Jankowski takes an unusual path to Astros’ bullpen
Tryout that ended his college career ultimately pays
Jordan Jankowski’s pitching for the Astros as a two-time 34th-round draft pick of the team is an underdog tale in itself. The story behind the pre-draft process of the newest Astro is even better.
In the spring of 2012, late in his senior year at Catawba College in North Carolina, Jankowski was kicked off his college team for attending an Astros pre-draft workout. An ordeal Jankowski now chalks up to a miscommunication cost him the chance to pitch in the Division II College World Series but ultimately solidified his draft stock with the team that selected him and, five years later, promoted him to the major leagues.
“Everyone has their own story on how they got here,” the righthander, 28, said Wednesday, hours before he made his big league debut in a 6-3 Astros loss to the Tigers. “Mine’s a little bit different than everybody else’s.”
Jankowski, who also was drafted by the Astros in the 34th round out of high school, went undrafted after his junior year at Catawba. As the story goes, the Astros were the only team to invite him to a workout as a college senior. He couldn’t make their closest tryout in Atlanta because of a game, so he booked a flight to California for their West Coast workout in Compton, which he said fell on a travel day for Catawba.
Jankowski said he was under the impression he was cleared by his college team to go until the day before his flight, when at practice he was told not to come back. Reached by phone Thursday, Catawba coach Jim Gantt said the decision was made because NCAA rules at the time stipulated a college player lost his eligibility if he worked out for a professional team before his college season ended.
“Obviously, I would’ve loved to finish the season with my team,” said Jankowski, who was Catawba’s Friday night starter and the co-South Atlantic Conference Pitcher of the Year that season. “If I knew that that was going to happen, it wouldn’t have happened.”
Catawba made a run to the Division II semifinals that year. Meanwhile, at the Astros’ workout, then-scouting director Bobby Heck was able to confirm the reports submitted on Jankowski by area scout Tim Bittner, whom Heck credits for the selection of Jankowski in the 34th round that June. He signed for $2,000, the typical $1,000 offered to seniors drafted in the later rounds plus an additional $1,000 given him as reimbursement for his travel.
It’s worth wondering if the Astros would have drafted Jankowski if not for the workout or whether he would have been drafted at all. Heck on Thursday said he thought Jankowski still likely would have been drafted but that the pitcher solidified his standing with the Astros by flying to Southern California and throwing in front of members of their brass.
“You could see he was passionate,” said Heck, now a special assistant for the Tampa Bay Rays. “You go across the country and put his eligibility with his team in peril, I think that says a little bit about how much he wanted to play professional baseball.”
Jankowski and Gantt, the longtime coach at Catawba, each said there are no hard feelings toward the other over the situation. Gantt said he’s “extremely happy” for Jankowski and that he wished they could redo the scenario under current NCAA rules, which the coach said allow players to work out for teams before their season has ended.
“It was kind of an expensive trip,” Jankowski said with a smile, “but it was worth it.”