‘Special’: A’s prospect Allen headed to Games
Nick Allen has garnered a few designations in his early baseball career — A’s shortstop prospect, thirdround draft pick, defensive whiz.
He is adding another: Olympian.
Allen, 22, in his first season with the A’s DoubleA Midland affiliate, is part of the U.S. Olympic baseball team headed to the Tokyo Games this month.
“I never knew this was going to be an opportunity,” Allen said recently by phone. “When I was younger my goals were to make the youth USA teams … and I never knew this was possible, so for this to be going on, it’s really special.”
Baseball was last part of an Olympic Games in 2008 — when Allen was 9 years old. Allen was drafted by the A’s from Parker High School in San Diego in 2017 and ranked their sixthbest prospect by Baseball America entering this season. He started at shortstop for Team USA as it claimed a berth in the sixteam Tokyo field at the Americas qualifier in June.
With players on 40man MLB rosters ineligible, the Team USA qualifying roster mixed prospects and veteran players with majorleague time. Allen said he arrived to find himself lockering next to former AllStar outfielder Matt Kemp. Another teammate, infielder Logan Forsythe, played in San Diego with the Padres for several seasons when Allen was growing up.
“It was really cool to kind of pick his brain because he’s a middle infielder and I can kind of see my game similar to his in certain ways,” Allen said.
“I knew some of the veterans just by watching them over years past. And getting to meet them in person, it was great to see how truly professional they were. They treated the young guys with respect. Hopefully if I’m ever in that situation, I’ll do the same.”
Team USA went undefeated at the Americas qualifier, securing its Olympic spot with a win over Venezuela. USA Baseball’s Twitter account compiled a thread during the tournament of Allen’s defensive highlights. About a week after qualifying, Allen said, he received a call from manager Mike Scioscia saying he had made the Olympic roster.
“When I heard that I was like, ‘Dang,’ ” Allen said.
Even in qualifying, Allen said, the game atmosphere was “different than playing in professional ball, for sure,” given the stakes.
“It’s like, if you lose, you’re done,” Allen said. “And I’m sure that’s what will happen, hopefully, if I’m ever fortunate enough to make the major leagues and be in a playoff position. But there it’s if you lose, you’re out. And you’re playing for something really big, for your whole country. So we all knew when we stepped on the field we were playing for a little something different. But I can’t wait to get out there and kind of get that feeling back again, for sure.”
The 24man USA roster for Tokyo has changes from the qualifying roster — Kemp, Forsythe and Jon Jay were among the omissions — but 14 returning players. The team convenes in North Carolina this weekend to play several exhibitions before traveling to Japan, where it is scheduled to play its opener July 30 against Israel. Japan,
South Korea, Mexico and the Dominican Republic round out the Olympics field.
Allen is compiling a strong season at Midland. Thursday, in his last game before leaving to rejoin Team USA, he went 3for3 to raise his season average to .319 and OPS to .845. A’s manager Bob Melvin said earlier this month the Olympic selection is “an honor (Allen) should be very proud of,” and: “Anytime you have an opportunity to do that, you need to.”
“Nothing’s really sunk in yet,” Allen said. “I don’t think it’ll ever really sink in until I’ve kind of gone and done the experience, because I just don’t know what I’m really getting into.
“I think at the end of the day I’ll be able to kind of look back and enjoy it. But I think when I got the call, I just still don’t know what I’m getting myself into. All I know is that I’d better be ready to play some baseball.”