2023 MLB Draft Roundup: Rounds 16-20
A Breakdown of my Favorite Picks From Each Round
Now that MLB Draft has passed us by, it’s time for me to reflect on each round of the draft. This series will start at round 20 and make its way all the way to round 1. Each week i’ll discuss one of my favorite picks from each round.
*Quick disclaimer. All graphics are created using Trackman data. If a player has a 10 HR for example, and the graphic only shows 3, the other 7 were hit in stadiums where data was not collected with Trackman.*
As we all know, there aren’t many guys who sign in the later rounds. A few seniors who have no other options, and some third year guys who want to go into pro ball. A decent amount of high school guys go in these rounds as either a relationship builder for the future, or taking a shot that a guy might hate college so much he just wants to get right into pro ball. You also get the “joke” guy who gets drafted and this year it was DJ Uiagalelei (shoutout to the Dodgers and shoutout to the fact he was labeled a two way player by MLB). To be fair DJ did throw 95 at one point in 2019 before going off to school so.
Round 20: Pierce Bennett, Wake Forest, Philadelphia Phillies
Alright into the meat and potatoes. In the 20th round, I had 13 options to choose from and honestly there were some pretty solid players. However, in my mind the clear best signing from this round was Wake Forest’s Pierce Bennett drafted by the Philadelphia Phillies 613th overall. I promise I’m not being paid by Wake by how high I’ve been on them in 2023 (although I am open to all conversations) but this team was just so good and Pierce Bennett did not get talked about as much as he should have.
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