DJ Uiagalelei? Baseball? Why the Dodgers drafted the former five-star St. John Bosco QB

Quarterback DJ Uiagalelei is hoping to find success at his second college this fall, after the former Clemson star and Bellflower St. John Bosco High product transferred to Oregon State for the 2023 season.

If football doesn’t work out, however, the Dodgers on Tuesday gave Uiagalelei the possibility of transitioning to a second sport, instead.

With its final pick in this year’s MLB draft, the team selected Uiagalelei in the 20th round at No. 610 overall, taking a flier on the former right-handed pitcher who last played baseball competitively during his junior year of high school in 2019.

For now, the likelihood of Uiagalelei ever pursuing a baseball career — let alone one day taking the mound for the Dodgers, who would likely develop the former two-way prospect as a pitcher, according to a person with knowledge of the situation unauthorized to speak publicly — is unclear.

But even without much baseball experience, the 22-year-old Inland Empire native had enough of a reputation as a pitcher who used to throw in the mid-90s, and grew up in the Southland passionate about baseball, for the Dodgers to take a late-round chance.

Uiagalelei rose to national prominence as a five-star prospect in the 2020 high school football recruiting class. He enrolled at Clemson that spring to much fanfare, arriving as the highly-anticipated heir apparent to Trevor Lawrence.

After three up-and-down seasons with the Tigers, however, Uiagalelei lost his starting spot and transferred to Oregon State this offseason.

While he is a graduate student with two seasons of college eligibility remaining, and is projected to be the Beavers’ starter this fall, his prospects of playing in the NFL have dimmed.

Against that backdrop, the Dodgers felt comfortable with their low-risk Uiagalelei gamble; taking a “wait and see” approach, as multiple people with knowledge of the pick described it, in hopes the quarterback might one day choose to return to the diamond.

Baseball was Uiagalelei’s first love, as he told ESPN in 2020. According to the Athletic, the Dodgers reached out to him this spring to gauge his interest in returning to the sport, too, though Uiagalelei told the website in April that he wasn’t tempted by the invitation. (Uiagalelei’s family didn’t immediately return a request for comment).

Still, if Uiagalelei ultimately decides to give baseball another try, he has a couple enticing tools that could propel his path through pro ball.

In high school, Uiagalelei’s fastball reportedly touched 95 mph, according to former Clemson baseball coach Monte Lee. Uiagalelei’s 6-foot-4 frame made him an imposing presence at the plate, as well, giving his swing some natural pop.

With his football career taking off, Uiagalelei only played for St. John Bosco’s varsity team as a junior in 2019, making just three pitching appearances (he struck out five and gave up three runs in 4 ⅔ innings) before a hand injury ended his season early, according to ESPN.

“Had he played baseball in high school, who knows what he would have been,” Lee said. “Because he had tremendous power, tremendous arm strength. Just no baseball reps.”

Despite Uiagalelei’s lack of experience, Lee said Clemson still recruited him to play baseball as well as football. Months before enrolling at the school, Uiagalelei told a Clemson recruiting site he was planning to play both sports.

But once he got on campus, Uiagalelei changed his mind, notifying the baseball team that he wanted to focus solely on football to prepare for the starting quarterback job.

“That,” Lee said, “was kind of the end of his baseball career.”

At least, that’s how it seemed until the Dodgers drafted him Tuesday, giving the club the exclusive right to sign Uiagalelei as a baseball player until next year’s draft.

Lee, who is now an associate head coach at South Carolina, said he was so surprised by the news that he texted one of his best friends, Dodgers triple-A manager Travis Barbary, excited by the idea of Uiagalelei playing baseball again.

“He was always super nice to me,” Lee said. “He’s the nicest kid in the world.”

Then, Lee remembered one more story from Uiagalelei’s time at Clemson, when the quarterback took part in a student-body home run derby at the baseball team’s stadium last year.

“DJ came and hit one way out of the stadium, like way out of there,” Lee said. “He had arm strength, and he had power. That’s for sure.”