By Andrew Knepper; ESPNRISE.com

The 2009 Area Code Tryouts for the Milwaukee Brewers kicked off on Wednesday, July 1 at Delta Community College in Stockton, California.  In attendance were 120 of the best prep players in the Northern part of the state, above the borderline of Fresno. The tryout lasted a grueling ten hours under one hundred degree temperatures, but in the end, the Brewers were able to gather some insight who may find themselves on the Brewers Gray roster for the 2009 Area Code Games in Long Beach this summer.

The first eye opening moment of the tryout was when P/1B Eric Jaffe stood in for his batting practice and launched several bombs to all sides of the field.  Jaffe, standing in at a solid 6-foot-3 220 pounds, out of Bishop O'Dowd High in Oakland made a statement with his raw power that had scouts talking about him the rest of the day.

Also showing good bats in the batting practice session was Alex Balog from Archbishop Mitty, Jake Rodriguez from Elk Grove, Tyler Kuresa from Oakmont High and Caleb Natov from hailing from the home of C.C. Sabathia, Vallejo High. 

In the infield drills, displaying good actions and strong arms were Joe Mello, James Roberts and Cody Zimmerman.  Mello had the smoothest actions of the threesome with Roberts having the best arm and Zimmerman having the strong bat. 

A player out of the Area Code Baseball Camp the day before, Javier Carrillo Jr. also displayed a great knack for fielding making some dazzling plays throughout the day.

The twenty-five outfielders that were in attendance had the best battle to make the midday cut due to their numbers and Joc Pederson out of Palo Alto displayed the right tools with great speed, a 6.7 60-Yard dash, an outstanding infield arm and a good gap power bat.  Also making the midday cut were DonAndre Clark, Scott Jarvis and OF/C Blake Grant-Parks.

Parks not only threw from the outfield, he also caught the entire day and had impressive pop times of 1.97, 2.00, and 2.06.  During the simulated game, Parks threw out one runner that had a good 2 strides left to reach the bag at second base.  This "wowed” all in attendance and to make things better for Parks, he is only a sophomore graduating in the year of 2011. 

Moving onto the pitchers, nobody topped the well-known AJ Vanegas, who came out of the gate throwing 90-92 with a solid slider that hovered around 79-81.  Other top velocities from the day included Braden Young (86-88) Cole Wells (88-89) Andrew Millner (88-89) Will Anderson (86-88) Robby Rowland (87-89) and Ben Griset (87-88)

The Milwaukee Brewers nest tryout will be held at Orange Coast College on July 7 and 8.  They will be looking to fill in the remaining spots for the two Californian teams that they hold.