at every detail of each player’s life, but your ratings are taken seriously by everyone who cares about any of these kids. I know 4 of them. They’re great kids, all with great potential for futures in baseball. But if you do rate them, it should be done fairly, based on more than just a cursory look at a few minutes of practice and a lot of gossipy background chatter.  My point was it came across as unprofessional and malicious.  Â
First of all, we saw Ficociello four straight days during the USA’s tour of the NECBL. I believe the Fenway game was near the end of that period but don’t recall exactly.
Anyways, Ficociello got bigger from what I heard and should be a great person to follow this season.
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I can appreciate how difficult it is to truly evaluate all the kids in the nation for a list like this. There will always be digruntled readers. Most of all it really isn’t taken into consideration by anyone out there that matters (ie: scouts, scouting directors, owners etc.). That being said as a freshmen in the SECÂ Ficociello hit 318( actually hitting better than 350 overall until regionals where he was really snakebit.). His average began to soar against Florida, South Carolina Georgia etc. after coming out of a 0 for 21 slump early in league play. Speaking of which he started 1 for 11 I believe with USA, so if you really want to be honest he probably was their most dynamic hitter after that. Also Elaine, Dominic hit 4 out of Fenway in practice. 2 from each side. All that being said Brian we all still are glad you do what you do. Thanks
Gary did you change your name to Elaine? Let the guy do his job. Some people never change…
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