2013 Draft: Jordan Sheffield

The 2013 amateur draft will be held from June 6-8 this year, and between now and then I’m going to highlight some prospects individually rather than lump them together into larger posts.

Jordan Sheffield | RHP

Background
A Tennessee kid who lives an hour or so outside of Chattanooga, Sheffield threw just three innings for Tullahoma High School this spring before blowing out his elbow and requiring Tommy John surgery. He had the procedure yesterday according to Maurice Patton. Sheffield is committed to Vanderbilt. He is Gary’s nephew.

Scouting Report
Listed at 6-foot-1 and 175 lbs., Sheffield sat in the low-90s for most of his career before sitting 94-95 with a few 97s during the Team USA 16-and-under trials last summer and the Perfect Game World Wood Bat Championship in October. He didn’t get much of an opportunity to show if the velocity spike was legit before the injury this spring. A power upper-70s/low-80s curveball is his top secondary pitch and a legitimate put-away offering, and his low-80s changeup is very much a work in progress. Sheffield showed pretty good control throughout his high school career. Here’s some more video.

Miscellany
Neither Baseball America (subs. req’d) nor Keith Law (subs. req’d) ranked Sheffield as a top 50 draft prospect in their most recent rankings, but both lists were published after the right-hander initially suffered the injury in early-March. Law called him a borderline top 100 guy earlier this week following the news of the elbow reconstruction. Sheffield was considered a tough sign before the injury, but the Yankees have a little bit of a history with buying guys away from Vanderbilt (Dellin Betances, specifically). There’s a decent chance he’ll go completely undrafted now. Sheffield is someone the Yankees could target with a late-round pick — sometime after the tenth round so they don’t risk losing draft pool money in case he doesn’t sign — just to see if he’ll turn pro should they have some extra draft pool money lying around.