South Carolina Baseball: Gamecock Signee Luke Little Drafted in Fourth Round
By Jacob Elsey
The first member of the South Carolina baseball recruiting class has been selected in MLB Draft.
Luke Little of San Jacinto Junior College was selected by the Chicago Cubs with the 117th overall pick. He is the first and only member of South Carolina’s 2020 recruiting class to be drafted. The fourth-round selection will likely ink a professional deal with the Cubs rather than pursuing a college career in Columbia. His draft slot is valued at $472,000.
This was the second straight season that Little had been a part of a Gamecock recruiting class, as he had also planned to sign in the class of ’19. He eventually chose to spend an additional year in JUCO, where he appeared in five games in the shortened ’20 season.
At San Jacinto, the 6’8” pitcher went 1-0 on the mound, and recorded three saves. He gave up two earned runs over nine innings of work, walking three batters and striking out 17. The year prior, he made 17 appearances, recording 69 strikeouts and a 2.04 ERA.
The lefty picked up some recent buzz on social media after posting a video of a bullpen session where his velocity consistently hit triple digits, topping out at 105-mph on the radar gun. No major league pitcher touched 105-mph in a game all of last year.
Little becomes the second player with Gamecock ties to be selected in this year’s draft. Right-handed pitcher Carmen Mlodzinski was chosen by the division rival Pittsburgh Pirates yesterday, going 31st overall and becoming the 15th player in program history to be taken in the first round.