Less than a year after signing a professional baseball contract with a substantial signing bonus with the Texas Rangers, Bahamian Sebastian Walcott has impressed his club to the point where he has been promoted to High-A in Minor League Baseball (MiLB).
Walcott got the nod at just 17 years of age. He is coming off playing in the Arizona Complex League (ACL) at rookie-level baseball for the Rangers, and is the first minor leaguer for the Rangers to play the full season at 17, since Michael De Leon. De Leon did it in 2014 when he was promoted from Low-A to Double-A Baseball.
Walcott is now playing for the Hickory Crawdads in the South Atlantic League. They sit in third in that league and second in the south division with a 65-55 win/loss record on the season. The Bahamian made his debut on Sunday, and he was in the lineup as the designated hitter in a 9-0 trouncing by the Crawdads of the Greensboro Grasshoppers (65-58).
In that game, Walcott went 1-for-4 with a run batted in (RBI). His only hit came in the top of the first when he hit a double to left field that brought home Cody Freeman. The Crawdads went up 4-0 at the end of that inning and never looked back.
The Crawdads returned to action yesterday against Winston-Salem Dash in the first round of playoffs, but no score was available up to press time.
In the 35 games he played in the ACL, Walcott sported a batting average of .273, an on-base percentage (OBP) of .325 and a slugging percentage (SLG) of .524. He hit seven home runs and had 19 RBIs. He also had nine stolen bases in the ACL. Walcott had a short stint in the Dominican Summer League, playing just nine games before moving on to the ACL.
In his season in the Dominican Summer League, Walcott had a batting average of .253, an OBP of .338 and a SLG of .827.
The 6'4' infielder came into the league as one of the top 20 international prospects from the Major League Baseball (MLB) international signing period. He signed on the dotted line with the Rangers in January of this year. He has drawn comparison to Miami Marlins' outfielder Jasrado 'Jazz' Chisholm Jr., a Bahamian. Walcott is currently the 64th rank prospect on MLB's top 100 list and the number three prospect on the Rangers list.
Walcott is the fifth player at age 17 or younger to play a full minor league season in 2023, joining Nelson Roda (Los Angeles Angels), Ethan Salas (San Diego Padres), Colt Emerson (Seattle Mariners) and Tai Peete (Seattle Mariners).
Click here to read more at The Nassau Guardian
