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Shortened MLB draft leaves vast pool of talented undrafted players in bind

Detroit — When the coronavirus shut down baseball in March — prep, college and professional — the defending GLIAC Player of the Year and returning Division II All-American Jacob Buchberger was hitting .525 with a 1.605 OPS, six doubles, six home runs, 62 total bases in in 61 at-bats — and the weather hadn’t even broken yet.

That’s after he hit a Davenport (Grand Rapids) University-record .429 with a .659 slugging percentage in his junior season in 2019 and somehow slipped through the cracks in the Major League Baseball Amateur Draft.