The Pirates Prospects 2012 Prospect Guide will be released by the end of this week. I’ve already placed the order for the first shipment from the publisher, and that order was shipped out today. I should receive it by tomorrow or Wednesday, at which point the book will officially go on sale. You can order your copy on the products page. Here are some updates on the book:
-For those of you attending PirateFest, I will be there all three days selling the book. Stop by the Pirates Prospects booth and pick up your copy. As a special offer, the first 100 copies sold come with a copy of the 2011 Prospect Guide for free. Even if you already bought your copy, stop by and visit us at the booth to talk some Pirates baseball.
-If you’re planning to order your book on the site, you can do so on the products page. Right now there are about 50 books left in the online inventory from the first shipment. I’ll be ordering more at the end of the week, although they might not arrive until after Christmas. If you’re looking to get the book by Christmas, I suggest placing an order this week, or picking a copy up at PirateFest.
-All of the books in the first shipment come with a coupon code for the Pirates Prospects 2012 Annual, which will be released in early February. The Annual will go on pre-sale by the end of this week, and you can use your coupon code during the pre-sale period. The coupon code will only be included in the pre-sale books, the books at PirateFest, and the 50 remaining books that I mentioned above.
-For those of you who have already placed an order online (or will be ordering this week), the books will be shipped out Thursday and Friday. You’ll probably get an e-mail alert on Wednesday with a tracking number. Normally when I ship something out by Friday, it arrives in Pittsburgh by Monday and other parts of the country by Tuesday or Wednesday. If you ordered the book as a Christmas gift, it should arrive in time.
-There will be an eBook version that will be released later this week. I’m currently in the process of finishing up the formatting for the eBook. I’ll have information up later this week on how you can purchase that version of the Prospect Guide.
Now we get to the part where I give you my “here is why you should buy the books” speech. The Prospect Guide and the Annual are the fuel of this site. Last year the sales from the book allowed me to provide coverage from Spring Training for a week, as well as live coverage from West Virginia, State College, Altoona, and Pittsburgh throughout the year. It allowed me to purchase a radar gun and a camera for the site, so that I could provide accurate pitch readings throughout the year, as well as most of the images you see on the site. Most importantly, the book sales allow me to work on this site full time.
I’ll be honest. If this site wasn’t a full time job it would probably close down. I spend over 100 hours a week working on the site, whether that’s writing, editing, web site maintenance, marketing, driving to games, or spending seven or eight hours at the ball park for a two and a half hour game. I’ve put over 12,000 miles on my car this year just from driving to games. I choose to do this, so I’m definitely not complaining. But the reason I can provide this coverage and dedicate so much time to the site is because the book sales make it possible.
The sales from the 2012 Prospect Guide and the 2012 Annual will help this site grow even more. If all goes well I plan on covering Spring Training during the entire month of March. Last year I got a ton of information in the seven days that I was down there. I had player features every day, video of the top prospects, interviews with team officials, and a lot of other features. I’m looking forward to all of the information I can get by attending Spring Training for the entire month of March. I’m also planning on increasing the live coverage throughout the year. I’m hoping to cover Gerrit Cole’s debut, and I also want to see Josh Bell as much as possible throughout the 2012 season.
Aside from being the fuel of the site, the books are great products. I spent three and a half months writing the Prospect Guide. It is 204 pages long with over 250 player reports, including reports on newly added players like Yamaico Navarro and the Rule 5 additions. It features the top 50 prospects in the system, a depth chart, the all-tools teams, and newly added this year: prospect rankings broken down by tiers. The book also features an article on the top four pitching prospects, and has the usual reference information, like the top draft and international bonuses in team history, the Rule 5 and minor league free agency dates, and stats and profiles on every player in the system.
Buy your copy of the Prospect Guide today, or stop by and pick up a copy at PirateFest.
