By Billie Eder and Claire Siracusa
Sydney-raised Travis Bazzana on Monday realised a dream by being selected as Australia’s first No.1 pick in a Major League Baseball draft.
Now he has to sit down and thrash out a contract that will come on top of a signing bonus of up to $10.5 million before commencing the task of earning a spot in the competition known as “The Show”.
Travis Bazzana has been taken with the No.1 pick in the MLB draft.Credit: AP
Bazzana, who grew up playing baseball for the Ku-Ring-Gai Stealers on Sydney’s north shore, was selected by the Cleveland Guardians on Monday morning (AEST).
Friends and family who had flown to the US, including mother Jenny and father Greg, erupted with joy when MLB commissioner Rob Manfred read out Bazzana’s name at the Cowtown Coliseum in Fort Worth, Texas.
The 21-year-old from Hornsby has become an overnight celebrity on the United States sports scene, and one of Australia’s highest-profile US-based sportspeople - a stone’s throw from the likes of NFL star Jordan Mailata and an NBA cohort led by Patty Mills, Josh Giddey and Ben Simmons.
Provided Bazzana earns his way into the major leagues, visits to venues such as Yankees Stadium and Wrigley Field await.
“It means a lot, it’s hard to put into words,” Bazzana told ESPN via video link. “It means everything, I’m just stoked, and I’m really happy to be with the people I am here with right now.”
“I see an opportunity to make an impact on a lot of baseball players and just people back home in Australia and hopefully, change the narrative for baseball,” he said. “I think World Baseball Classics and Olympics are something I want to see on the cards, and hopefully really compete there.”
A former cricket, rugby and soccer player who went to the US to play college baseball at Oregon State University, Bazzana is the first second-baseman to be selected with the No.1 overall pick. He’s expected to become the first Australian since Dave Nilsson in the 1990s to become an ‘everyday player’ - the term given to non-pitchers who are available to play most of their team’s 162- regular season matches.
In his final year for Oregon State, Bazzana ranked in the top 10 for all Division One college players in the three most important statistical categories for batting (hitting average, home runs and slugging percentage).
Guardians president of baseball operations, Chris Antonetti, said the team made its decision on Sunday.
“He [Bazzana] recognises pitches exceedingly well,” Antonetti said. “He knows the strike zone, makes good swing decisions, [and] when he does choose to swing makes elite-level contact. And I think what’s really grown in Travis’ game over the past year or so is the ability to add impact and drive the ball.”
Baseball Australia chief executive Glenn Williams, who played for the Minnesota Twins in the 2005 MLB season, said Bazzana showed the same aptitude that Antonetti described back when he was a junior player in Sydney.
“He just loved baseball, [he had] a real thirst for knowledge and wanting to get better,” Williams said. “[He was] Really dedicated, and committed to his sport.”
“The one thing that did stand out was he was always a really good athlete. He could always run well, he always had really good bat-to-ball skills, great hand-eye coordination and the one thing that stood out was that he had that kind of ability, but he was willing to work really, really hard on it, and he wanted to be able to get better and become the best player that he could.”
With AP
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