SEATTLE, Wash. – Missouri State’s Spencer Nivens was selected by the Kansas City Royals in the fifth round (142nd overall) of the 2023 Major League Baseball First-Year Player Draft on Monday.
Nivens was named the Missouri Valley Conference Joe Carter Player of the Year this season and hit .341 with 14 home runs and 45 RBI. The outfielder reached safely in 53 of 56 games and ranked among the MVC’s top 10 in nearly every offensive category. The Columbia, Mo., native’s six triples this year were the most by an MSU player since 2016, while his 36 extra-base hits were the most since both Jake Burger and Jeremy Eierman reached that total in 2017. He also hit for the eighth cycle in school history and first since 1998 in February.
Nivens is the first MoState outfielder chosen in the draft since Hunter Steinmetz in 2018. His selection marks the 116th time a Missouri State player has been picked in the draft, and he is the 19th Bear to go in the top five rounds. Among MSU outfielders, only Tate Matheny (4/111 in 2015) and Matt Cepicky (4/120 in 1999) have been drafted higher.
Missouri State’s Jake Eddington was the seventh-round pick of the Philadelphia Phillies on Monday on day two of the 2023 Major League Baseball First-Year Player Draft, going off the board as the 223rd overall pick.
Eddington made 14 starts on the weekend for the Bears this season, going 4-2 with a 4.20 ERA and 59 strikeouts in 55.2 innings. The right-hander from Doniphan, Mo., held opponents to a .226 batting average and lowered that to a .206 mark in nine MVC starts. Eddington struck out a season-high 10 batters against Murray State in the MVC Tournament, yielded two or fewer earned runs in 12 of 15 total appearances, and gave up more than four hits only three times.
Eddington’s selection marks the 117th time a Missouri State player has been picked in the draft.
UPDATE: Hayden Minton became the third Bear to come off the board in the 2023 Major League Baseball First-Year Player Draft on Monday, going to the Detroit Tigers in the ninth round as the 260th overall pick.
Minton started on all 15 weekends for the Bears this season, going 6-2 with a 4.07 ERA as an honorable mention all-conference selection. He ranked second in the Missouri Valley Conference and 66th nationally with 96 strikeouts and sat third in the league in strikeouts per nine innings (10.29) and second in strikeout-to-walk ratio (3.56).
The Collinsville, Okla., native tossed the Bears’ only complete game of the season, a five-hitter with one run allowed against Belmont on April 21, and fanned a season-high 10 batters against SIUE on March 12, retiring the final 16 batters he faced in the game. Minton also earned all-tournament honors at the MVC meet by throwing seven shutout innings with seven strikeouts in a victory against UIC.
With Spencer Nivens (fifth round to Kansas City) and Jake Eddington (seventh round to Philadelphia) being picked earlier Monday, the Bears have three players selected in the top 10 rounds for the third time in school history, joining the 2003 and 2015 teams.
