{"id":124275,"date":"2026-06-24T11:41:28","date_gmt":"2026-06-24T15:41:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/?p=124275"},"modified":"2026-06-24T11:57:06","modified_gmt":"2026-06-24T15:57:06","slug":"evan-dempsey-mlb","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2026\/06\/24\/evan-dempsey-mlb\/","title":{"rendered":"The Two Way Prospect MLB Fans Should Be Hoping Their Team Drafts"},"content":{"rendered":"

Heading into the 2024 MLB Draft<\/a>, there was a lot of attention and buzz surrounding Jac Caglianone<\/a> and his ability to dominate in the batter’s box and on the mound. Being in the national spotlight of college baseball helped Caglianone become a well-known name by the time the draft rolled around. Well, this draft cycle, there is another two-way star set to hear his name called, and that is Florida Gulf Coast’s Evan Dempsey<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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In an era where mid-major stars typically transfer to a big-name program to help boost their visibility, Dempsey remained loyal to the Eagles for his three seasons of college baseball. While this decision may have limited the attention his two-way ability has gotten from the casual fan, it won’t take long in his professional baseball career to have fans clamoring about him.<\/p>\n

Evan Dempsey’s Dominant College Tenure<\/h2>\n

Upon his arrival at Florida Gulf Coast, it was clear Dempsey was a program-altering talent. In his freshman season, the 6’2″ Tampa native started 46 games in the field, and in 184 at-bats, he hit .332 with 20 extra-base hits and 48 RBIs. On the mound, the right-hander would only log 5.1 innings, but it wouldn’t take long for the rest of the ASUN to realize Dempsey would soon be terrorizing them on the mound as well.<\/p>\n

When he returned for his sophomore season, Dempsey became a member of the Eagles’ starting rotation. Across 15 appearances, 10 starts, and 68.2 innings, the right-hander pitched to a 1.97 ERA with 75 strikeouts and just three home runs allowed. Aside from having the sixth-lowest ERA in the country, Dempsey continued to produce at the plate as well, recording a 114 wRC+ and .828 OPS in 235 at-bats.<\/p>\n

Following a season like that, in which he won the John Olerud Two-Way Player of the Year Award<\/a>, Dempsey undoubtedly had countless well-known programs tampering with him and trying to lure him into the transfer portal. What other schools were offering him in terms of NIL packages is unknown, but it’s safe to assume he would’ve been one of the highest-paid transfers during the cycle. Regardless of what the price tag was, the consensus First Team All-American returned for his junior season.<\/p>\n

After announcing he would be back in an Eagles uniform, Dempsey was named the 2026 Preseason ASUN Co-Player of the Year and a Preseason All-American. With even more pressure on him to perform, being that it was his draft year, Dempsey continued to rise to the occasion, going 7-2 on the mound with a 3.15 ERA, 126 strikeouts, and two complete-game shutouts in 88.2 innings.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, at the plate, Dempsey launched a career-high 10 home runs, while swiping 15 bases and recording a .947 OPS, earning him a second consecutive Two-Way Player of the Year Award.<\/p>\n

\"FGCU's
FGCU’s pitcher (25) Evan Dempsey pitches during the ASUN baseball tournament finals against Stetson, Sunday, May 25, 2025, at Melching Field in DeLand. \u00a9 Nadia Zomorodian\/News-Journal \/ USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The MLB Draft Outlook for Evan Dempsey<\/h2>\n

With the 2026 MLB Draft<\/a> just a few weeks away, it won’t be long until Dempsey will be taking his talents to the professional ranks. As it stands, MLB Pipeline has the FGCU standout ranked as the 100th best prospect in the ’26 class<\/a>, while Over-Slot has him ranked 96th. With teams attempting to navigate signing bonuses, the draft will certainly not fall like the rankings are set, but if they came close, these rankings would have Dempsey coming off the board in the middle of the third round.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, Dempsey’s landing spot will come down to how a team plans to use him. Most of the time with two-way stars<\/a>, the team that drafts them ends up identifying which position they have the higher ceiling at, and has them play just that position. If that ends up being the case with Dempsey, he’ll likely be a pitcher in pro ball.<\/p>\n

Dempsey’s fastball can reach 95 MPH, and there is a chance his average velocity will increase since he won’t be expending energy making throws from the outfield in games he is not pitching. Outside of his fastball, the right-hander produces elite spin on his curveball, and will also mix in a slider and changeup, which will both need to be further developed after being drafted.<\/p>\n

At the end of the day, whatever franchise selects Dempsey will open a world of possibilities that should have its fans dreaming of a future as bright as the Florida sun.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Main Photo Credit: \u00a9 Nadia Zomorodian\/News-Journal \/ USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Heading into the 2024 MLB Draft, there was a lot of attention and buzz surrounding Jac Caglianone and his ability to dominate in the batter’s box and on the mound. Being in the national spotlight of college baseball helped Caglianone become a well-known name by the time the draft rolled around. Well, this draft cycle, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5819,"featured_media":124331,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1071,29143,29576,35],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-124275","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mlb","category-mlb-draft","category-ncaa-baseball","category-news"],"modified_by":"Augustus Oswald, Site Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124275","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5819"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=124275"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124275\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":124333,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124275\/revisions\/124333"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/124331"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=124275"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=124275"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=124275"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}