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#1 Pick Harper Heads List Of Signees…

It came right down to the wire, but number one overall MLB draft pick Bryce Harper signed his first professional contract with the Washington Nationals just before the deadline late Monday night.  The 17-year-old junior college player inked a five year contract worth a reported $9.9 million, including a $6.25 million signing bonus.

Bryce Harper

Harper’s deal was inked just seconds before the 12:01 am E.T. deadline early Tuesday morning.  Like Harper, last year’s top pick, Stephen Strasburg, is also represented by Scott Boras. Like Harper, Strasburg’s negotiations with the Nationals went down to the wire.

Harper is expected to be introduced to the Washington D.C. media next week during the Nationals’ next homestand. He will begin his career in the Gulf Coast League and then play in the fall Instructional League.

Seven other college players who were taken in the first round of June’s draft also inked deadline deals.  The highest of those pick is former Ole Miss pitcher Drew Pomeranz.  The lefty was taken with the #5 pick and signed with the Cleveland Indians for $2.65 million.

Other college first round signees (with their corresponding draft order) include:

7. Matt Harvey-RHP-North Carolina/New York Mets – $2.525 million signing bonus

11. Deck McGuire-RHP-Georgia Tech/Toronto Blue Jays – $2 million signing bonus

12. Yasmani Grandal-C-Miami (FL)/Cincinnati Reds – $2.99 million four-year contract

24. Gary Brown-OF-Cal State Fullerton/San Francisco Giants – $1.45 million signing bonus

25. Zack Cox-3B-Arkansas/St. Louis Cardinals – $2.99 million four-year contract

26. Kyle Parker-OF-Clemson/Colorado Rockies – $1.4 million bonus

CLICK HERE to continue reading about the college player drafted in the first round who didn’t sign as well as Kyle Parker’s unique contract.

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Nine College Players Among Unsigned First Rounders…

The countdown is on for big league teams to sign players who were selected in the 2010 MLB Draft. With the deadline Monday night at midnight E.T. (officially 12:01 am Tuesday, August 17), 17 first round draft picks remain unsigned. Nine of those 17 are college baseball players.

Overall #1 draft pick Bryce Harper

Number one overall pick, Bryce Harper, played just a year at the College of Southern Nevada. The 17-year-old phenom got his GED so he could skip his senior year of high school to begin his march toward the professional ranks. He hit ,442 with 29 home runs and 89 RBIs while leading Coyotes to the Junior College World Series. He also received the Golden Spikes Award as the nation’s top amateur baseball player.

The Washington Nationals took Harper with the top pick in this year’s draft, just as they did with former San Diego State pitcher Stephen Strasburg last year. Like Strasburg, Harper is a client of mega agent Scott Boras, who is known as a tough negotiator. Harper also still has three years of college eligibility remaining, which gives him plenty of bargaining leverage.

Interestingly, Harper’s junior college coach, Tim Chambers, has already left Southern Nevada to become the head coach at UNLV.

Most of the other eight unsigned first round college players are juniors, which gives them negotiating leverage as well.  Zack Cox of Arkansas is one of the exceptions. He is a draft eligible sophomore because he is already 21 years old.  Cox was taken by St. Louis with the 25th overall pick in June.

Here’s a look at other unsigned first round college players with their corresponding draft order:

5. Drew Pomeranz-LHP-Ole Miss./Cleveland Indians

6. Barret Loux-RHP-Texas A&M/Arizona Diamondbacks

7. Matt Harvey-RHP-North Carolina/New York Mets

11. Deck McGuire-RHP-Georgia Tech/Toronto Blue Jays

12. Yasmani Grandal-C-Miami (FL)/Cincinnati Reds

24. Gary Brown-OF-Cal State Fullerton/San Francisco Giants

26. Kyle Parker-OF-Clemson/Colorado Rockies

Parker is a bit of a wild card, because he plays both football and baseball at Clemson. This past year he became the first player in Division One history to throw 20 touchdown passes and hit at least 20 home runs in the same academic year. He has three years of eligibility remaining on the football team, but just one season remaining with the baseball team.

Parker’s self-imposed deadline for the Rockies to sign him passed last month, but there is always the chance he could sign with Colorado before the deadline, continue to play football for the Tigers and then play minor league baseball next spring and summer.

UCLA Next Faces Florida At CWS

Noe Ramirez had 13 Ks in Friday's 4-3 Fullerton win.

By clicking the “Los Angeles Super Regional” link above this page will expand to fully support the table below.

CLICK HERE for our Super Regional Central page which includes links to other Super Regionals.

Best two of three series (all times Eastern)

Gm 1 – Friday – FINAL:  Cal State Fullerton 4, UCLA 3 |  Final Stats
CSF Recap | UCLA Recap *Fullerton leads series 1-0
* Highlight: Fullerton’s Noe Ramirez (12-1) had 13 Ks in 7 IP

Gm 2 – Saturday – FINAL: UCLA 11, Cal State Fullerton 7 (10 inn.) |  Final Stats
UCLA Recap | CSF Recap *Series tied 1-1

Tyler Rahmatulla's 9th inn. HR helped UCLA force Sunday's game 3.

* Highlight: UCLA with four HR

Gm 3 – Sunday – FINAL UCLA 8,  Cal State Fullerton 1 |  Final stats
UCLA Recap | CSF Recap

* UCLA wins series (2-1)

The Skinny

UCLA: (#6 National Seed) The Bruins have already set a program record with 46 wins this season.  It’s one more than the 1997 Bruin College World Series team had.  The last time John Savage’s Bruins advanced to a Super Regional was 1997.

The Bruins are built on power pitching.  Starters Trevor Bauer (10-3, 2.72 ERA), Bob Rasmussen (10-2, 2.90 ERA) and Gerrit Cole (10-2, 3.11 ERA) and closer Dan Klein (5-0, 2.03 ERA, 9 SVs) all have more strikeouts than innings pitched.  The staff’s 611 strikeouts and 2.94 ERA both rank second in the nation.  Bauer, Rasmussen and Cole are the first trio of 10-game winners in the same season in program history.

The UCLA offense doesn’t have a player with double-digit home runs, but seven players are batting .311 or better.  Dean Espy has team highs with a .365 average and 48 RBIs.  He’s one of five Bruins to drive-in at least 35 runs.

Cal State Fullerton: The Titans are in a Super Regional for the seventh straight season.  Head coach Dave Serrano took Fullerton to Omaha in his second year as head coach last year after guiding UC Irvine to the CWS in 2007.  A Super Regional win would give Fullerton its 16th CWS appearance in 35 seasons as a Division One program.

Gary Brown (.438, 1.185 OPS) is the team’s top overall hitter, but he missed last week’s Regional due to injury.  Christian Colon (.360/16 HR/73 RBIs) and Nick Ramirez (.358/16 HR/67 RBIs) provide the punch in the middle of the order.  Ramirez also doubles as the team’s closer with 10 saves.

Freshman Dylan Floro (7-1, 3.08 ERA) has emerged over the course of the season as one of the team’s top starters.  He has two saves and two of the team’s six complete games.  Noe Ramirez (11-1, 2.63 ERA) and Daniel Renken (12-2, 3.95 ERA) provide a formidable counter to UCLA’s rotation.

Los Angeles Super Regional

More from Chase Titleman at our partner site Road2rosenblatt.com

The Bruins Win If?

UCLA wins the series if a solid bevy of stallions on the bump limit a very potent Titan batting line-up.

Of great importance to the Bruins is jumping out early.

In the two games versus Fullerton earlier this season, the Titans jumped to big leads as they pulverized Garrett Claypool, one of UCLA’s best pitchers, to the tune of 8 runs over the course of two games.

UCLA cannot afford to let Fullerton jump ahead early and get into their bullpen.

On the bright side, Fullerton has yet to see Trevor Bauer and Dan Klein, two of the Bruins best pitching prospects, nor have they seen Rob Rasmussen, so the Bruins could have a few surprises for the Titans.

The Titans Win If?

The hot hitting continues from the top half of the order, especially Christian Colon, who gave Fullerton a huge boost in game two of their regional at home last weekend versus Stanford, when he connected for two home runs.

The Titans go as Colon goes, and if Nick Ramirez continues to send balls over the wall as well, it will be a long series for the Bruins.

Titan ball consists of the get on base, move runners over and drive runners in variety.

However, the Titans add a twist as they have great speed, have a tremendous bunt game, and have much more power than the Bruins up and down the line-up.

Unfortunately for the Bruins, if the Titans continue to hit the long ball with consistency, now you have to defend the short game, the first and third circus and the long ball threat.

Advantage Titans, but if Bauer, Rasmussen and Co. can keep the Titans in check, the only team that may be capable of beating the Bruins is the other school still alive in the PAC-10…Arizona State!

Should be one of the more entertaining series across the country on the Road to Omaha!

Four Things I’m Thinking About Right Now…

By Collegebaseball360.com Editor Sean Stires

As April hits its stride we’re getting ready for another weekend of college baseball.  We’ve had some new podcasts and will continue to have more in the coming weeks as we look at different teams and conferences around the country.  Here are some things that gnawed at my mind this week…

Say What… Here are the current statistics of two catchers.  One is on the 2010 Johnny Bench Award Watch List, but

Yasmani Grandal (Miami photo)

the other is not.  See if you can guess which one is:  A.  .414 BA, 7 HR, 37 RBIs, 1.211 OPS, 1 Passed Ball  B.  .294 BA, 6 HR, 25 RBIs, .888 OPS, 3 Passed Balls.  If you said catcher “B” is the one on the watch list you would be correct (I won’t mention his name here).  Catcher “A” is Miami Hurricane Yasmani Grandal.  After hitting 16 home runs and then playing last summer for Team USA the junior was not only not on the original watch list, but also left out of the group of nine catchers who were added to the watch list this week.  That’s 61 total catchers now on the watch list, but the guy hitting .414 at one of the best programs in the history of the sport is not one of them.

Big Shake-Up…Before last week the Big East was looking like it was going to be a one-bid league when NCAA selections come out next month, and Louisville was looking like it might earn the programs first top 8 national seed.  That all changed when Pittsburgh took two of three games from the Cardinals in the Steel City.  Pittsburgh (22-9, 6-3) was three outs from sweeping the series before Louisville rallied to salvage the series finale, but their two wins shook-up the Big East standings.  South Florida (16-16, 8-1) is in first place followed by UConn (24-7, 7-2) and Rutgers (18-13, 7-2), with Louisville (26-6, 6-3) and Pitt tied for fourth place.  USF played a brutal early schedule, but has zero quality wins to show for it.  UConn handed Louisville its other conference loss and seems to be gaining momentum.

Revving-up The RPI…The NCAA’s official RPI is out, and it’s no shock that the top five teams include Arizona State, Arkansas, UCLA, Florida, and Virginia.  Three of those five teams made it to Omaha last year and a fourth (Florida) played in a Super Regional.  Louisville (Big East), Coastal Carolina (Big South), Clemson, Texas, and Oregon State round-out the top ten.  That gives the Pac 10 three top ten RPI teams, the ACC and SEC each have two.  Here are some “non-power conference” teams that join Louisville and Coastal Carolina in the RPI Top-50:  17. Western Kentucky 21. The Citadel 23. TCU 24. New Mexico 30. College of Charleston 35. Western Carolina 39. Texas State 40. Connecticut 41. San Diego 44. Southeastern Louisiana 47. South Alabama 49. Pittsburgh 50. VMI

Gary Brown (mattbrownphoto.com)

Titan Turnaround…Since a disappointing 8-8 start to the season Cal State Fullerton (18-12, 5-1 Big West) has won ten of its last 14 games, including two of three from Big West rival UC Irvine last weekend.  The Titans also won a midweek match-up over UCLA (26-3)-a team that moved to #1 in two polls this week.  Fullerton didn’t shy away from tough competition early on, with six of those losses coming at the hands of TCU (24-7), Arizona (23-9) and Arizona State (28-3).  The Titan’s offense is starting to click, with Gary Brown and Billy Marcoe hitting .443 and .402, respectively.  The biggest issue has been inconsistent pitching from a team that has been traditionally dominant on the mound.  2010 Team USA invitees Tyler Pill and Nick Ramirez are a combined 2-7, although Pill gave-up just an unearned run in 8 1/3 IP and also had an RBI in Sunday’s 6-1 win over the Anteaters.  Expect the Titans to build some serious momentum over the next month…

A Look At Some Movement From Opening Weekend Action