The Nationals have agreed to phrases with second total choose Dylan Crews, experiences Jon Heyman of the New York Submit (Twitter link). The precise signing bonus is unclear, although Heyman signifies it’ll are available round $9MM.
That’s proper consistent with the choice’s $8.99MM slot worth. It’s very doubtless that’ll go down because the second-highest bonus on this 12 months’s class. Paul Skenes landed a file $9.2MM upon going first total to the Pirates. The Skenes/Crews duo turned the primary pair of faculty teammates to ever go 1-2 within the MLB draft.
Crews, a right-handed hitting outfielder, has been thought to be a prime novice expertise going again to highschool. He went to LSU after groups declined to fulfill his bonus calls for within the 2020 draft. Crews had a monster profession for the Tigers, posting an OPS north of 1.100 in all three seasons whereas enjoying in school baseball’s prime convention.
Thought to be a possible first total choose all through the 2023 season, Crews greater than met expectations. He raked a .426/.567/.713 clip over 344 plate appearances as a junior. He related on 18 residence runs, walked at an elite 20.6% clip and saved his strikeouts to a 13.4% price. Crews received the Golden Spikes Award as school baseball’s prime performer and helped LSU to a nationwide championship.
Going into the draft, he was nonetheless very a lot within the working for the primary choose. Every of Baseball America, Keith Legislation of the Athletic, Kiley McDaniel of ESPN, and MLB Pipeline rated Crews the #1 or #2 participant within the class. He topped the pre-draft rankings at BA and The Athletic. Pittsburgh finally elected for the potential top-of-the-rotation starter in Skenes. Washington nabbed Crews at #2.
The 6’1″ outfielder is credited with a possible plus hit/energy mixture. He’s more likely to start his profession in heart area. Evaluators recommend he would possibly finally be bumped to proper area however ought to be an above-average to plus nook outfielder if that occurs. It’s troublesome to seek out fault with a lot in his profile. Crews would doubtless have gone first total in most draft lessons, however Skenes is broadly thought to be one of the best school pitching prospect in additional than a decade.
Baseball America slots Crews as the game’s #3 total prospect behind Jackson Holliday and Jackson Chourio. He’s one slot forward of fellow Washington outfielder James Wooden (and two locations above Skenes). The Nats will hope for Crews and Wooden to anchor their outfields of the longer term as soon as they pull out of their ongoing rebuild.
