Boston Red Sox chief baseball officer Craig Breslow is in his second year on the job and he has made it clear to his scouts that he likes big pitchers and the SEC in particular.
That was evident in this year’s draft when in their first 20 picks the Red Sox, currently the hottest team in baseball, picked 15 pitchers, 10 of them from the SEC. And they were all 6-foot-4 or taller.
One of those players fitting that mold was former Richmond Hill High School standout Leighton Finley who was taken in the sixth round by Boston after spending the last three years pitching at Georgia where he was a main cog in helping lift the Bulldogs program to elite status.
Finley stands 6-foot-5 and checks in at 225 pounds with a fast ball that has been clocked as high as 98 miles per hour. In three seasons at Georgia, he was 11-5 overall with 4.76 ERA. He appeared in 54 games, starting 31, and had 190 strikeouts in 172 innings while walking 63.
Finley, who was the fifth pitcher taken by the Red Sox, becomes the fourth former Richmond Hill player, all pitchers, to be drafted by a major league team. The slot value signing bonus for a sixth-round pick is $364.800.
The first was Kevin Matthews who was a first-round pick of the Texas Rangers in 2011. Next came Brian Eichorn who was a ninth-round selection of the Cleveland Indians in 2018 after an outstanding three-year career at Georgia Southern where he was Sun Belt Conference pitcher of the year, and in 2023 Jackson Finley, Leighton’s older brother, was taken in the eighth round by the Athletics after starring at Georgia Tech.
While Matthews and Eichorn are both now out of baseball Jackson Finley is with Stockton (Calif.) Ports, an Athletics affiliate. He was 2-7 last year but has yet to make an appearance this season as he is currently on the 60-day injured list.
When it comes to pitching, the Finley brothers dominate the record book at Richmond Hill.
Leighton, who played for Chris Jenkins as a senior and helped lead the Wildcats to a region championship, had a surreal season for a team which was 24-9 in advancing to the second round of the state playoffs.
He was 13-0 that season which is the school mark for wins in a season. His career record of 18-2 bested Jackson’s 16-5 career mark. Leighton’s 104 strikeouts is a single season record and his 177 career strikeouts are second to Jackson’s 191. Jackson, who played for Stacy Bennett, holds the school mark for home runs with 20 for his career.
The Finleys still have a presence at Richmond Hill as their sister, Kyra, is starting her second season as an assistant coach with the girls basketball team. Kyra, a Georgia Southern graduate, was an all-region performer for Coach Sarah Jones.