Chris Abrams’ own realization that he should have stuck with baseball over college basketball led him to put a bat in the hands of his son at 18 months old. He did not know if CJ would grow tall enough for a future on the hardwood. He did not know if he’d bulk up enough to play football.

But Chris Abrams could figure out a way to teach his son to hit.

“I would go to work thinking, ‘What could I put together, what can I make” the elder Abrams said, “so we can work this muscle memory to solve whatever deficiency I thought I saw?”

One contraption thrown together over the ensuing years was essentially homemade nunchucks, two PVC pipes connected by a chain. A correct swing kept the younger Abrams’ hands inside the ball. A poor swing resulted with the pipe coming around it. A miss, though certainly not by design, punished CJ with a thwack across his back.


The concept was similar for the ball attached to a handle that CJ swung at pitched tennis balls. Chris Abrams also threw flat bean bags, whiffle balls and golf balls for his son and most recently began firing small Nerf pellets at him.

Naturally, from time to time, CJ Abrams stepped into the batter’s box with a puzzled look on his face.

On Saturday, after signing with the Padres for $5.2 million as the sixth overall pick in the draft, it made all kinds of sense.

“He’s always been trying to make me better,” CJ Abrams said. “It all helped. It got me to where I’m at today.”


× Hear from Padres shortstop C.J. Abrams after he was picked No. 6 overall in the 2019 draft.

Which is on the cusp of a professional career, which begins Monday morning when the 18-year-old shortstop reports to the Padres’ spring training facilities in Peoria, Ariz.

Before departing, Abrams’ official tour of Petco Park included meeting players in the clubhouse, talking with Hall-of-Famer Trevor Hoffman alongside the home dugout and throwing out a ceremonial first pitch alongside fellow draftees Joshua Mears (2nd round), Logan Driscoll (No. 73 overall) and Matt Brash (4th round).

Just six days ago, Abrams was at a Taco Mac in Georgia when Commissioner Rob Manfred called out his name as the Padres’ first-round pick. On Saturday, he was in San Diego for his physical. Only three other first-rounders had inked contracts when Abrams pulled a No. 1 jersey over the brown Padres polo worn to his introductory press conference.


“The goal is to get to the big leagues,” Abrams said. “I just want to get started as quick as I can.”

The Padres’ began to think he’d have a chance to get there during his sophomore year at Blessed Trinity Catholic High in Roswell, Ga., when scouts Chris Kelly and Chip Lawrence wrote him up as a potential future top-10 pick. Abrams would have even played for the Padres’ scout teams after his sophomore and junior year had high school basketball not gotten in the way. Eyeing improvement on infield defense, Abrams removed the sport from his schedule this year, allowing him to take off both as an athlete who could stick at shortstop and a left-handed-bat worthy of the sixth overall selection.

The strides stood out especially as Preller flew into Florida last summer to watch Abrams play alongside Bobby Witt Jr. and Riley Greene – the No. 2 and No. 5 picks, respectively – on Team USA’s 18-and-under team.

“He’s the kind of guy you want to give to your development staff,” Preller said. “He’s got ‘now’ ability and we think we’re just scratching the surface of what he can do.”


That ‘now’ ability is certainly intriguing.

Abrams is an 80-grade runner who swiped 33 bases his senior year and regular clocked sub-4-second home-to-first times. He paired three homers, 27 RBIs and a .723 slugging percentage with a .431 batting average his senior year. More unbelievably, Abrams struck out just 12 times in four years of high school ball, the result of all those contraptions used to hone the muscle memory of a left-handed stroke that should add at least gap power as his fills out a 6-foot-2, 180-pound frame.

“I just see ball, hit ball,” said Abrams, who was committed to the University of Alabama before joining the Padres. “I keep it simple at the plate.”

Only he and his father know that the approach and the results weren’t at all built on simplicity.

