It turned Sunday into a prep prospect party for the Detroit Tigers as they grabbed high school talent with their first two picks in the 2025 MLB Draft, snatching catcher Michael Oliveto of Hauppage (New York) High with the 34th overal pick – 10 spots after making Florida prep shortstop Jordan Yost their first choice at No. 24 overall.
The Tigers had been tied to Oliveto, who like Yost, is a left-handed hitter, and who unlike the 6-foot Joyce, is a big lad – 6-3, 185 pounds, and a young man with enough intellect to have earned a Yale scholarship.
Oliveto is, not surprisingly, considered to have prime-time power and a sophisticated hit-tool. Whether he can continue as a catcher or is better targeted down the road for another position is of little immediate concern to the Tigers, who clearly like his potential, both ways.
The Tigers’ calling-card through three drafts under front-office general Scott Harris have been prep hitters with up-the-middle talents. They struck twice Sunday in a manner reminiscent of last year’s first-round pick of Bryce Rainer and the Max Clark-Kevin McGonigle dual haul in 2023.
Yost, 18, is a left-handed batter from Sickles High in Tampa, Florida, about 50 miles from the Tigers’ farm headquarters in Lakeland. He is 6-foot, 170 pounds, and is viewed as a skilled hitter with the kind of contact-crunch and strike-zone eye an organization celebrates.
Yost is a high-ceiling pick, for sure, with two-way, bedrock talents that conform to the Tigers’ concentration on up-the-middle draft skills and baseball savvy, even when a prospect is as young as Yost.
The Tigers took a break from their prep-heavy ways when they chose Malachi Witherspoon, a 6-foot-2, right-handed fire-thrower from the University of Oklahoma with their second-round turn, No. 62 overall.
Witherspoon, 20, is the twin brother of Kyson Witherspoon, also from the University of Oklahoma, who was Boston’s first-round pick Sunday. Malachi is considered to have a power fastball (up to 99 mph) and slider, with control issues the Tigers clearly believe can be harnessed.
Malachi Witherspoon was a 12th-round pick by the Diamondbacks in 2022 and then was considered between the brothers to be a better MLB prospect. But he turned down a heavy offer to pursue college baseball.
Wrapping up their four-player, three-round beginning to the draft, the Tigers late Sunday evening settled on Ben Jacobs, a left-handed starter from Arizona State, as their third-round choice, and the draft’s 98th overall pick.
Jacobs is 6-foot-1, 195 pounds, and began his college career at UCLA before transferring to ASU.
He was the second consecutive college player taken by Detroit during Sunday’s opening draft turns, which continue Monday with rounds 4 through 20.
Jacobs is regarded as having a strong, all-around repertoire that isn’t distinguished by any particular four-seam fastball fury or any single premier secondary pitch. But his steady work for the Sun Devils and projection as a pitcher who can help, even at the far end, a big-league rotation apparently lured the Tigers.
The Tigers have gone for prep bats in early rounds spanning the three years Tigers drafts have been headed by Rob Metzler and Mark Conner, all since Scott Harris became Tigers front-office boss in 2022.
The draft opened with a Sunday surprise: Oklahoma high school shortstop Eli Willits going to the Nationals at No. 1 overall.
The Angels followed with a second surprise: Tyler Bremner, a right-handed pitcher from University of California-Santa Barbara.
Kade Anderson, a left-handed fireball from LSU who was believed to be going first overall, fell into the third overall slot owned by Seattle.
The Rockies followed at fourth with the player they were most tied to: prep shortstop Ethan Holliday, brother of Orioles second baseman Jackson Holliday, and son of ex-Cardinals great Matt Holliday.
This is a developing story. Come back soon to detroitnews.com for more.
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