THE MAP
Introducing THE MAP
This is something I’ve been messing around with for the past few months. The idea was to create an engaging and interactive tool that provides relevant info on the players that I’m covering. Behind the scenes I am a heavy google sheets user and I love organizing information and data in ways that help me cover the northeast area. However, a lot of the info I utilize ends up being hidden from my audience for one reason or another. With Looker Studio, I’m able to present a lot of that information to my audience while still managing to ‘control’ what people are able to see.
THE MAP is a fun, easy to use tool that people can use in a variety of ways. Users are able to find some basic information on the players I’m following including heights/weights, draft year eligibility, age at the time of the draft, and more. People can also look to see how many times I’ve seen a specific player and when I saw them last. You’ll also be able to see if videos or notes are available for a specific player. Unfortunately, I am unable to embed Looker Studio reports directly into Substack at this time. That means in order to use THE MAP you will have to go to a separate webpage. Hopefully that will change, but for the time being you can click on the picture below to bring you to Looker Studio where you can interact and play around with THE MAP in full. Below you can see a preview of what THE MAP looks like.
Using THE MAP
After following the link to the Looker Studio page, you’ll see a picture of a map, a table of players at the bottom, and a Draft Class slider to the right of the map. You can scroll through the full table without interacting with the map if you wish. This will allow you to see information for all of the college players I am ‘tracking’ to date. The table is organized in alphabetical order by School + Last Name by default, but can be changed by clicking on the header of a category (First, Height, Year, etc.) There are currently over 300+ college players listed with 50 players showing up at a time in the table. In the bottom right of the table you’ll see a couple of arrows which you can click to move on to the next group of 50 players.
If you look at THE MAP you will see that each state I am covering is colored slightly differently. This represents the total amount of players being tracked in that particular state. The darker the reddish color gets, the more college players there are in that state. For example, New York has the most players with 131 players while Maine only has 4. If you click on a specific state it will update the table at the bottom of the page to only include players from that state. Here is what you’ll see if you click on New York for example:
This makes it easier to sort through information and see what’s going on in a specific state. Clicking on New York again will reset the table to it’s original state.
You can also use the Draft Class slider to further sort out information. Sliding all the way to the left side will make it so only players in the 2025 draft class are included in the table. Sliding to the right will only include 2027 players and sliding to the middle will include eligible players from the 2026 class. Here is what it looks like when you change the sliders to only include 2026 draft eligible players:
Pretty straightforward, no? Every time you select a state from the map or adjust the Draft Class slider the table will update automatically.
Live Look Tiers (LL Tier)
The column labeled LL Tiers IS NOT a ranking. I separate players into 4 different LL Tiers, T1, T2, T3, and T4. What this shows is how I am prioritizing each player in terms of seeing them in person, hence live look, a term I borrowed from my days at Prospects Live. While perceived skill/draft stock is a big factor in determining what LL Tier I place a player, there are a multitude of factors in play. Simply looking at which LL Tier a player falls into won’t tell you how good the player is or how he actually stacks up against other players in the table. Once again for the folks in the back, LL Tier IS NOT a ranking.
These Tiers will change over time. Some players will have TBD in their LL Tier column. This means I am still in the process of determining how to prioritize this player. Freshman will often be listed as TBD as I work to gather more information and see how things play out. A player with N/A in the LL Tier means I have already seen this player during the spring. Over time, most players with an N/A will have a note included about them, more on that later. After the spring college season concludes, many of the N/A listings will reset as I begin to track down players in summer ball, fall ball, and spring 2026.
Videos + Notes
Towards the right side of the table you’ll see a column labeled VIDEO and another labeled NOTE? The video column will include links to video I have taken of that player. The vast majority of these links will bring you to Youtube, though I plan on adding links to past tweets that included video as well. will also direct you to a specific article that includes embedded video. All you have to do is click on the link in the VIDEO column and it should automatically redirect you to video of that player.
The last column, NOTES?, tells you if there is a written note/report on that player. If there is an X in that column, a note is available. I will be adding player notes regularly in the months ahead with an emphasis on players that are eligible for the 2025 draft. If you want to check out a note for a specific player all you need to do is click on the Notes/Reports tab on the far left of your screen (see below) and it will bring you to a new page.
The Player Notes/Reports page will only show players who have a note. Some players will have a link to an article which means I wrote about that player in an article. Copy and paste the link to find the article with info about that player. As of now 49 players have some kind of note included with many, many more on the horizon. Below you can see some examples for several players.
For the time being THE MAP will be available to all free subscribers of Northeast Draft Guide. That could change depending on how things work out, but my goal has always been to keep as much of my content readily available as possible. However, THE MAP will NOT include things like rankings. I have to keep the lights on somehow, right? In the near future I will be adding a separate map specifically for high school players. Again, you can access THE MAP by clicking on the first picture in this article or by following the link below: