Beaver County native McKay chosen No. 4 by Rays in MLB Draft

It was not long ago that the fourth player chosen in the Major League Baseball First-Year Player Draft on Monday was a high school phenom fooling hitters in western Pennsylvania.

Since his days at Blackhawk High School in Beaver Falls, Pa., Brendan McKay has transformed into a dominant left-handed pitcher and power-hitting first baseman at Louisville, capturing the attention of scouts and analysts around the country.

So much, in fact, that many believed he would be chosen No. 1 overall, but McKay was selected as a first baseman with the fourth pick by the Tampa Bay Rays.

Additionally, Arizona outfielder J.J. Matijevic, a North Huntington, Pa., native and a graduate of Norwin High School, was selected as a second baseman by the Astros with the No. 75 overall pick.

McKay, a starting pitcher with a 94-mph fastball, is 10-3 with a 2.34 ERA and 140 strikeouts to 33 walks in 16 starts for College World Series-bound Louisville this season. A native of Darlington in Beaver County, he is also batting .343 with 17 home runs and 56 RBI.

The junior was chosen in the 34th round of the 2014 draft by the Padres — six rounds after the organization selected former Browns quarterback Johnny Manziel — but chose to join the Cardinals' program.

This time, high school shortstop Royce Lewis of Aliso Viejo, Calif., was chosen by the Twins at No. 1 overall, high school phenom Hunter Greene, a right-handed pitcher whose fastball has reached 100 mph, went to the Reds at No. 2 and left-handed high school pitcher Mackenzie Gore went third to the Padres.

McKay is the second western Pennsylvania native in as many seasons to be chosen in the first round after outfielder Alex Kirilloff, a graduate of Plum High School, was selected by the Twins at No. 15 last June.

Kirilloff batted .306 in 55 games for rookie-level Elizabethton last season, but was shut down after reporting elbow soreness on Aug. 28 and is out for the 2017 season after undergoing Tommy John surgery in March.

McKay has twice been named an All-American by Baseball America, has won the John Olerud Two-Way Player of the Year Award for three consecutive seasons and was voted the ACC Baseball Player of the Year in 2017.

He has used his fastball command mixed with a curveball and changeup to dominate hitters in the conference.

Analysts believed he was destined for a professional pitching career, but he is one of the better hitters in the draft. His success at Louisville came as no surprise to those who saw him pitch for Blackhawk High School.

He was 30-2 as a pitcher with 366 strikeouts with a career ERA of 0.53. He received national attention with a scoreless streak of 72⅓ innings, tying the second-longest streak ever recorded in high school baseball around the country.

McKay also batted above .400 in each of his high school seasons.