Today is the day that dreams are made for some of the top baseball players across the country. That dream became a reality for high school left hander Kodi Medeiros who the Milwaukee Brewers selected with the 12th overall pick in the 2014 MLB First-Year Player Draft on Thursday.
“It’s just a dream come true,” Medeiros said at MLB Network’s studios, where he attended the draft in person. “All the hard work and sacrifices and all the help from my family and my brother and everyone else who helped me along the way. It just paid off.”
All of his hard work has paid off as only a week ago Medeiros was in Milwaukee displaying his skills for the Brewers where MLB.com’s draft expert Jonathan Mayo said his fastball topped out at 97 mph. This obviously got the attention of Brewers’ scouts.
Despite Medeiros’ small frame, 6 feet and 180 lbs., he has electric stuff. Usually his fastball sits in the 90-92 mph range while occasionally touching 95. His top pitch however is his slider, which outside of Carlos Rodon’s slider could be the best out of any other pitcher in this draft class. It has ridiculous tilt while breaking late to both left handed and right handed hitters causing batters to have an extremely tough time hitting it.
Medeiros also throws a change up, but it is still a pitch that he is working on in order for it to be effective.
Some people around baseball though question, even if he develops an effective third pitch, if he can ever be a starter in the Majors due to his unorthodox delivery. Right now he projects to be a middle of the rotation starter.
In his senior season at Waiakea High School, Medeiros was 7-1 with a miniscule 0.97 ERA in 43 1/3 innings while striking out 83 batters and only walking 15.
The slot value assigned to the 12th overall pick is $2,805,700, but if Medeiros chooses not to sign with the Brewers he is committed to Pepperdine University.
Medeiros has tons of potential and repeats his delivery extremely well while throwing a lot of strikes. If he can develop a third pitch, while being able to handle the heavy workload required to be a MLB starter, then he will have a great chance of succeeding at the Major League level.
