Baseball America says Carolina comes up a loser at signing deadline

With players having to decide by mid-August if they are going pro or going on to college, Durham-based Baseball America did a piece on the winners and losers in college baseball as players decided to go pro.

Winners included Georgia Tech while North Carolina and Florida State were judged among the losers.

Aaron Fitt wrote about Carolina: "UNC is actually quite pleased with its haul, which includes a solid core in catcher Matt Roberts, lefthander Kent Emanuel and righty Jake Cole, plus good depth. But still, the Tar Heels entered Monday hoping to land one of their three remaining elite recruits—Stetson Allie, Sean Coyle and Ty Linton—and came up empty. Coyle, in particular, would have been a cornerstone player in the UNC infield, but the third-round pick signed with Boston for $1.3 million. The Tar Heels still wound up with a sure-fire top 25 recruiting class—and maybe a top 15 class—but heading into the day it had a chance to be an elite class, and it wound up falling short of that distinction."

To read the entire piece, please click here.

Ty Linton was also a high school all-state linebacker in football and had been practicing with the Tar Heels.

Before coming to UNC, Linton said, "It’s always been a dream of mine to play at Carolina. And I’m going to be at Carolina unless life-changing money comes my way."

Selected in the 14th round by Arizona, evidently he got that life-changing money as the Diamondbacks gave him a $1.25 million signing bonus.

UNC football coach Butch Davis said the football program is disappointed to lose Linton to the Diamondbacks.

"We are always going to recruit talented student-athletes and Ty was a very good two-sport prospect in football and baseball. He had an opportunity at Carolina to pursue his education while playing both sports," Davis said.

"He was making significant progress in training camp and I believe he had a bright football future. After meeting with Arizona over the last few days, Ty and his family felt it was in his best interest to pursue a professional baseball career. We wish him the best of luck.”