Despite looming nearly seven feet into the troposphere, Kentucky Wildcats junior Sean Hjelle has results that have been drawing the attention of MLB front offices and scouts.

That includes Houston Astros GM Jeff Luhnow and scouting director Mike Elias. In fact, several mock drafts have projected Hjelle (of Norwegian origin, it’s pronounced “Jelly”) to land at Houston’s first-round draft spot at #28.

Related: Astros 2018 Mock Draft Roundup

While some bios put the 6’11” right-handed starting pitcher’s weight at 215, more seem to agree it’s closer to 225. Even if that number is accurate, Hjelle’s body is what many would call “painfully thin,” and future employers will be torn between adding some weight via muscle for added power and whether added weight might add stress to joints and tendons.

For the record, pitcher Jon Rauch (MLB 2002-2013) is recognized as the tallest player ever at 6’11”, 290 lbs. If 33-year-old Dutch pitcher Ludovicus Jacobus Maria van Mil (known to most as “Loek”) ever hurls for a major league team, he’ll take the record at 7’1″. Currently, though, he toils for the Adelaide Bite of the Australian Baseball League. van Mil pitched in abbreviated turns for the minor league affiliates of the Twins, Angels, Indians, and Reds for parts of the decade from 2005 through 2015.

Lanky Zephyr

Born in Fridley, Minnesota on May 7, 1997, Sean Hjelle attended Mahtomedi (MN) High School, a long toss from White Bear Lake.

According to a June 9, 2015, Twin Cities Pioneer Press article, “Hjelle was 6 feet tall when he started eighth grade. By the end of the school year, he had grown eight inches, leaving him struggling to find something as simple as his footing.

“‘I had a lot of scrapes and bruises on my elbows,’ Hjelle said. ‘It was a vicious cycle of trying to find my coordination and my balance.'”

Reaching 6’10” and 190 lbs, Hjelle starred in both baseball and basketball at Mahtomedi, earning three letters in baseball, and four in hoops, averaging 15.3 points a game one season. He was baseball first-team All-State in 2015 and was on the honor roll in each year.

Hjelle’s baseball coach, John Hardgrove once gave this assessment of his star moundsman: “It’s a whole different angle that he’s throwing from, with a pretty consistent arm slot. The amazing thing about Sean is his athleticism. I mean, his feet are so quick and he fields his position extremely well, and he’s got all the tools.” As a junior, he went 8-2 with a 1.23 ERA, leading the Zephyrs to a second consecutive state tournament berth.

In high school, Hjelle was focusing on an arsenal that included a two-seam fastball, a four-seam fastball, a curveball, a “cutter-slider thing,” and a changeup, with the latter being his strikeout pitch.

“I always tell him to throw it in the dirt, because people chase it,” Mahtomedi senior catcher Sean Noel said at the time. “That’s how much it drops.”

According to an interview with The K Zone News recently, Hjelle grew up appreciating the pitching careers of Cliff Lee and the late Roy Halladay and enjoyed rooting for the Twins. He reports that his favorite movie is “Good Will Hunting,” while his small screen fave is “The Office.”

Elevated Expectations

Undrafted, Hjelle, a card game and board game aficionado, enrolled at the University of Kentucky, spending his freshman year in the bullpen, and in the classroom, declaring a Secondary Education major.

In fact, he served as Kentucky’s closer for much of that season, earning eight saves (a UK freshman record), trailing Trevor Gott’s (Washington Nats reliever) 12 saves in 2013 for the single-season high. Hjelle struck out 29 batters in just 21.2 innings, without yielding an earned run in 16 of his 21 appearances.

In the summer of 2016, Hjelle appeared in eight games for the Elmira Pioneers of the Perfect Game League. He made eight starts, posting a 3-1 record with a 3.06 earned run average in 44 innings, giving up just 31 hits, while striking out 42. Hjelle threw a complete game shutout in the PGL playoffs, giving up two hits and striking out six.

The Wildcats moved him into the starting rotation as a sophomore in 2017 and he performed admirably, posting a 3.89 ERA in 108.2 innings, with a 102/33 K/BB, and an 11-4 record in his 17 starts. Boasting a .243 batting average against, Hjelle was named UK’s first SEC Pitcher of the Year. He’s continued to improve this year, posting a 3.09 ERA in his first 58 innings with a 53/9 K/BB with a stingy 44 hits allowed.

His 108.2 innings pitched, last year, were the most since former Arizona D-Backs’ celebrated starter Brandon Webb in 2000 (112.2). The 102 Ks he recorded were the most since current Angels starter Alex Meyer in 2011 (110). Hjelle entered the 2018 campaign with the third-best career winning percentage in UK history (.750).

Scouting Update

MinorLeagueBall.com reports that Hjelle’s fastball “has gained four to six MPH since high school, consistently at 91-93 now, with reported peaks at 95-96. He’s refined a high school slurve into a plus curveball. He has an average change-up, and when all three pitches are working his combination of size, stuff, and command seems unfair.

“Hjelle’s stock has held up and he is still seen as a first-round candidate, though more likely in the back part of the round than the front. His steady development and college success gives him projection as a mid-rotation starter. If his fastball picks up additional steam he could exceed that.”

20-80 Baseball: “At 6’11”, it’s an understatement to say that Hjelle pitches downhill. Creating difficult angles for hitters from his high three-quarters arm slot, Hjelle consistently fills the strike zone with three different pitches. Hjelle locates his 91-to-93 mph fastball to the lower quadrants of the plate, setting up his hard curveball with 11-to-5 break. Thrown at 81-to-83 mph with plus depth, the curveball generates swings and misses as an out pitch. Hjelle repeats his delivery exceptionally well for a man of his size, contributing to his above average control.”

The Future Awaits

“Sometimes just sitting around a bonfire, we talk about all of the possibilities and all the excitement with [a pro career],” former Mahtomedi teammate Grant Gibson once said. “But right now, he’s been our best friend, and he’s Sean Hjelle to us, not some MLB pitcher yet. We hope that he’ll get there, but we still think of him as our ace right now.”

“Trying to make a difference in somebody’s life is the ultimate passion for me.”-Sean Hjelle