How former State College outfielder Jack Hurley has boosted his 2023 MLB Draft stock
Jack Hurley built onto his stardom at State College, making the All-Mid Penn Second Team and is currently a standout outfielder for Virginia Tech.
The 6-foot, 185-pound outfielder started his collegiate career by playing 51 games in 2021 with 175 at-bats, batting .251, holding an on-base percentage of .354 and a slugging percentage of .411. He also had six home runs and 25 runs batted in. His breakout season came in 2022, slashing .375/.452/.664 with 14 home runs and 55 RBI.
Hurley received a ton of buzz for his accomplishments. He was selected to the Team USA Baseball Collegiate National Team 26-man roster, earned All-American Second Team honors from the NCBWA and made the All-ACC First Team as a semifinalist for the Dick Howser Trophy. The rising junior believes that it’s just the beginning of what he can accomplish on the diamond.
“I’m sticking to my childhood dream of wanting to be a professional baseball player,” Hurley said. “I’ve always wanted to make it to the big leagues and I know that it’s going to take a lot of work and I’m not even close to being where I need to be to get anywhere near there. I’m really trying to take it day by day and work as hard as I can to reach my childhood goal of being a professional baseball player. It’s going to take a lot of hard work and it’s going to take being around the right people.”
Some of the right people that Hurley mentioned are from his past. Troy Allen served as State College’s baseball coach from 2016-2018 and watched Hurley constantly improve. Allen played professional baseball in the Atlanta Braves organization, seeing how players conduct themselves and build strong training habits.
Not only does he believe that Hurley has built those habits as a young player, but he feels that it won’t be too long before he’s playing Major League Baseball.
“There’s no doubt in my mind that he’s going to be on a Major League roster in a few years,” Allen said. “He’s going to be a double-digit-year MLB guy, there’s no doubt about it. I played with the Braves and there’s a kid that I played with named Jose Villar who was one of the best defensive outfielders that I’ve ever seen and Jack is way better than him defensively. At the plate — he (Hurley) isn’t huge, but he’s got a lot of power and obviously, he hits for average, he can bunt and his speed translates on the bases.”
Allen knew of Hurley’s talent, even as a freshman baseball player. He was blown away by his raw ability, using a tryout system employed by the New York Yankees. The workouts include 60-yard sprints, velocity, ball exit speed, along with defensive and swing assessments. At the conclusion, a grade is given to each varsity and junior varsity player.
Hurley had the third highest grade of any player in the program and made the varsity team as a freshman.
“It was a no-brainer to put him on varsity because his talent just jumped off the page,” Allen said. “He started for us right away and he contributed. That year that we went to the state semifinal, he was a key member of that team as a freshman.”
Former Bellefonte baseball star CJ Funk is now playing against Hurley in the Atlantic Coast Conference. Now at Pitt, Funk looks fondly back on the memories that the two had on the baseball field playing for Flood City Elite since they were 13 years old. He too is excited for Hurley’s accomplishments as a collegiate player.
“It’s awesome to see him have a really exceptional year this year,” Funk said. “He works his tail off and he really deserves everything that came his way this year. He has a really bright future ahead of him. It’s really awesome to see guys like him. There’s other athletes from this area in general that have done well in their respective sports. It’s a cool way to represent the Centre County area and central Pennsylvania in general. I was really happy to see that.”
Hurley’s Virginia Tech squad had a great deal of buzz surrounding it this season too. The Hokies went 45-14 in 2022 and were the No. 4 seed overall heading into the NCAA Baseball Tournament. There, Virginia Tech advanced to the Super Regional, falling to Oklahoma 2-1 in a best of three series.
It was an experience that Hurley will never forget.
“It was the most fun that I ever had playing baseball,” Hurley said. “We were always the underdogs. Going into the season we were picked 13th of 14 teams to finish in the ACC. So, we’ve always had that underdog mentality and I think it’s way more fun playing like that because you have really, really low expectations, but it’s always a great feeling when you can break the expectations.”
Heading into what may be his final collegiate season, Hurley looks to boost his stock with the lessons learned from Allen and hopes to continue impressing his friend in Funk on the baseball field.
