Vanderbilt baseball's Sean Gamble signs with Kansas City Royals
Gamble was selected 23rd in the 2025 MLB Draft on July 13, and signed with the organization for $3,997,500.
The 185-pound outfielder, who hits left-handed, was ranked the No. 7 prospect in the 2025 class by Perfect Game. He was also the No. 27 prospect in the draft, according to MLB Pipeline.
The Vanderbilt commit is one of a few who signed MLB contracts before arriving campus. Right-handed pitcher Seth Hernandez was selected 6th overall and signed with the Pittsburgh Pirates. Shortstop Cooper Flemming went 53rd overall and signed with the Tampa Bay Rays.
Talon Haley was selected on the second day of the draft at 349th and signed with the Los Angeles Angels.
The two other Vanderbilt commits that were drafted and have not signed are Slater de Brun and Connor Hamilton.
Alaina Morris is the summer sports intern for The Tennessean. Contact her at amorris@gannett.com or on X @alainammorris.
This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Vanderbilt baseball recruit Sean Gamble signs with Kansas City Royals
Hashtags

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


New York Times
38 minutes ago
- New York Times
The 3 preseason San Francisco Giants predictions I wish I'd made
I once made a prediction that was accurate and amusing enough to be included on my Wikipedia page. Because of this, you might assume that I'm good at predictions. I am not. That was the only good prediction I have ever made. I am better at fixing transmissions than I am at making predictions, and you don't want me within 50 feet of your car. Advertisement It's probably for the best that I don't remember any of the predictions my corporate overlords forced me to make before this season, because I'm sure they're already shot to heck. What I do remember, though, are the educated guesses and half-baked hunches about the Giants that I had before the season. Some of them came close to happening. If I had any courage at all, I would have published them as predictions and ended up looking smart. I didn't. They're only the preseason predictions I wish I made. To be fair, I at least hinted at the idea in a predictions article, but that was even more wishy-washy than my normal stuff. These were the actual words that were in my brain all winter: This dude might struggle something fierce. Every time I clicked on his Baseball Savant page, it was like a blinking red siren. He wasn't just making weak contact; he was making some of the weakest contact in the league. He wasn't just swinging and missing; he had some of the worst strikeout and whiff rates in the league. Then there was his batted-ball profile, which has him as one of the most extreme pull hitters in baseball. It all adds up to the profile of a hitter the league will catch up with. Then you get to the evidence that the league already did catch up to him at the end of his breakout season: His OPS for September of last season was under .700, and his strikeout-to-walk ratio was all cattywampus. It's a shame, because there's so much already right with him as a player. His speed, instincts, pull-side power and versatility are all helpful to a major-league team right now, which helps explain why Baseball-Reference's WAR still has him as the fourth-most valuable position player on the Giants this season, behind only Matt Chapman, Mike Yastrzemski and Willy Adames. He's still young, and there's still time for him to make the adjustments he needs to. Advertisement It was always unlikely for him to repeat what he did last year, though. It was unlikely for him to come close, even. That's pretty much what's happened. His OPS vs. lefties is 22 points lower than his OPS against right-handers this year, which is both great and horrible news, but his overall production is roughly the same. His adjusted OPS was 25 percent better than the National League last season, and it's 22 percent better this season. He's still as streaky as hitters get, but he's at least shown that last season's second half was just a slump, not a result of the league solving him. The caveat to all this is that I did not see the defensive calamity coming. There have been rough defensive patches for Ramos throughout his Giants career, but nothing like the rough defense he's shown all season. Ramos is between Fitzgerald and Christian Koss in WAR this season, according to Baseball-Reference, which gives you an idea of just how much Ramos' defense is hurting him. And I can't disagree with the numbers, either. They match the eyeball test, and the eyeballs hurt. Still, the offense is a welcome not-surprise. Ramos is a healthy part of a balanced lineup, just like he was last year. Not only is that welcome for this season, but the Giants can start expecting it for future seasons, too. I'd imagine there's quite the generational split among Giants fans when it comes to expectations for pitching prospects. In one corner, you have the old guard, the ones who spent decades expecting doom. Between the Bob Knepper trade in 1980 and Matt Cain's debut in 2005, there wasn't a more dangerous job on the planet than 'exciting young Giants pitcher.' Every time a pitcher would start to fly, they'd fly too close to the sun on shoulders made out of wax. Can you believe there was a time when the Giants had five starting pitchers in the top-100 prospects, including the best pitching prospect in baseball? Only one of them lived up to expectations, and only after he was traded for A.J. Pierzynski. It was always doom for the young pitchers. Doom, doom, doom. Advertisement And in the other corner, you have newer fans, who watched the Giants thrive beyond their wildest dreams because of young pitching. They understand that pitching is a cruel profession, and they know that success can be fleeting, but they're not terrified of young pitchers in general. Sometimes they work. Look at Logan Webb over there. Came up, got good, stayed good for a long time. What's the big deal? That happens with young pitchers sometimes. I'll always be the one in the first example, though. It doesn't surprise me when other teams develop pitchers. The Mariners had a couple seasons where they were consistently making homegrown pitchers out of glowing dirt they dug up behind old Boeing test grounds, and that made sense to me. When it comes to the Giants, though, I always hold my breath. Young pitchers, you say? Sounds risky. There was a point this season where the Giants had too many young pitchers. They sent an incumbent starter to the minors. They had a battle for the one and final spot in the rotation. They had to use starting pitchers as relievers because, well, there were just too many young pitchers. I was scared for them. 'There's no way it will work,' the oldest, crustiest lobe of my brain croaked. And I nodded in agreement. For these were promising young Giants pitchers we were talking about. Except this prediction makes it in here because it's both correct and incorrect. Yes, Hayden Birdsong is caught in a developmental maelstrom right now, and Kyle Harrison is currently on the Pawtucket Red Sox, but Landen Roupp has been stellar. It's been enjoyable to watch his changeup develop as the season progresses, and you can see the curveball become even more effective the less he has to rely on it. Sometimes it's better to be wrong. Maybe there's a way to scoop this lobe of the brain out and replace it with something more optimistic. 'Oops! All Lincecums!' or something like that. I wish I were more wrong in public about the Giants' plan to rely on young pitchers, which I was quietly skeptical about. If the Giants make the postseason this year, young pitching will be a major reason why. Sometimes young pitchers end up helping, and they don't have to stop for a long time. (Top photo of Tyler Fitzgerald: Emilee Chinn / Getty Images)
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
Tyler Mawhinney rallies on back nine to reserve a spot in U.S. Junior Amateur match play
Tyler Mawhinney of Fleming Island was getting uncomfortably close to the projected cut for match play in the second round of the U.S. Junior Amateur on July 22. But the rising senior at Fleming Island High School and Vanderbilt commit birdied three of his last five holes at the Brook Hollow Golf Club in Dallas and, at even-par 141, reserved a spot in the field of 64 players who will begin match play on July 23 at the Trinity Forest Golf Club. Mawhinney (73) tied for 24th after dipping as low as a tie for 36th and joins Miles Russell of Jacksonville Beach (72 at Brook Hollow) in match play. Russell shot 2-under 139 to tie for eighth. Russell will play Jackson Ormond, a resident of Webster, N.Y., who has verbally committed to the University of Florida, at 9:40 a.m. on July 23. Russell committed to Florida State on June 30. Mawhinney's first match will be against Lapossapon Heras-Gomez of Thailand, beginning at 11:10 a.m. Tyler Mawhinney has rough start Mawhinney, who shot 68 in the first round at Trinity Forest, began his round at Brook Hollow on the 10th hole, was 5-over for the day and 2-over for the tournament through his first 12 holes. He parred the par-3 fourth hole, then got his first birdie of the day on a 6-foot putt at No. 5 Mawhinney then drained a 27-footer for birdie on the next hole, and bounced back from a bogey at No. 7 with a closing birdie, on a roll of 23 feet. Mawhinney already has one USGA national championship this season. He and future Vanderbilt teammate Will Hartman won the U.S. Amateur Four Ball on May 22. Russell, who shot 67 in the first round, was 2-over through five holes in the second, then stopped the bleeding with a birdie at the par-3 eighth hole. He bogeyed Nos. 11 and 13 but played his final five holes at 1-under with no additional blemishes on the card, with a birdie at the 615-yard, par-5 15th. Four other area players failed to qualify for match play: Phillip Dunham of Ponte Vedra Beach and Jackson Byrd of St. Simons Island, Ga., (7-over, tied for 105th), Lucas Gimenez of Jacksonville (11-over, tied for 166th) and Brady Dougan in St. Johns (15-over, tied for 212th. Did Charlie Woods qualify for match play? Charlie Woods, the son of 15-time major champion and two-time Players champion Tiger Woods improved on his first-round 81 at Brook Hollow but his 74 in the second round at Trinity Forest wasn't nearly enough and he finished at 14-over-par 155 and in a tie for 196th. Tiger Woods followed his son all 18 holes for the second day in a row. Woods won the U.S. Junior Amateur three times, then added three U.S. Amateur titles and three U.S. Opens for nine USGA championships in his career. Among Charlie Woods' next appearances is scheduled to be the Junior Players Championship, Aug. 28-31, at the TPC Sawgrass Players Stadium Course, where his father won the 2001 and 2013 Players Championships, as well as the 1994 U.S. Amateur. This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Tyler Mawhinney, Miles Russell reserve spots in U.S. Junior Am Match Play
Yahoo
6 hours ago
- Yahoo
Rich Hill starts for Kansas City Royals: Who are oldest active MLB players?
The Kansas City Royals turned to 45-year-old Rich Hill to start Tuesday's game against the Chicago Cubs, making the left-handed pitcher the oldest player to appear in MLB this season. Hill pitched five innings against the Cubs, allowing three runs — just one earned — striking out one batter and walking two. The Cubs went on to win the game, 6-0, with Hill taking the loss. Hill was called up from the Triple-A Omaha Storm Chasers on Monday, July 21. The veteran left-handed pitcher last appeared in the majors late in the 2024 season, making four relief appearances in August and September for the Boston Red Sox. Hill is one of just five players over 45 to play in the majors since 2010, and the first to do so since 2018. Hill also became the oldest player to ever play for the Royals, playing for his 14th MLB team. That ties Edwin Jackson's record for the most teams played for by one player. Here's what to know about Rich Hill and the oldest active players in the majors: Oldest active players in MLB Rich Hill might be the oldest active player in Major League Baseball, but he'll have to stick around for some time to break Satchel Paige's incredible record. Paige was 59 years old when he made his final MLB appearance on Sept. 25, 1965, a record that might never be broken. However, that's not to take away from Hill and the other durable players across the majors who are still plugging away at the top of the sport. Here, per Baseball Reference, is a list of the 10 oldest active MLB players: 1. Rich Hill (Kansas City Royals) - 45 years, 133 days 2. Justin Verlander (San Francisco Giants) - 42 years, 152 days 3. Charlie Morton (Baltimore Orioles) - 41 years, 252 days 4. Max Scherzer (Toronto Blue Jays) - 40 years, 360 days 5. Justin Turner (Chicago Cubs) - 40 years, 241 days 6. Carlos Santana (Cleveland Guardians) - 39 years, 105 days 7. Chris Martin (Texas Rangers) - 39 years, 50 days 8t. Martín Maldonado (San Diego Padres) - 38 years, 340 days 8t. Yu Darvish (San Diego Padres) - 38 years, 340 days 10. Andrew McCutchen (Pittsburgh Pirates) - 38 years, 285 days The biggest stories, every morning. Stay up-to-date on all the key sports developments by subscribing to USA TODAY Sports' newsletter. This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Rich Hill tops list of oldest active MLB players