MLB DRAFT CORVALLIS — After MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred called his name, after he was mobbed by family and friends, after he conducted a live interview on ESPN, Travis Bazzana strolled down three flights of stairs alongside Oregon State coach Mitch Canham at Goss Stadium. The Cleveland Guardians had just selected Bazzana with the No. 1 pick of the 2024 MLB draft, and as the pair made their way down a back staircase to meet with reporters, Bazzana had an unexpected question for his former coach.
"Did you ever think this would happen?'' he asked Canham. "Ever since the day we met you," Canham answered. Bazzana polished off a reord-setting three-year Oregon State career in historic fashion on Sunday, becoming the first Australian-born player, first second baseman and second Beavers player to go No.
1 in an MLB draft. Adley Rutschman, a two-time All-Star and OSU alum, also was selected with the top pick by the Baltimore Orioles in 2019. Bazzana, a junior from Sydney, Australia, was the odds-on favorite to go No.
1 heading into Sunday, but it was not a foregone conclusion in a draft that also featured Wake Forest's Chase Burns and Nick Kurtz, Georgia's Charlie Condon, Florida's Jac Caglianone, Arkansas left-hander Hagen Smith and West Virginia's JJ Wetherholt. But about 15 minutes before Manfred announced Bazzana's name on a stage at Cowtown Coliseum in Fort Worth, Texas, Cleveland's front office called Bazzana to let him know the Guardians would be using the first No. 1 pick i.
