UVA shortstop Griff O’Ferrall and catcher/first baseman Ethan Anderson are headed to the Baltimore Orioles, who took O’Ferrall with the 32nd pick in the first round of the 2024 MLB Draft, and later took Anderson with the 61st pick in the second round on Sunday.
That’s the good news for UVA Baseball fans.
The bad news: the two shortstops of the future were taken with back-to-back picks in the second round.
The Chicago White Sox took Caleb Bonemer with the 43rd pick, and the Washington Nationals took Luke Dickerson at 44.
The signing-bonus slots for those picks are in the $2.1 million-plus range, so, they gone.
Another incoming UVA recruit, right-handed pitcher Bryan Meccage, went with the 57th pick to the Milwaukee Brewers.
That bonus slot: $1.5 million.
Maybe …
For O’Ferrall, the bonus slot is $2.8 million, not bad for a kid who was ranked the 275th-best shortstop in the high school class of 2021.
From that, O’Ferrall started and batted leadoff 185 times over three seasons for Brian O’Connor, played in two College World Series, slashed .324/.367/.454, and struck out just 24 times in 284 at bats in 2024.
The O’s, at the moment, are a bit stacked with prospects in general, and then specifically up the middle.
Obviously, there’s the Gunnar Henderson issue for O’Ferrall at shortstop, and then the minors’ top prospect, Jackson Holliday, on the verge of taking over as the second baseman of the future, probably in 2025.
Jordan Westburg is an All-Star for the first time this season at third base, a position that O’Ferrall could certainly play defensively, but he doesn’t have enough power right now to be an everyday guy at third in the bigs.
O’Ferrall’s best bet to getting to the next level is to work on developing power, work on defense at multiple positions, and play himself into being a trade piece.
For Anderson, the path to MLB is through his versatility.
Adley Rutschman, the 2019 first overall pick and 2022 AL Rookie of the Year, is entrenched at catcher for Baltimore, but Anderson, who slashed .341/.441/.560 in three seasons at Virginia, could work his way to the O’s big-league roster by being able to split his time at catcher and first, and by hitting.
The bonus slot for the 61st pick is $1.4 million.
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Chris Graham
