Fresno State redshirt junior catcher Zach Morgan grew up watching Giants games. Now, he’s been drafted by San Francisco.
On July 18 San Francisco selected Morgan in the seventh round on day two of the 2022 Major League Baseball (MLB) First-Year Player Draft. He was taken with the 226th selection after being named No. 248 on MLB.com’s Top 250 Draft Prospects list.
Morgan is the 33rd student-athlete under Fresno State head coach Mike Batesole to be selected in the first 10 rounds since Batesole became head coach in 2003.
The 6-foot Diamond ‘Dog is the first catcher taken by the Giants in the 2022 MLB Draft, and the 15th from college ranks. He is the second player to be selected from the Mountain West after the Tigers took San Diego State’s Troy Melton in the fourth round.
In 2022, Morgan earned All-Mountain West First Team honors, was one of three finalists for the Buster Posey National Catcher of the Year Award and was an ABCA/Rawlings Gold Glove finalist at catcher.
The 22-year-old Stockton native started all 55 games in 2022 at catcher, and scored a run in 31 games. 13 of them were multi-run, including three different three-run performances. Morgan led the team and ranked fifth in the Mountain West, hitting .381.
Morgan was a three-year letter winner for Lincoln High School, earning First-Team All-Tri-City Athletic Conference as a junior and senior in 2017 and 2018. In 2015 he was a USA National Team Gold Medalist, which he named his “biggest athletic thrill,” and in 2017 he was an Oakland A’s Area Code Team member.
He received his first college offer from Nevada as a high school freshman, and more throughout his sophomore and junior year, but chose Fresno State when they contacted him after his junior year.
“When I walked onto the baseball field, I knew that’s where I wanted to be,” Morgan said when previewing the draft with Fresno State digital reporter Taylor Martinez. “Obviously they have a great baseball history, a rich baseball history. I wanted to come and play at a great baseball school, and that’s where I wanted to go.”
Morgan told Martinez he grew up a Giants fan and attended many Giants games, but would be happy to play for whatever team called his name. He was more concerned with leaving his fellow Bulldogs.
“They are more like brothers than teammates, so I think those are memories I’ll cherish. I’ll be sad to leave those behind, but I think that those bonds will last forever,” Morgan said.
The 2022 MLB Draft will end on Tuesday with rounds 11-20, which will be aired on the MLB website at 11 a.m.