Top pick Lee gets grand tour after signing
Ten minutes before closing their clubhouse to reporters Wednesday afternoon, the Astros welcomed a new addition. Led inside by Michael Brantley, Korey Lee surveyed the room. He shook many hands and wore an irremovable smile. Soon he plopped down on a recliner next to fellow firstround draftee Carlos Correa and began a conversation.
“It’s incredible,” said Lee, the 32nd overall pick in last week’s MLB Draft who signed with the Astros on Wednesday. “It’s feeling like a little kid. You’re dreaming about it, and you don’t wake up. Honestly, it’s a dream come true.”
Lee’s yearlong ascent up the amateur baseball hierarchy reached its peak Wednesday. He took batting practice alongside the major league club, spent pregame inside the clubhouse and was paraded around Minute Maid Park during the Astros’ game against the Milwaukee Brewers.
All this for a player who started just 46 games, struck 42 hits and slugged five home runs during his first two seasons at California. The departure of two-year starter Tyrus Greene allowed Lee to break out. He started 50 games as a junior and garnered first-team AllPac 12 honors.
The 6-2 catcher caught 12 of 27 base stealers while accruing a 1.045 OPS in 198 at-bats. His selection came as somewhat of a surprise, given the dearth of pre-draft hype surrounding him. Neither Baseball America nor MLB.com ranked him among the top 100 draft prospects.
“We were ecstatic to get him,” said Astros domestic scouting supervisor Kris Gross, who oversaw the team’s draft operations.
“The physical attributes jump off the page right away. A strong, physical catcher … moves around really well behind the plate. A bazooka for an arm. I think he’s really going to be a big factor in shutting down the run game. At the plate, the combination of hit and power jumped out at us.”
Lee will report to short season Tri City on Thursday and, according to Gross, may appear in the ValleyCats’ opening night lineup Friday. Lee is represented by agent Scott Boras, who attended Wednesday’s game at Minute Maid Park.
There is an obvious opportunity for Lee to quickly move up in a farm system that lacks catching depth. Trading Jacob Nottingham in 2015 and Jake Rogers in 2017 left the Astros without two of their most viable major league catching projects.
General manager Jeff Luhnow acknowledged the deficiency on draft night, moments after Lee’s selection. The Astros had not selected a catcher in the first round since Jason Castro in 2008.
“I don’t want to put any pressure on him. Everyone goes at their own pace,” Gross said. “He was a little behind in college at-bats with the part-time playing. … If he goes out and produces with the bat like we think he can, he can move fairly quickly.”
Lee was among 16 Astros draft picks to sign Wednesday. Six came from the first 10 rounds.
The Astros saved money on Lee, who signed for $1.75 million — more than $500,000 below the pick’s slot value of $2.26 million.
The tactic figures to continue while the club pools as much money as it can to lure fourth-round selection Colin Barber. Barber was picked with the 136th overall selection, which holds a slot value of $410,100. Belief within the Astros’ organization is it will take far more to lure Barber — an Oregon signee — to professional baseball.
“Part of our job through the first 10 rounds is managing our pool of resources and getting as much talent as possible,” said Luhnow, who did not officially disclose any of the bonus totals. “We were pretty creative this year in doing that again, and as a result, we were able to hopefully get to a point where we have enough resources to sign all our top-10 picks.”
Sixth-round pick Matthew Barefoot and 10th-rounder CJ Stubbs signed for less than slot value, the Chronicle learned, saving the Astros a combined $146,200.
Barefoot brought in a $150,000 bonus at a pick with a slot value of $239,000. Stubbs, the younger brother of Astros backup Garrett Stubbs, signed for $85,000. Value for his selection at No. 316 was $142,200.
Also signed Wednesday was fifth-round pitcher Hunter Brown, a righthander from Wayne State. MLB.com’s Jim Callis reported Brown was signed for $325,000 — $18,200 over slot value — putting some of the savings on the other signees to work already.