The race for the number one pick in the MLB draft was already a wild ride. The established name for Jace Laviolette was slow to start the season, with a new name coming to the top of the draft board. No player has made a big rise than Tennessee left-handed pitcher Liam Doyle.
Doyle started this year as a 75th draft prospect through the MLB pipeline, but now it’s nearly the first round after four starts. That sounds extreme, but it’s justified. Like Paul Skens a few years ago, Doyle became a whole new pitcher for his third year. Similarly, Doyle transferred schools before his third year.
Liam Doyle presents a bit of the changing landscape of university sports. He will be in three schools three years later. Doyle started in Coastal Carolina before transferring to Ole Miss for his sophomore year. After a season in Oxford, Doyle joined the baseball powerhouse at the University of Tennessee.
In Knoxville, Doyle’s thing exploded. His fastball reached 98 this season, sitting in the 91-94 mph range. Doyle’s fastball has already increased his speed from past speeds due to his deceptive delivery and strong features. Nowadays, it is a completely dominant plus product.
According to the Keith Athletic Act, Doyle is Dominate the fastball pitcher. However, it works because it cannot touch the heater. Having a dominant fastball is a very strong base to do your job. All pitch labs can develop broken ones, but it is difficult to change the shape of the fastball.
The law had Doyle as his number one outlook, which shocked me, but if you only saw the 2025 performance, it makes sense. Doyle’s nuts 47 strikeouts in 20.1 innings, 0.44 ERA. Although the sample size is small, he is on the map in the number one pick race.
When Paul Skens came to LSU from the Air Force, he was on the Nobody’s Radar to become the number one pick. It was considered a race between Dillancrue and Wyatt Langford at the time. However, Skenes was so good that he put himself in the conversation and eventually became the consensus number one man.
Tennessee has yet to play against the SEC, so we are still far from declaring 1-1 locks to Doyle like the Skenes, but his performance cannot be ignored. Keith was really intrigued to put him in number one. Because Keith is Maverick, who isn’t afraid of what other people think about his rankings. He places someone who thinks he’s the best guy at 1 o’clock, even if it’s against grain. This often means he’s at the party early.
In federal baseball, we also want to go ahead of the curve, so we’re talking about Liam Doyle as our number one pick candidate. If he keeps something like this in SEC play, this is where he heads. This is the dominant fastball with a promising secondary pitch and solid command. It looks like an ace blueprint to me, and the Washingtonians need an ace of the future.
