Georgia Tech Baseball Player Preview: Drew Burress

Opening day for the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets is just two days away so it’s time to wrap up the player preview series with one of the best players in the entire country – Drew Burress.

Anyone who has followed college baseball over the last two seasons should be familiar with Burress after he took the game by storm in his freshman year in 2024. A Georgia native, Burress garnered some buzz as a draft prospect in his senior year at Houston County High School in Warner Robins, but decided on fulfilling his commitment to Georgia Tech after he didn’t get the first round recognition he was looking for due to being undersized. He quickly put the doubts that his size would limit him at the next level as he immediately went on to hit 25 home runs and post a 1.333 OPS as a freshman. His insane first year of college baseball earned him a number of accolades including D1 Baseball, Perfect Game, and the ACC’s freshman player of the year award, NCBWA’s freshman hitter of the year award, a Perfect Game All-American third team selection, a D1 Baseball All-American second team selection, and a NCBWA All-American first team selection.

DREW BURRESS!!!!!!!!!!

WALK OFF GRAND SLAM!! pic.twitter.com/w4cub94rLo
— Georgia Tech Baseball (@GTBaseball) February 15, 2025

While he didn’t repeat the same level of production as a sophomore in 2025, his list of accolades continued to grow as he was named to D1 Baseball, Perfect Game, and NCBWA’s All-American first team as well as the All-ACC first team. He was also a Golden Spikes award finalist in each of his first two seasons. While his offensive numbers did take a step back in his sophomore year, he was still obviously one of the best players in the country, posting a 1.162 OPS with 19 home runs and 43 total extra-base hits. There’s reason to believe Burress can surpass both his freshman and sophomore seasons, putting together one of the best seasons in Georgia Tech history. He has already found himself on a number of preseason awards lists, being named to the Golden Spikes award watchlist along with teammates Jarren Advincula and Vahn Lackey, and has been named to D1 Baseball, Baseball America, and Perfect Game’s preseason All-American first teams.

Burress checks just about every box as a player. At the plate, he makes plenty of contact, makes good swing decisions, knows how to get the ball in the air often, can hit to all fields, and of course has a lot of juice in his bat. On the other side of the ball, he’s nearly as impactful. It’s great speed in center field that helps him cover a lot of ground and a well above-average arm that rounds him out as a plus defender in the outfield. In the rare event that his bat may slump, you can still count on getting production from Burress elsewhere.

HOSED HIM! @drew_burress08 with the laser from center to @TylerMinnick7 to get him at home! pic.twitter.com/b1KQzZjH4T
— Georgia Tech Baseball (@GTBaseball) March 6, 2024

Headed into the 2026 season, Burress is one of the most highly-touted draft prospects and is as close to being a lock as a top ten pick as you can possibly get. He’s currently the fifth highest ranked draft prospect on MLB Pipeline and the competition between him and other top college draft prospects such as UCLA’s Roch Cholowsky, Alabama’s Justin Lebron, and Virginia’s AJ Gracia to be the first overall pick this July should be a fun story line to follow.

While the Jackets have arguably the top lineup in the country, this team is going to go as Drew Burress does. Head coach James Ramsey named Burress the team captain, and he should handle that role well as he is the centerpiece in helping this program return to Omaha for the first time since 2006.

Georgia Tech Baseball Focus