A question that frequently comes up in any discussion about sports is, “Who was the best player you ever saw play the game?” It is a subjective question loaded with various biases, but it often produces some very interesting answers.
The Athletic’s Mitch Light recently cobbled together the collective takes from five of his sports media colleagues in roundtable fashion, confronting them with the query offered above in regard to college baseball. Four of the representatives hailed from ESPN, while the fifth is a member of the D1Baseball publication.
Chris Burke of ESPN answered the question with a recent member of the Florida Gators baseball program: outfielder Wyatt Langford. In his mind — recency bias also considered — the now-member of the Texas Rangers was the best he had ever seen.
“I’m going to say Wyatt Langford,” Burke begins. “I thought the two years (2022-23) he put together at Florida, … he was almost flawless in the outfield. He ran the bases as hard as anybody I ever covered, especially for a superstar. And you felt like he was going to hit an extra-base hit every at-bat. So I’ll just go in the era that I’ve been covering the sport.”
Langford’s accolades in Gainesville were numerous, including a unanimous First Team All-American honor across five different publications in 2023, as well as being named to the College World Series All-Tournament Team and First Team All-SEC. His 2023 MLB draft selection at No. 4 was the second-highest ever for a UF alumnus behind Mike Zunino, who was selected third in 2012.
The outfielder’s career slugging percentage stands at a program-record .746, topping Brad Wilkerson’s 25-year record (.714) by a whopping .32 points, while finishing his collegiate career ranking top-10 all-time fielding percentage (tied-second), batting average (fifth), home runs (tied-sixth) and on-base percentage (seventh).
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