Washington Nationals 2017 MLB draft profile: Keston Hiura
The Washington Nationals have taken chances on pitchers with injuries in the first round before. Will they take a chance on a hitter who has had a major elbow injury in the past?
In the past, the Washington Nationals are one of those organizations that will take a player high in the draft even with an injury history. They have taken pitchers Lucas Gioltio and Erick Fedde, who have had or were going to undergo Tommy John surgery. In this year’s draft, there’s a player who has good offensive skills, but has an injury preventing him from playing the field right now.
This season, Keston Hiura from UC Irvine is tearing up the Big West conference. In 49 games, the 21- year-old has a slash line of .402/.546/.669 with eight home runs and 34 RBI’s (as of Friday). He leads the Big West conference in batting average and is tied for fourth in home runs.
True, you can question the level of competition that Hiura has played against, but he has put up consistent numbers every season. Last year, he was second in the conference in batting average (.358) and third in batting average (.436).
Here is some video about Hiura, courtesy of MLB.com
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With those numbers, you would think Hiura would have a chance at being picked in the first 10-15 picks of this year’s draft easily. The one problem for him is that he’s not playing the outfield because of an elbow injury.
Back in 2016, Hiura hurt his elbow while he was playing the outfield and it ended up being a sprained UCL. While he didn’t undergo surgery just yet, he hasn’t played one game in the field, as I mentioned earlier. Before this season, he underwent platelet-rich plasma treatment (PRP) on the elbow, but who knows if Tommy John will be needed down the road.
When you look at the mock drafts from the major publications, they have Hiura anywhere from 12th to 25th on their mocks. John Sickels of Minor League Ball on SB Nation has Hiura going to the Nats on his mock draft.
Hiura has shown good versatility in the field over the course of his college career by playing both the outfield and infield. In an article written by Hudson Belinsky of Baseball America, UC Irvine associate coach Robert Orloff thinks he is more suited for second base.
“Orloff sees that potent offense playing well at second base, which has become an offensive-oriented position. Assuming Hiura’s arm recovers to where it was prior to his injury, he has the potential to develop into an adequate big league defender, be it at second or in the outfield.”
If Hiura ends up playing primarily second base, it might be of good value to the Nats. According to MLB Pipeline’s top 30 rankings of the Nats system, they do not have one second baseman in their top 30. So, if he stays healthy, Hiura could be an impact bat at that position.
Second base isn’t a position that the Nats don’t draft that high in the past when you consider no second baseman has ever been taken by the franchise in their history and that includes the Expos.
The Washington Nationals have never been afraid to take a chance on a player with an injury. If Hiura is still there with the 25th pick, they could add another impact bat into the farm system and focus on pitching in later rounds.