The Pittsburgh Pirates have the fourth overall draft pick in the 2022 draft, which is still five full months away. It’s not too early to take a look at the first mock draft from Baseball America, just ahead of the start of the college baseball season, plus some warm area high schools will also begin their seasons soon. For this first mock draft, BA had a scout make all of the odd-numbered picks, followed by their draft expert Carlos Collazo making all of the even-numbered picks. The scout/Collazo also gave some thoughts on the other picks as they were made.
Collazo has the Pirates selecting Brooks Lee, a college shortstop from Cal Poly. The first three picks went with Druw Jones, Termarr Johnson and Elijah Green. The scout believed that this is a good pick in that spot, saying Lee is a safe pick because his floor is so high as the best pure hitter in the college class. It’s basically the same thing that was said about Nick Gonzales before the Pirates drafted him. For reference, MLB Pipeline ranks Lee as the fifth best prospect in the class, with the same three players (Jones, Johnson and Green) in the top three spots.
We will be following the draft throughout the year here, highlighting all of the possible picks with that #4 overall spot, which is really anyone who gets mentioned in the top ten at any point, but the group will get narrowed down most likely as we get closer to the pick (remember how many times we mentioned Henry Davis last year because he was getting almost all of the mentions for the Pirates).
