Ask Andrew Vaughn to describe his game, and the response is wonderfully simplistic.
"Shoot, I love to hit," he said on a Monday night conference call not long after the White Sox took the power-hitting first baseman out of Cal with the No. 3 pick in the draft.
"That’s my thing," he elaborated. "I love to come out to the ballyard every day and take on the best pitchers possible. I’m very excited to do that and hopefully get to the next level facing the best.
"And I’m a baseball rat. I love to play the game. I love to go out every day. That’s just who I am. It’s how I’ve always been. I’m just very excited to get on with this journey."
White Sox fans should be excited, too, after the franchise injected some serious pop into its rebuilding project. Vaughn earned rave reviews from every corner of the baseball universe for what he can do with a bat in his hands. He was a .381/.544/.716 hitter for the Golden Bears this season, numbers only topped by what he did a year prior, when he became the rare sophomore to win the Golden Spikes Award, handed out annually to the best player in college baseball. In 2018, he posted a .402/.531/.819 slash line with 23 home runs and just 18 strikeouts.
That's something worth remembering: This guy hits the ball and hits it far, but he brings on-base skills and regular hitting skills, too. Enough so that one national writer called him perhaps the best college hitter since Kris Bryant.
"When we looked at all the analytics and data we were excited to see the exit velocity was elite, it was one of the top in the class, if not the top of the class with (the wood bat in) both the Cape Cod (League) and (playing with) Team USA and aluminum bat with Cal," White Sox scouting director Nick Hostetler said Monday night. "The Pac 12 is one of the toughest conferences to hit in from a ballpark and pitching perspective, so when you couple all those together and what our scouts were saying in regards to his ability to get the ball in the air, hit to all fields, we’re really excited about the projection of his power playing here at Guaranteed Rate."
Hostetler also had plenty to say about Vaughn's makeup off the field, and rave reviews like that have been a constant among the players the White Sox have brought in during this rebuild. Vaughn seems like another one of those guys and talked about the personality that goes along with that big stick.
MLB
"I learned it a lot this year, being a leader at Cal," he said. "We didn’t have any seniors on our roster. I just had to show up every day and be myself, help the younger guys out. Just be present, be consistent. Just kind of let my actions speak for themselves on the field.
"I’m not a huge talkative guy. I just love to play. I play the game hard, and I hope what I do wears off on the people next to me. I hope I can build people up and make our competition that much better."
The talk will immediately turn, of course, to Vaughn's projected fit once he reaches the major leagues, which could be quicker than the normal draftee, per Hostetler, based on how advanced a hitter Vaughn is. Hostetler said plenty of times that the White Sox wouldn't be drafting for need, but they might have filled one anyway with Vaughn, who's being described as a middle-of-the-order type hitter. Not that the White Sox were bereft of that — Eloy Jimenez and Jose Abreu come to mind — but they have a lot of young players who project into different spots in the order. Vaughn provides that stereotypical middle-of-the-order bat.
And then there's the position. The only real knock on Vaughn — if you even want to call it a knock, considering it wasn't such a negative that it prevented him from being ranked as one of the top prospects in this draft — is that he's a first baseman and not much else. The White Sox have some guys who either are at or could be moving to that position, creating a potential logjam. The simplest answer, though, is the one the White Sox will likely offer, that they'd rather have too many good hitters than not enough. That's one of Rick Hahn's "good problems to have."
Regardless, Hostetler had positive reviews for Vaughn defensively, as well.
"We discussed the defense a lot," Hostetler said. "We looked at different comps throughout baseball. Obviously, it's noted he's a 6-foot first baseman. There was a lot of talk looking back, who were the 6-foot, right-handed-hitting first basemen? Jeff Bagwell and Steve Garvey were some names that came up. But you know it was something that we feel real confident about his ability at first base.
"He's got good, soft hands. The feet really are good over at first base. He's shown the ability in the past to play some third base, we've seen him take some groundballs there. Really, it was never discussed in our room in regards to third base. It was first base and first base only for us at this time. I'm not saying that in the future that might not change, or we might not look at some other options. But the first base was really above average, and we felt that with his hands, with his ability to pick the ball, it was something that was going to be beneficial to bring."
Picking this high in the draft, the White Sox were going to walk away with a very, very good player. It sure sounds like they got one in Vaughn, who brings a power bat but so much more.
The prospect rankings won't be refreshed for a bit, but when they are, expect to see Vaughn's name high on the list.
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