In the summer of 2021, the Yankees took a shot on a Dartmouth lefty masher in the 12th round of the MLB Draft. His name was Ben Rice, and as his draft slot might have given away, he wasn’t a star prospect at the time.
After playing a couple of games in the Complex League in that 2021 campaign, he was then placed in Single-A Tampa Tarpons, where he had a 110 wRC+ in 20 games and 78 plate appearances. Rice’s slugging percentage there was .387, which coincided with some of his pre-draft concerns: a lack of impactful game power.