Through his first four starts of the 2020 season, only Duke’s Bryce Jarvis was having a better beginning to the year than Clemson’s Sam Weatherly.

The lefty helped the Tigers get off to a 14-3 start, while he was off to a 2-0 start on the mound and had an ERA of 0.79 in 22 2/3 innings of work. Like Jarvis, Weatherly hopes his success, despite an early stop to the season, will lead to MLB Draft success.

Jarvis was taken No. 18 overall in the first round of the 2020 MLB Draft Wednesday night with the No. 18 overall pick by the Arizona Diamondbacks. Weatherly will be drafted Thursday as MLB concludes its 2020 Draft with rounds 2-5. The draft will start back up at 5 p.m.

Some draft experts think Weatherly could go in the second round, the Tigers’ ace is hoping he showed the scouts and general managers enough before COVID-19 took away the 2020 season so abruptly.

“I had more to prove. I really felt like I was headed in a good direction,” Weatherly said to The Clemson Insider. “I felt like the team overall was headed in a really good direction. That is where I feel robbed. Not so much for myself, it is more about kind of where we were as a team.

“We were really, really starting to find our groove. We felt good about what we were doing defensively, offensively, as a team we were starting to click. That is what was exciting. That was really exciting to see. It is just unfortunate we were not able to see it all the way through.”

When his coaches first broke the news to him and his teammates that the season was over just as it was getting started, Weatherly admitted it was a hard pill to swallow. He knew it meant he likely had pitched his last game in a Clemson uniform.

“It is tough not going out on your own terms. Having something taken away from you is extremely painful,” the Clemson pitcher said. “I wasn’t able to get a full year in with my teammates, and especially the new guys and everything with the freshmen and the transfers. I was not able to spend a full year with them to see them grow and see them take off.

“It hurts, it really … I wish we were able to go see it through and go play the way we wanted to see it play out instead of having it taken away. But everyone was in the same boat. Everyone had to deal with the same stuff. All players lost their season. All coaches lost their season. It’s tough, but some people have it worse. Some people have some family members who are sick. Some have some family members that are dying or whatever it might be. It kind of put it into perspective.”

Thursday afternoon will be Weatherly’s first opportunity to really move on and to finally say goodbye to the season that was lost.

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