2025 Prep Baseball Minnesota State Games: Top Outlier Pitches

July 8, 2025
Dayne McNaughton
Upper Midwest, Prep Baseball

Minnesota, USA - The 2025 Minnesota State Games had it's fair share of fuel and filth. Utilizing our Trackman Baseball unit, we collected data including Velocity, Spin Rate, Induced Vertical Break, Horizontal Movement, Vertical Approach Angle and more. Today we will be looking at 10 pitchers that showcased plus stuff at the State Games these past couple weeks.

+ Tate Becker's Fastball

Tate Becker fastball ranked at the top of the 2026 leaderboards in our Rise+ metric, that measures how a pitch rises vertically through the strike zone. Becker's fastball had an average velocity of 86.4 MPH, along with 18.7 inches of Induced Vertical Break, with 5.3 inches of horizontal break, creating slight cut in the baseball compared to a traditional 4SFB.

The one metric that makes this stand out the most is his Vertical Appoach Angle, which averaged -4.2. Vertical Approach Angle Measures how steep the ball enters the strike zone, between -3.7 and -4.4 means the ball is coming in the zone flat, creating a rising effect when the hitter is in the box.

+ Daschle Duwe's Curveball

Daschle Duwe spun a curveball 35% of the time during his state games outing and it was gross. The pitches velocity averaged at 74.3 MPH and spun as high as 2686 RPMs. The pitch averaged -7.4 IVB and -9.9 horizontal break. With the potential for more movement with high spin, along with having lots of feel for the pitch, Duwe's ability to spin offspeed is clearly there and could carry him further along in his career.

+ Carter Nelson's Splitter

Carter Nelson posses a 6-foot-5 frame and an 89 MPH fastball, but today we are talking about the split piece. For starters, Nelson kills spin on this pitch, averaging 603 RPMs, while also throwing it on average at 76 MPH. Carter averages an IVB of 2.6, which is a roughly 13 inch difference in vertical break from his fastball, making his splitter an effective pitch to get whiffs on.

+ Jon Harvey's Slider

Jon Harvey spun a slider that many would call a sweeper. Getting up to 18.1 inches of horizontal break, while averageing 2.2 inches of IVB, this pitch is essentially a sideways curveball. Throwing it on average at 71.7 MPH, and can get up to 29 inches of horizontal difference between his fastball and slider.

+ Connor Finn's Fastball

Connor Finn's fastball movement on the outside looks average. With an IVB of 15.4 and HB of -12.9. However, Finn posses a VAA of -4.1, along with an average velocity of 89.8, making the ball have a rising effect through the zone, allowing him to get lots of swing and miss in the upper 1/3 of the strike zone.

+ Griffin Epema's Slider

Griffin Epema has been on an upward track from when he did his first Prep Baseball Showcase. He ran his fastball up to 88 MPH at Baseball Day Minnesota and tossed his electric slider. Epemas slider average -15.4 inches of horizontal break at the State Games, maxing out at 20 inches of horizontal break.

+ Will Von Bank's Curveball

Will Von Bank stayed with the trend of throwing breaking balls with crazy horizontal break. His curveball velocity averaged 71.1 while having an average horizontal break of -18 inches. Neadless to say, it is a frisbee of a pitch, topping our Sweep+ metric at 124.

Learn More About Metrics

VERTICAL APPROACH ANGLE CLICK HERE

RISE+ METRIC CLICK HERE

SWEEEP+ METRIC CLICK HERE