In Chase Burns, the Cincinnati Reds hope they landed the best pitcher in the MLB Draft
The fireballing righty went 2nd overall last night.
The talk before the 2024 MLB Draft had long been about whether the Cleveland Guardians, who held the #1 overall pick, would eschew the early draft rankings and instead shake things up by taking a player they may be able to sign for under-slot value.
Instead, the talk of the draft became that the Cincinnati Reds bucked the consensus rankings and bypassed taking one of the proven college bats 2nd overall after Cleveland settled on Oregon State’s Travis Bazzana with pick #1. Despite the presence of Georgia’s Charlie Condon and Florida’s Jac Caglianone still on the board, Cincinnati returned to Wake Forest to select RHP Chase Burns at pick #2.
The consensus All-American and Golden Spikes Award semifinalist boasts an electric fastball that routinely tops 100 mph, and his slider is filthy to the point that ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel gave it a 70 grade. It was a hair-split betweeen Burns and Arkansas LHP Hagen Smith for the nod of being the ‘top’ pitcher in this particular draft class, and clearly Cincinnati showed their leanings when they played this hand.
Burns was listed by most as between the 4th and 7th best prospect in this draft class, side by side with Smith behind the before-mentioned trio of top hitters (with Caglianone, a two-way player at Florida, generally expected to focus on hitting). Cincinnati, though, clearly liked what they saw with the potential in Burns, and made him their selection almost a year to the day they selected Rhett Lowder in the 1st round of the 2023 draft out of Wake Forest, too.
