This is great for Wallace and UConn. My hope has been that some of the "stars" of Connecticut, like those who committed to Duke, Virginia and NC State this year, and others in the future, will see how well Penders and his staff have developed players like Wallace and go to UConn. Wallace, as I understand it, was a walk-on and here he goes third round and #100. That ought to help recruiting along with Springer and the many others who've been drafted and made the majors in the last ten years.
Yes, Jacob Wallace was a non-scholarship player or walk on in his initial year at UConn. Still, Wallace is hardly the first UConn baseball player who was initially a walk on to end up getting drafted. Before this draft, 47 players have been drafted during Penders tenure as coach at UConn. Of these players, 10 were non scholarship players at least in their first year at Storrs. The UConn baseball website has the list of players drafted during the Penders era, and they highlight those were initially walk ons, including some big names:
2017 - John Russell - 16th round
2017 - Doug Domnarski - 27th round
2016 - Jack Sundberg - 26th round
2016 - Bobby Melley - 34th round
2011 - Nick Ahmed - 2nd round
2011 - Mike Nemeth - 21st round
2011 - Doug Elliot - - 35th round
2009 - John Folino - 27th round
2009 - Harold Brantley, Jr. - 30th round
2008 - John Folino - 49th round
2006 - Tim Norton - 7th round
In addition, there were two more initial walk on players who were not drafted but signed free agent contracts after the draft:
2014 - Anthony Marzi
2012 - Ryan Fuller