By all accounts, the Boston Red Sox appear to be positioned to take yet another position player with their top pick in the 2022 Major League Baseball Draft.
There have been plenty of mock drafts pouring out as of late, and they all seem to agree on one thing, the Red Sox taking a hitter.
In a roundtable presented by The Athletic, a beat writer from each team acted as a representative, and that trend continued Thursday. Jen McCaffrey projects the Red Sox to select Florida Gator outfielder and second baseman Sterlin Thompson.
“The Red Sox have prioritized bats in the first round the last two seasons with second baseman Nick Yorke in 2020 and shortstop Marcelo Mayer in 2021,” McCaffrey wrote. “Though both of those players were high schoolers, the top high school bats figure to be gone by the time the Red Sox pick at No. 24. Thompson is a left-handed-hitting draft-eligible sophomore who’s hit well in the SEC with a .354 average and 1.006 OPS in 66 games for the Gators this year. While he’s an offense-first player, he could strengthen the Red Sox’s minor-league outfield depth.”
The 6-foot-4, 200-pound versatile slugger is the No. 29 player on MLB Pipeline’s 2022 MLB Draft rankings. He had 27 multi-hit games and eight three-hit games during his sophomore season. To put those numbers into perspective, he had multiple hits in 41% of his games and at least three in 12% while playing in the toughest division in college baseball, the South Eastern Conference.
On top of his incredible bat-to-ball skills, Thompson saw an increase in power from his first season to the second. He hit six more doubles (16), six more home runs (11), had 24 more RBIs (51) and increased his slugging percentage from .470 to .563. He also dropped his strikeout rate from 24.5% to 18.5% and his walk rate increased from 11.4% to 14.5%.
Thompson is on a trajectory to become a feared prospect with all his numbers trending in the right direction.
