A Navy graduate has never been drafted higher in baseball’s draft than the 10th round, and the only two who have played in the big leagues are Mitch Harris, a pitcher who spent 2015 with the St. Louis Cardinals after a five-year military commitment, and Nemo Gaines, who pitched four games for the Washington Senators shortly after graduating in 1921. (Oliver Drake, a reliever with the Tampa Bay Rays, left Navy after two seasons.)

“I guess the easy way of saying it is I’m used to my day being planned out by somebody else at this point,” Song said with a smile. “In my mind, I’m not worried about it because I have two Plan As. There’s no such thing as a backup plan for me at this point. Both are fantastic opportunities.”

Not long ago, it was hard to see either one coming.

Song’s arrival at the academy was hardly auspicious. On induction day, when freshmen spend the day getting processed (haircuts, paperwork, uniforms, running shoes and the like), their gear — about 75 pounds stuffed inside white cloth bags — is dumped atop the steps of the dormitory, Bancroft Hall, with their name on it. Their minds overloaded already, the plebes are ordered to hustle to their rooms, change into their new uniforms and organize their belongings.

But Song could not find his bag: another freshman with the same last name had taken it.

The start of baseball practice that September also did not unfold without wrinkles. The 15 pounds Song had gained for baseball disappeared after six weeks of pull-ups, situps, push-ups and conditioning runs. His fastball velocity had dropped several clicks, to 82 miles per hour.

“We were like, ‘Oh, no,” said Bobby Applegate, Navy’s pitching coach.

Steadily, though, Song regained his strength, and by the end of his freshman season had worked his way into the starting rotation. The blossoming on the baseball field continued, even amid the rigors of academy life. Song earned an invitation to the prestigious Cape Cod summer league after his sophomore season and garnered enough attention from pro scouts that he asked them not to draft him unless they were willing to pay him a $1 million bonus: the value he placed on his Navy degree, which he would not have been able to earn if he withdrew from the academy early to chase a pro baseball career.

“In my mind, this had to be an absurd amount of money, something that’s almost unfathomable in order for me to leave,” said Song, who, not surprisingly, went undrafted.