Penn State And The Draft (Ya, Baseball)

First of all, congratulations, again, to Drew O'Neil for being selected in the MLB draft, again.  While he passed at the opportunity to play for the Reds last season, he completed his degree and, according to the Collegian , will most likely be playing pro ball next year in the White Sox farm system.  In the closer roll, O'Neil finished the season with a 1.88 ERA, an opponent batting average of .208, and a K/BB ratio of 1.7:1.

Here is a list of Penn State players taken in the MLB Draft:

Drew O'Neil, 8th Round, Chicago White Sox

Here is a list of players selected in the same draft that either attend or have committed to attend The University of Texas (H/T: Burnt Orange Nation ):

Kyle Russell, 3rd Round, LA Dodgers
Jordan Danks, 7th Round, Chicago White Sox
Kyle Walker, 11th Round, Colorado Rockies
Kenn Kasparek, 12th Round, Seattle Mariners
Casey Whitmer, 30th Round, Washington Nationals
Riley Boening, 42nd Round, Minnesota Twins
Robbie Grossman, 6th Round, Pittsburgh Pirates
Taylor Jungmann, 24th Round, Anaheim Angels
Hunter Cervenka, 27th Round, Boston Red Sox
Brandon Loy, 32nd Round, Baltimore Orioles
Sam Stafford, 40th Round, Boston Red Sox

Here is a selection of schools that sent players to professional baseball before any Big Ten player was selected:

Texas Christian, Eastern Kentucky, Pitt CC (N.C.), Wichita State, Southeartern Louisiana, New Orleans, Long Beach State, Howard JC (Texas)

RHP Josh Lindblom was the first Big Ten player selected in the draft. He was taken by the L.A. Dodgers with the 61st overall pick.

I don't really know what I'm getting at other than the obvious: it's a bit of an uphill climb for Big Ten schools on the national level.  While baseball is set up so that a team like the Rockies can go to the world series, with player performance often times hard to judge and many times impossible to predict, the law of averages still applies.

So the Big Ten might not produce the cream of the crop, but that doesn't make the games any less competitive or fun to follow.  With Penn State's  new ballpark , easily the nicest in the league, and a solid grasp on the in-state talent, the Nittany Lions have a chance to establish themselves.