Two former Fort Mill Yellow Jackets were taken in the most recent Major League Baseball draft.
Graduates of the class of 2022, Connor Rasmussen and Mathieu Curtis were taken on day two of the draft on Monday, July 14.
Curtis, 20, was drafted first of the two being picked by the Atlanta Braves in the 14th round (pick 427). Rasmussen, 21, was drafted in the 15th round (pick 458) by the Kansas City Royals. Both players were teammates for the 2022 Upper State champions as part of the Fort Mill High baseball program.
Curtis will be heading to Florida to start his pro career with the Braves, while Rasmussen will be heading to Arizona, to do the same with Kansas City. Neither were aware they had gotten drafted until after the fact.
A right-handed pitcher, Curtis was watching the draft and playing cards to get his mind off things, when he saw his name pop-up on the screen.
“I knew it would be (rounds) 11 through 20, if I would get picked,” he said. “I talked to my advisor and he said the Braves were interested. I was playing cards with my best friend and girlfriend and we were watching the draft tracker when my name popped up and I was like, ‘Holy smoke.’” Normally, you get a call before. It caught me off guard.”
Curtis said he was glad it was the Braves that picked him because he is excited to be playing so close to South Carolina.
“I am ecstatic about it being them,” he said. “Plus, they are an analytic based team so that would help me to develop to the best of my abilities. They are the team I wanted to go to from the start.”
Curtis started his college career with USC-Upstate, but transferred after two seasons to Virginia Tech, which helped him he believes.
“I felt like I reached the best of my ability when I was at Upstate, so that is why I entered the portal,” he said. “When I got to Virgina Tech, they broke me down and I developed two new sliders. I didn’t have that before. They worked on my delivery and a lot of mechanical stuff and flaws I didn’t know I had. I feel like it helped me in tremendous ways.”
For Rasmussen, an infielder, it was more of a waiting game that he described as “one of the most brutal days of my life.”
“It was a crazy process,” he said. “I got a call from them (Kansas City) in the 10th round asking about the 11th round, but then the 11th round went by and 12th round went by, so I started reaching out to my advisor. I got a call from them after they took me, but I was sitting there watching it with the draft tracker and saw my name pop up, so that is how I found out. Just sitting around and not knowing, it was kind of brutal.”
Rasmussen started his college career by going to East Carolina University, but then transferred to Tulane University as a sophomore where he played the last two seasons.
“It is super exciting for me,” he said. “I have been wanting this for so long. After my freshman year in college, I didn’t know how possible it would be for me. It was pretty surreal. It is kind of crazy now.”
Like Curtis, Rasmussen said transferring from East Carolina to Tulane helped to promote his stock in the draft.
“I didn’t see a chance of getting on the field my sophomore year at ECU,” he said. “That was why I decided to leave and go to Tulane. I wanted to go somewhere I knew I could play every day which had a good history of getting people drafted.”
Curtis and Rasmussen are the 17th and 18th players from Fort Mill High School to be drafted by a Major League Baseball team.
Mac Banks: mac@fortmillprepsports.com, @fortprep
