Biggest Name in College Baseball: All Eyes On Gators’ Caglianone in 2024

If you see more security guards surrounding the bullpen at Condron Ballpark this spring, chances are Florida baseball star Jac Caglianone is about to take to the mound. As the Gators’ two-way phenom has blossomed into a superstar, Gators pitching coach David Kopp quipped that the team has considered hiring bullpen security due to the growing number of fans who seek Caglianone’s attention while he warms up.

“Wherever we go, everybody wants his autograph. Every little kid wants to be like Jac; they want to hit home runs and throw 100 miles an hour,” Kopp said. “He has this ultra-Superman alter ego that everybody thinks he is. But he’s such a humble person. He tries to sign every autograph he can. … At the end of the day, he’s just a college baseball player.”

But he’s no average player. Stories like these show Caglianone already is one of the biggest names in baseball. Amid all of his incredible performances and the MLB draft buzz surrounding his name, however, it can be easy to forget he is still just a 20-year-old college student.

Standing at 6-foot-5 and weighing 245 pounds, Caglianone can quite literally do it all. Hitting? He blasted a program-record 33 home runs as a sophomore last season, leading the rest of the entire nation. Pitching? He took to the mound for the Gators every Sunday and held opponents to a team-best .190 batting-average against. Fielding? He checked in as D1Baseball’s top first baseman in the country in 2023.

As he prepares for his third season in Gainesville, Caglianone already has established himself as a household name in baseball circles. He served as a catalyst for UF’s record-breaking 54-win season in 2023. The Gators made it to the College World Series Finals, but their championship hopes came to an end in a Game 3 loss to the LSU Tigers.

Since its CWS run, Florida has lost numerous key players. Some of the Gators’ biggest names, such as outfielder Wyatt Langford, shortstop Josh Rivera and pitchers Hurston Waldrep and Brandon Sproat, turned pro. Others, like catcher BT Riopelle, graduated following the 2023 season. But Florida remains hungry for another College World Series run, and all eyes will be on Caglianone.

The 2023 Golden Spikes Award finalist is the consensus top prospect for next year’s MLB draft class, and for good reason. With the amount of accolades he has already collected and the talent he has displayed over the past two years, the pressure is on Caglianone to lead the Gators back to the promised land of college baseball: Omaha, Nebraska. But make no mistake: He is more than up to the task at hand.

“Pressure is a privilege, and you have to embrace it,” Caglianone said. “It’s cool to have this buzz and be in the conversation for all this cool stuff down the line, but at the end of the day, I just really want to go out there and win, and I want to compete and give my all for this team.”

Planting the Seed in Tampa

Caglianone’s baseball journey began in Tampa, Florida at a young age. His father, Jeff Caglianone, played college baseball at Stetson. The Tampa Bay Rays were a consistent presence on the Caglianone family’s TV sets. 

Whether he was on or off the field, baseball seemed to follow him wherever he went. Caglianone dabbled in a few other sports, such as basketball, soccer and flag football, but above all else, he always excelled on the diamond.

“From an early age, baseball was the sport that was for me,” Caglianone said. “It was always something that was really prominent in our house… I would spend just about every morning before school watching ‘Quick Pitch’ on MLB Network, getting the recaps of all the games.”

Caglianone began to blossom as a potential star early on in his high school career. After his freshman year, he visited the University of Florida and felt an immediate connection to the Gators baseball program. Even then, Caglianone knew that when the time came, he would become a Florida Gator.

“It just felt like home right off the rip,” he said. “Being two hours away, being a great academic school and all that, if they were to offer, I knew that I would definitely be coming here.”

Caglianone attended Plant High School in Tampa, which has produced top-level talent such as Hall of Fame third baseman Wade Boggs and UF baseball legend Pete Alonso. Caglianone took some time to find his footing, both as a pitcher and a hitter. But while he did not smash home runs or rack up strikeouts the way he does today, Caglianone always demonstrated passion and poise on the diamond. He just needed time to develop and learn how to deal with the ups and downs of the game. 

“It’s this constant battle that he’s had with himself,” Plant head coach Dennis Braun said. “Sometimes, with how he acted, he needed to come off the field… Like I tell our guys all the time, there’s a reason we have levels. You have to figure it out at each level.”

By the time he graduated, Caglianone had become one of the best prep prospects in the country. In his senior year, he batted .371 with three home runs while maintaining a 2.44 ERA over 37.1 innings on the mound. As a result, he earned a Gatorade Player of the Year nomination and a Florida Athletic Coaches Association All-American nod.

His First Major Snag

Coming out of high school, Perfect Game ranked Caglianone as the fourth-best left-handed pitcher and the No. 1 first baseman in the country. Some professional teams even considered him as a potential top 100 prospect in the 2021 MLB Draft.

But the hype came to a screeching halt after Caglianone tore his left ulnar collateral ligament in August 2021. He suffered the injury in a high school postseason All-Star game, just two weeks before he was to start summer training with the Gators. As a result, he underwent Tommy John surgery, which kept him off the mound for 16 months. 

Caglianone initially struggled to deal with this setback, both physically and mentally. But as time passed and he progressed in his recovery, Caglianone remained undeterred in his pursuit of full return to the field. 

He continued to rely on his work ethic and commitment to the game. However, away from the diamond, he used the recovery process as an opportunity to grow spiritually. Caglianone credits his faith as a major contributor to his success on and off the field.

“It was definitely an emotional roller coaster. I’m not one to sit on the sidelines in any way, shape or form,” he said. “There were a lot of rough days, just knowing that there’s going to be more to it. One thing that resonated with me is that I got close to my faith here. It was just sticking to God’s plan and knowing that he had something more in store for me.”

By the time the 2022 season rolled around, Caglianone already had made significant progress in his recovery. While the team originally planned to have him redshirt his freshman season, Caglianone  felt confident that he could still play in 2022. Caglianone’s family initially felt hesitant to have him return to the field so soon, but Gators head coach Kevin O’Sullivan floated the idea of him coming back as a designated hitter.

“I was taking [batting practice] on the field, and Sully was like, ‘If you want, I want you to start DH’ing’,” Caglianone said. “It took a lot more convincing on my parents’ side and my inner circle, but I was all for it… After some back and forth, we finally agreed, and I’m thankful that Coach O’Sullivan stuck with me through it.”

Making Some Early Noise

On April 24, 2022 against Tennessee, Caglianone finally made his Gators debut. Fittingly, his first career hit came on a solo home run over the center-field wall.  

Caglianone continued to excel as a DH as Florida wrapped up its 2022 campaign. As Caglianone himself put it, he was playing with “house money.”  Every night he took to the field, he just wanted to have some fun and knock some balls over the fence.

He finished his abbreviated season with a .288 batting average and a .887 OPS. He also blasted seven home runs in just 28 games, the final of 27 of which were starts at DH. There was no doubt that he had potential, but little did the world know that Caglianone was just getting started.

In 2023, Caglianone made his return to the mound and immediately established himself as one of Florida’s go-to starting pitchers. In his 18 starts, Caglianone pitched 74.2 innings and compiled a 7-4 record with a 4.34 ERA. He also struck out 87 batters.

Caglianone had plenty of impressive performances on the mound throughout his sophomore season. From sitting down nine batters on strikes against the No. 5 Vanderbilt Commodores last May to dominating in Florida’s NCAA Regional opener with six scoreless innings on the mound, his impeccable track record shows that the hype surrounding his name is more than warranted.

He faced some issues with his control as the season went on — typical for pitchers recovering from Tommy John surgery — but he did not allow these struggles to derail his otherwise stellar 2023 campaign. Kopp noted that, above his numerous strong individual outings and all else, Caglianone’s poise and consistency throughout the entirety of the season impressed him.

“There were some highs, and there were some lows, but… he made 18 starts coming off of Tommy John, and he didn’t miss one weekend,” Kopp said. “Results aside, I was proud of him.”

But while Caglianone put together some strong showings on the mound, it was his presence at the plate that allowed him to reach historic heights. Caglianone maintained a .323 batting average and 1.127 OPS while driving in a team-high 90 RBIs. He also not only shattered Florida’s previous single-season home run record (27); he set a new national single-season home run record in the BBCOR era. (BBCOR, also known as Batted Ball Coefficient of Restitution, took effect in 2011 when the NCAA implemented stricter regulations for the material composition of bats.)

Thanks in part to Caglianone’s breakthrough two-way campaign, the Gators punched their ticket to Omaha for the first time since 2018. Nonetheless, their run came to a screeching halt in the MCWS Finals, where Caglianone struggled on the mound – allowing six runs in 1 ⅓ innings – against LSU in his final outing of the season. But now, the Gators have put last year’s ending behind them as they look to finish what they started in 2023.

“[The loss to LSU] makes me and everybody else in this locker room a lot hungrier for next year,” Caglianone said. “We lost a lot this past year, but the culture here has changed these past few years, and it’s only just going to keep getting better.”

Sky-High Expectations

Following its 13th MCWS Finals appearance, Florida has now turned its focus to the 2024 season. With the departure of numerous seasoned veterans from the clubhouse, Caglianone has stepped into a leadership role for the Gators. 

In the past, he paid attention to how some of his older teammates, such as Langford and Waldrep, commanded the respect of their teammates and kept the team rolling through the good times and the bad times. 

He now hopes to emulate these qualities and serve as a guiding light for his younger teammates. Caglianone wants to lead the way his former teammates did for him.

“You had a bunch of dudes to look towards when things were a little haywire. You’d always lean towards them and see what they had to think,” Caglianone said. “I made sure to focus on how they handled everybody and went through their business. Hopefully, I can apply it this year, knowing that we don’t have a bunch of those older guys anymore.” 

Outside of the clubhouse, Caglianone has accrued plenty of buzz on his own. D1Baseball has him ranked as the No. 1 college prospect for the 2024 MLB Draft. He has become one of the most recognizable faces across campus.

Even UF’s Barstool affiliate account has gotten in on the hype train, selling “Jactani” merchandise, a nickname that serves as a nod to the comparisons to Los Angeles Dodgers two-way superstar Shohei Ohtani.

“This year, when we got back to campus, [things were] a little different,” Caglianone said. “Walking into stores, and people are recognizing me and asking to take pictures, so that was pretty weird. But it’s cool, it’s definitely something that I take pride in. It’s different, for sure, but I’m still kind of navigating and figuring all that stuff out.”

His Role Model? Not Ohtani

Caglianone does not take his comparisons to the 2021 American League MVP lightly. If anything, he has used these comparisons to fuel the fire lit underneath him this season.  

“Any comparison to someone of his stature is really cool,” Caglianone said. “He’s paving the way for two-way guys, and hopefully I can be the next one to do exactly what he is doing.”

Caglianone cites former Rays and Red Sox pitcher David Price as one of his biggest baseball role models. He has always been inspired by Price’s competitiveness and longevity. Caglianone even singled Price out as one of his two main inspirations for wearing number 14 to this day. (His father also wore 14 when he played at Stetson.)

As for his status as a two-way player, Caglianone is open to whatever the future may hold for him. But, if given the choice, he wants to remain a dual threat as a pitcher and a hitter, even in the major leagues down the road. 

“I want to be a two-way [player] for as long as possible,” he said. “I know, at the end of the day, I feel like somebody is going to end up making the decision for me. But I definitely would love to be playing on both sides of the ball for as long as possible.”

The Focus Is On One Goal

From the comparisons to Ohtani to the mock drafts pinning him as the top player in college baseball, saying that Caglianone has the weight of the world on his shoulders this season would be an understatement. But he remains undaunted.

“The main goal is to win the last game of the season. That’s really as simple as it gets, and that really encompasses all the personal goals as well,” he said. “That last game—I think about it very often, don’t think I’ll forget it for a long time. I think that if we can work hard enough and get this team to where I know we can go to, all my personal goals will fall into place.”

Many have raised the possibility of Caglianone breaking even more records for the Gators this coming season. After smashing Florida’s single-season home run record last year, Caglianone now chases the school’s career home run mark He’s 34 shy of Matt LaPorta, who recorded 74 homers in his career with the Gators (2004-07).   

But these accolades and pursuits of history have rarely crossed Caglianone’s mind this offseason. As of now, he remains focused on one thing and one thing only: avenging Florida’s loss in the National Championship.

“It’s definitely going to be a very fun year, and I can personally promise that this team is going to work really hard to get us back to Omaha.”