South Carolina Baseball: The top Gamecock commitments to go straight to the pros

Former South Carolina Baseball commitments who went on to become all-time greats in Major League Baseball

Wade Boggs: Wade Boggs (1976, 7th round pick by the Boston Red Sox) was committed to South Carolina baseball AND South Carolina football coming out of high school. Boggs was set to be on scholarship as a kicker and punter for Jim Carlen’s Gamecock football team and a walk-on to Bobby Richardson’s Gamecock baseball squad. When Richardson retired to pursue a political career, Boggs elected to sign a contract offer for $7500 from the Boston Red Sox.

The rest, as they say, is history. After a six-year climb through the Minors, Boggs became one of the best third basemen of all-time. The “Chicken Man” as he was known, never had a chance to be a Gamecock, but things worked out just fine for him. Boggs is one of just 33 players to ever amass 3000 hits and is in the Hall of Fame. He led the league in hits, runs (twice), doubles (twice), walks (twice), batting average (five times), and on-base percentage (five times) in his career.

Jose Bautista: Jose Bautista (2000, 20th round by the Pittsburgh Pirates) was committed to South Carolina and used his scholarship offer from head coach Ray Tanner as leverage to get paid a significantly-higher-than-slot $500,000 despite being picked in the 20th round.

After bouncing around the Minors for four seasons, Bautista then bounced around Big League benches for years until sticking with the Toronto Blue Jays. From 2010-2015, Bautista was one of the best bats in Major League Baseball. In that span, he made six All-Star Games, hit 227 home runs, and led all of MLB in long balls twice. He will never make the Hall of Fame, but Bautista was one of the best power bats of his era and the center piece of some massive moments in baseball history.

Bryce Harper: Bryce Harper (2010, 1st round pick by the Washington Nationals) took a unique route to Major League Baseball. His brother Bryan was slated to come to South Carolina after finishing up at the College of Southern Nevada (junior college), and Bryce briefly committed to joining him. However, the commitment from Bryce was never viewed as legitimate as Harper was never going to come to school. Instead, he elected to drop out of high school and enroll in junior college with his brother.  This made him eligible earlier for the Major League Baseball Amateur Draft.

Harper was the 1st pick of the 2010 MLB Draft while his brother completed his transfer to the Gamecocks. The younger Harper won the National League Rookie of the Year award and has since added two NL MVPs and made 7 All-Star Games. Barring the unforeseen, Harper will join Wade Boggs as should-have-been-Gamecocks who are elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.