Sterling, Pirates' 17-year-old second-rounder, 'just getting started'

Levi Sterling comes from a place that is known for producing great baseball players. 

Hunter Greene and Giancarlo Stanton are just two of the biggest names that head baseball coach Tom Dill has seen walk through his doors at Notre Dame High School in Sherman Oaks, Calif. Dill estimated that he's sent at least another 50 or 60 players to the Division I level. 

Sterling, the Pirates' second pick of the 2024 MLB Draft, No. 37 overall pick in the Competitive Balance A round, is now next in line to join that special group.

However, at such a young age -- Sterling is still 17 years old -- it's hard to predict exactly how he'll pan out, but there's no shortage of potential. He's a 6-5, 200-pound right-handed pitcher who throws a fastball in the low 90s with a mixture of breaking pitches that includes a low-80s slider, a mid-70s curveball and a low-80s changeup. He also still has room to grow.

"He's able to compete and go after guys, he throws a lot of strikes," Dill said. "He's young, he's got a great body for a pitcher, he's athletic with big legs, you know, there's big-time potential there. He's just getting started as far as I'm concerned." 

But, even at that point, there are so many unknowns when it comes to forecasting the career of a young hurler. He doesn't have the hitting power of Stanton or Greene's triple-digit fastball. But, Sterling has all the intangibles that make up a good pitcher at the professional level.

"You've got these guys (Greene and Stanton) with kind of sick special gifts," Dill said. "It's going be a little bit different with Levi. Yea, he has a lot of gifts and I think he's got huge upside. I think the fact that he has command of all his pitches, he doesn't get rattled, he's got the right demeanor and attitude, he's got room for growth and a good body, a good arm and because he has all of those things, I can see why the Pirates picked him up."

Sterling, a Texas signee, first came to Dill as a freshman and he played on junior varsity for one season. He played shortstop, but he wasn't necessarily a pitcher who could play shortstop. He was a shortstop who could pitch, Dill said, adding he saw the same thing with Greene and has always thought position players who also pitch have more control and more command on the mound. 

Sterling was no different. Over the next two years, Dill used him in a relief role. He would play third base or shortstop and then come in to close games down. As a junior, Sterling pitched 38 innings, tallied a 0.55 ERA, allowed just three earned runs, recorded seven saves and struck out 59 of the 148 batters he faced. 

"He would come in relief and just mow everybody down," Dill said. 

Sterling's competitive nature made him perfect for the role as well. Dill described Sterling as one of those guys who wants to have the ball in his hands with the game on the line. 

"He wants to win, he will do whatever it takes," Dill said.

But that is something that any successful player at Notre Dame High School has to have as the Knights play in the Mission League in Southern California. It includes the likes of Harvard-Westlake, Chaminade, Sierra Canyon and others. Dill said in his nearly 30 years in the league, it's had 10 or 15 first-rounders, maybe more. 

So, if you wanted to survive on a nightly basis you had to have that competitive edge. 

"A lot of our guys will have competitiveness, but he's definitely on the higher end of that," Dill said. "To compete out here in Southern California you have to have that because you'll get eaten alive."

During Sterling's senior season, he recorded a 2.62 ERA in 45 1/3 innings while also hitting .319. He was a 2024 end-of-season Baseball America second-team High School All-American and was rated by Perfect Game as the No. 6 right-handed pitcher in the nation and as the No. 31 prospect overall. He was also ranked by Baseball America as the 54th-best prospect in this year's draft and was rated No. 58 by MLB Pipeline. 

Justin Horowitz, the Pirates' amateur scouting director, said Sterling does things easily and is projectable physically and with his stuff.

"He’s got an effective fastball. He already has some present velocity that we think is going to get even better as he continues to add strength," Horowitz said. "He’s got a nasty changeup. Gets a ton of whiffs with that pitch and a developing breaking ball, too."

On top of performing well at the high school level, Sterling also played alongside Konnor Griffin for USA Baseball in September at the WBSC U-18 Baseball World Cup in Taiwan.

Griffin was fielding questions from local media via Zoom after the Pirates selected him Sunday night when he was told the Pirates also selected Sterling. A big smile suddenly came across his face before he gave his own synopsis of what Sterling can do.

"He's great on the mound, I don't know what the Pirates are planning to do with him but he's great on the mound, can play the infield and he can hit," Griffin said. "You can do a lot with a player like that." 

Over the course of his career at Notre Dame, Dill has collected the jerseys of his former players who have reached the major league level and displays them throughout his office. 

Greene, Stanton, Brendan Ryan, Chris Dickerson and others all have jerseys hanging up at their former stomping grounds. But, Dill is hoping that someday soon he'll get to add another jersey to his wall. 

"Hopefully, I'll get one of those from Levi someday."