The journey from high school draftee to big leaguer can often be a long and lonely one. Even with the proliferation of prospect rankings, a player taken early in the first round can largely disappear from public view, at least in terms of watching him in action.

For at least a day, though, the MLB Pipeline Game of the Month is going to open a window into the process these young players are going through. We’re heading to Bradenton, Fla., on Thursday night at 6:30 p.m. ET, as the Marauders, the Single-A affiliate of the Pittsburgh Pirates, host the Dunedin Blue Jays. 

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This first Game of the Month glimpse at the Florida State League will be available for free on MLB.com and the MLB Pipeline homepage and can also be viewed through MLB.TV, MiLB.TV and the First Pitch app.

The star of the show will be Termarr Johnson, the No. 4 overall pick of the 2022 Draft and the Pirates’ No. 1 prospect. Johnson, who is No. 20 on our Top 100, was slowed a little bit out of the gate with a hamstring issue and took a little while to get his feet under him once he returned to the active lineup. But the left-handed-hitting middle infielder, who many scouts felt was the best pure prep hitting prospect they had seen in recent memory, has found a bit of a groove of late.

From the middle of May until the end of Bradenton’s series this past Sunday in Tampa (Yankees), Johnson has posted an OPS north of .900 and slugged his first two homers of the season. His .406 on-base percentage for the season would put him seventh in the FSL if he had enough at-bats to qualify and even despite his slow start has posted a very solid 129 wRC+ (weighted runs created plus)

Johnson is not the only ranked prospect who’ll be in the ballpark. In addition to Johnson, the Marauders’ lineup will also feature No. 26 prospect Shalin Polanco, one of the Pirates’ big international signings in 2021, making his full-season debut. The visiting dugout will feature Blue Jays No. 5 prospect Tucker Toman, who was taken with the No. 77 overall pick in last year’s Draft, No. 16 Adrian Pinto and No. 20 Manuel Beltre.

As part of the MLB Pipeline Game of the Month, be sure to follow the @MiLB and @MLBPipeline Instagram feeds. On the @MiLB side, we’ll bring fans inside the ballpark with a pregame tour of LECOM Park, and over on @MLBPipeline, I’ll have a live Q&A with Johnson. Later down the line, circle back to MLB.com/Pipeline for interviews with other prospects.