The Mariners made a splash move in the 2024 draft, taking high school pitcher Ryan Sloan with their second-round pick, 55th overall. Sloan comes with all the bona fides you’d want to see in an early-round high school draft pick: he’s got a high-octane fastball, he’s built like a walk-in refrigerator, and he seems almost blissfully ignorant of the talent he’s been granted in his right arm (witness him talking about discovering his late-fade changeup like he found a dollar on the street).
But high school pitchers remain one of the draft’s riskiest demographics, and cold-weather preps some of the riskiest of all.