Polarizing prospect Kumar Rocker is back on the MLB draft radar. Does that include the Phillies?

TROY, N.Y. — The nightcap of the Tri-City ValleyCats’ June 22 doubleheader against the Trois-Rivières Aigles at first glance seemed like your typical night of independent league baseball: $8 tickets, two teams with unusual nicknames, and a right-field wall littered with more local ads than you can count.

Look more closely, though, and you’d soon realize this was not just any other night at Joseph L. Bruno Stadium in Troy, an 8-mile drive from the state capital of Albany. The first giveaway? The 30-plus scouts and MLB personnel sitting behind home plate holding up radar guns. The second? The 6-foot-5, 245-pound man on the mound they were all there to see: Kumar Rocker.

Rocker, the No. 10 pick in the MLB draft a year earlier and the son of Eagles defensive line coach Tracy Rocker, was making his fourth start for the ValleyCats, a Frontier League team primarily made up of former college free agents and later-round picks who have bounced around the lower rungs of the minor league baseball pyramid.

After failing to sign with the Mets following the 2021 draft due to a combination of factors, including his signing bonus and the results of a physical exam, Rocker signed with Tri-City on May 13. Now he is attempting to showcase his stuff, and prove he is healthy and worthy of being a top pick in this year’s draft (July 17-19).

The former Vanderbilt ace has learned better than anyone what a difference a year can make. Once the top pitching prospect in the country, on this night, Rocker pitched in front of a listed crowd of 2,016 at “The Joe,” a far cry from the 24,052 people who saw him start the deciding game of the College World Series in Omaha only 12 months earlier.

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Rocker, 22, understands his current path to hopefully the top is a less-traversed one — if an ever-traversed one — but after a year of simulated games and bullpen sessions, he’s just happy to be back on the mound facing live hitters again.

“It’s always good to have those eyes on you, to have an opportunity to play at the next level,” Rocker said after his first start on June 4. “So that was amazing.”

After a College Football Hall of Fame career at Auburn, Tracy Rocker was drafted in the third round of the 1989 NFL draft by Washington. It was there that he met his future wife, Lalitha, then a student at the University of Maryland.

When the two were expecting, Lalitha, the daughter of two Indian immigrants, chose to name their son Kumar, which means “prince” in Hindi.

“I want him to be aware of his heritage and for other people to question where his heritage is, and not look at him only as an African American child,” Lalitha said in 2019 about her son’s name.

Since then, Rocker has more than lived up to the prince moniker on the mound. After choosing baseball over the family sport of football (Kumar’s uncle, David Rocker, also played in the NFL), Rocker went on to become the No. 1 high school baseball recruit in the country.

The Colorado Rockies drafted him in the 38th round in 2018, but Rocker turned down pro ball to attend baseball power Vanderbilt, following in the footsteps of big-league pitchers like David Price, Sonny Gray, and Walker Buehler.

During a standout freshman season, he burst onto the national scene with one of the most dominant pitching performances you will see at any level. In the 2019 NCAA Super Regionals against Duke with Vandy facing elimination, he no-hit the Blue Devils, striking out 19 and throwing 131 pitches. The Commodores went on to win the College World Series a few weeks later, with Rocker winning the tournament’s Most Outstanding Player award.

After COVID-19 wiped out most of Rocker’s sophomore campaign, he led Vanderbilt back to Omaha as a junior. In 2021, he posted a 14-4 record, 2.73 earned run average, and struck out 179 in 122 innings, while forming the nation’s best 1-2 punch with 2021 No. 2 overall pick Jack Leiter.

But after Rocker was drafted by the Mets, speculation began to arise over whether New York would sign him before the Aug. 1 deadline. A Scott Boras client, Rocker reportedly had orally agreed with the Mets on a $6 million signing bonus ($1.3 million above slot value), pending a physical.

» READ MORE: Mark Appel's long journey from No. 1 overall pick to the majors

According to reports, the Mets ultimately decided not to sign Rocker because of “elbow issues” that came to light in that physical.

“This is clearly not the outcome we had hoped for and wish Kumar nothing but success moving forward,” the Mets’ acting general manager at the time, Zack Scott, said in a statement.

Boras disputed the claims that Rocker was injured or had medical concerns.

“Kumar Rocker is healthy according to independent medical review by multiple prominent baseball orthopedic surgeons,” Boras said in a statement. “Immediately upon the conclusion of his collegiate season, he had an MRI on both his shoulder and his elbow. When compared to his 2018 MRIs, the medical experts found no significant change. Kumar requires no medical attention and will continue to pitch in the regular course as he prepares to begin his professional career.”

95 miles per hour. That’s what the scouts’ radar guns read after Rocker’s first pitch — a high fastball blown past Aigles leadoff hitter L.P. Pelletier — on June 22.

Rocker hovered between 94 and 96 mph with his fastball during his four innings of work, topping out at 97.6 mph. After worries about a drop in velocity toward the end of his college career, in his first start for the ValleyCats on June 4, Rocker reportedly touched 99 mph with his fastball. ValleyCats pitching coach Scott Budner has no concerns about Rocker’s velocity these days.

“The velocity is there, obviously, the arm works well, he’s a big-bodied kid and the ball comes out of his hand really well,” Budner told The Inquirer. “What I’ve been really impressed with is his curveball and his slider. He’s got really good stuff and his stuff is going to play at the major league level. His curveball is a plus pitch and his velocity is plus.”

Rocker showed his best stuff in the third inning, when following an error and a double, he pitched out of a jam with runners on second and third and nobody out. He struck out Pelletier and first baseman Connor Panas on three pitches apiece, showcasing a little extra on his fastball and utilizing both of his plus breaking pitches: curveball and slider. After an intentional walk to load the bases and set up a force play, Rocker mowed down Aigles designated hitter Steve Brown via strikeout to put out the fire.

Rocker’s ability to bear down impressed his manager, former Phillie Pete Incaviglia.

“Funny thing, Bud [Budner] walked over and goes, ‘That’s what a big leaguer does,’ ” Incaviglia said. “He gets into jams and he has another gear and makes the pitches he has to and gets out of the inning. The guy is going to pitch in the big leagues. I’ve been saying that for a long time.”

Rocker credited a new approach for helping him work through the jam.

“For sure, it’s definitely changed since college,” Rocker said. “Now it’s just a little more poised and relaxed on the mound.”

Rocker struck out two more to work around a leadoff double in the fourth and retired for the evening with a final line of four innings pitched, zero runs, two hits, seven strikeouts, two walks (one intentional), and 58 pitches (42 strikes).

Through five starts, Rocker (1-0) has a 1.35 ERA and 32 strikeouts in 20 innings with the ValleyCats.

Prior to his start on Friday, Incaviglia said he believed Rocker would “air it out and show people one more time that he’s worthy of a top-five pick.” He did just that against the Empire State Greys, striking out the side in the first, and throwing five shutout innings to earn his first professional victory.

On Saturday, the ValleyCats placed Rocker on the inactive list while he awaits the MLB draft.

While it is unlikely that Rocker will go in the top five, exactly where he will land depends on whom you ask. The extremely talented but polarizing prospect is ranked No. 39 on MLB.com’s draft prospect list, 34th according to Keith Law of The Athletic, and 58th by ESPN (before his Frontier League stint). In Law’s most recent mock draft on June 21, he had the Phillies taking Rocker with the 17th pick.

While Budner praised Rocker’s stuff, he believes it is his makeup that will make him successful at the next level.

“[He’s] the whole package mentally and physically,” said Budner. “He’s tough, he’s a man, and I don’t think he’s going to buckle under pressure. I think he’s going to be more of the intimidator, not someone who gets intimidated, and that’s what teams need to hear when they are making a big decision on a high pick.”

Budner, like Law, believes Rocker could be on an MLB mound as soon as this year.

“He just looks like a big-leaguer that’s under control mentally and physically and I think he’s going to move pretty quick when somebody signs him,” Budner said.

Incaviglia and Budner both called Rocker a tremendous pitcher but an even better person and teammate who has shown no ego and cares about his new, albeit temporary, teammates. Nowhere was this more apparent than following the ValleyCats’ 5-4 win on June 22, when Rocker could be seen leading the pack in sprinting out of the dugout to dump water on walk-off hero Brad Zunica.

While Rocker’s time with the ValleyCats has ended, he has made an impression and new friends and fans in an unexpected place.

“It’s just [been] a really good fit,” Zunica said about Rocker. “[He’s] a really good guy and I am really excited to see what the future holds [for him].”