MINNEAPOLIS -- The Angels used the first day of the 2025 Draft to make a clear statement about how they wanted to shape this class: one high-upside prep bat up top, then a run of college position players who could move faster.
With interim general manager John Mozeliak in charge after replacing Perry Minasian in late June, scouting director Tim McIlvaine had more room to steer the board his way. McIlvaine said Mozeliak gave him the freedom to run the room, and he leaned into it.
“It’s fun,” McIlvaine said. “As scouting director, you want to be able to make picks and every general manager has the ability to run the room however they want to. And so the way Mo does, he came in and empowered me to do it, so I ran with it.”
That approach showed immediately. The Angels snapped a seven-year streak of taking a college player with their first pick, grabbing Huntington Beach High School outfielder Jared Grindlinger at No. 12 overall. Grindlinger is only 17, and his appeal goes beyond the bat - he’s also viewed as a possible two-way player because of his left-handed pitching.
After that, the Angels shifted to players considered closer to the Majors. They added Georgia Tech second baseman Jarren Advincula at No.
45, Texas A&M third baseman Gavin Grahovac at No. 81 and Georgia outfielder Rylan Lujo at No. 109.
The mix was obvious: youth and ceiling first, then college polish.
The Angels also stayed committed to position players across Day 1, a sensible route for a system that is said to be deeper in arms than bats. Still, Mozeliak said before the Draft that the club would simply take the best player available with each selection, and that’s the lane they followed.
Grindlinger may need more time, but Advincula and Lujo bring elite contact skills, while Grahovac offers real power. It’s a group that fits the recent mold of high Draft picks for the Angels, even if each player brings a different path to the big leagues.
McIlvaine said the organization has never been opposed to high school players, even if the board didn’t line up that way in recent years.
“I always tell you guys every year we talk about a lot of high school players, and that didn't change,” he said. “It just never really happened that way.
And this year, it just was the way it fell. Jared ended up the best player on the board, and that's the one we went with.”
Advincula arrives after a huge season at Georgia Tech, where he led NCAA Division 1 with 111 hits and hit .434/.503/.629 in 61 games in his lone year there. Before that, he batted .334 with a nine percent strikeout rate over his first two seasons at Cal. He’s also viewed as a steady baserunner and a dependable second baseman.
“It’s pretty surreal just to be drafted. It’s easy to think about all the possibilities, and therefore I try not to think,” Advincula told the Silicon Valley Voice.
Grahovac, a native of nearby Orange, Calif., brings some of the loudest raw tools in the class. The Texas A&M third baseman posted a .339/.429/.722 line with 22 homers in 57 games during a strong junior season, and he has trimmed his strikeout rate. The defensive side is less settled, though, with Grahovac described as erratic at third base and spending most of this year at first.
“There’s going to be a lot of emotions going through my head, a lot of emotions going through everyone around me, but just enjoy the moment with my family, just see the work that I’ve done throughout my entire life is paying off. And I’m finally getting to live out a dream that I’ve had since I was as little as I can remember,” he told KBTX 3
Day 2 of the Draft begins Sunday at 11:30 a.m. ET and runs through the end of the event, covering Rounds 5-20. It can be streamed live on MLB.com, MLB.TV, MLB+ and the MLB App.
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