Mississippi State’s Foscue, Westburg Drafted in First Round of 2020 MLB Draft

STARKVILLE, Miss. (MSU Athletics) – For the second time in program history, the Mississippi State baseball program has seen a pair of student-athletes drafted in the first round of the Major League Baseball Draft, as Justin Foscue and Jordan Westburg were each chosen on night one of the event.

After both went undrafted out of high school, Foscue and Westburg join the Thunder and Lightning duo of Will Clark (No. 2) and Rafael Palmeiro (No. 22), who were chosen in the first round of the 1985 MLB Draft. The Diamond Dawgs are the 22nd NCAA program to have multiple student-athletes taken in the first round on multiple occasions.

Foscue became the 15th Diamond Dawg first-round pick in the June Regular Draft. As the No. 14 overall pick, he is the fifth-highest pick in Mississippi State history, behind only Clark (1985; 2nd), B.J. Wallace (3rd; 1992), Paul Maholm (8th; 2003) and Hunter Renfroe (13th; 2013). He is the 12th Diamond Dawg drafted by the Texas Rangers, which are the most by a single organization in program history.

Westburg was the first pick in the competitive balance round, as Baltimore picked an MSU player for the 10th time in the organization’s history with the 30th overall selection.

Mississippi State now has 16 student-athletes drafted in the first round of the June Regular Draft, which ranks tied for No. 10 nationally. The Diamond Dawgs have seen seven players taken in the first round since 2012, which is tied for No. 4 among NCAA programs.

In the MLB Draft, Mississippi State has heard 174 student-athletes’ names called at the event for a total of 214 draft picks. State has seen 63 taken in the first 10 rounds with 31 selected in the first five rounds, including the 16 first rounders.

Justin Foscue  |  IF  |  Huntsville, Alabama

On the short list of Mississippi State baseball student-athletes to appear at the College World Series twice, Foscue earned All-America honors from all seven publications after a breakout sophomore season in 2019. A three-year starter, Foscue made the move from third base to second base in 2019 and didn’t skip a beat. In 62 starts, he hit .331 with 36 extra base hits – including 14 home runs – and he struck out only 32 times in 275 at bats.

Spending the 2019 summer with the USA Baseball Collegiate National Team, Foscue made 14 appearances with 12 starts for Team USA. He tied for the team lead in doubles (3) during the summer and picked up right where he left off to start the 2020 season. In the shortened 2020 campaign, Foscue owned five multi-hit games and four multi-RBI games. He posted at least one RBI in the first eight games of the season and produced an RBI in 11 of 16 games.

Foscue owns a career .380 career on-base percentage in 141 games played (131 starts) with 100 runs scored and 96 RBIs. In 594 career plate appearances, Foscue has struck out in just 9.6% of his plate appearances (57 strikeouts) and walked in 11.3% of those (67 walks). In 83 starts over the last two seasons, he posted a .320 batting average and reached base in 70 of those contests.

Jordan Westburg  |  IF  |  New Braunfels, Texas

Westburg was off to the best start if his career before the 2020 season was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, as he was hitting .317 with 17 runs scored, 11 RBIs and eight extra base hits in 16 starts at shortstop. He had scored a run in 10 of the 16 games to start the season and led the team in slugging percentage (.517), doubles (6) and hit-by-pitch (7), while tying for team best in home runs (2), runs scored (17) and total bases (31).

A preseason second-team All-SEC pick in 2020, he reached base in 78 or 82 games dating back to the start of the 2019 season and owned a 30-game reached base streak spanning 2019 and 2020. Finishing No. 15 on the career hit-by-pitch charts, Westburg was on base 23 times via the HBP and walked 55 more for a .385 career on-base percentage. In his career, he owned four reached base streaks of 10-or-more games and produced 38 multi-hit games.

The 48th student-athlete to hit a grand slam at the College World Series, Westburg tied the CWS record for RBIs in a game with seven versus Washington on June 19, 2018. He was invited to the USA Baseball Collegiate National Team trials, before spending the 2019 summer in the Cape Cod Baseball League where hit .326 with four home runs.