It’s still early in the year, but Jac Caglianone is living up to the hype in his junior season at Florida.

Caglianone proved once again on Sunday why he is the best show in college baseball as he completely dominated Miami — both on the mound and at the plate — in an 8-4 victory.

In his first extended start of the year (his first appearance lasted only 3 innings), Caglianone pitched 6 scoreless innings and struck out a career-high 11 batters against a talented Miami lineup. Only 5 Hurricanes reached base on Caglianone’s watch — 3 hits, 2 walks.

Here’s video of his final strikeout of the day — which came on a nasty changeup to end a rally by Miami:

Offensively, Caglianone more than matched Miami’s offensive production by himself while he was on the mound. He went 3-for-5 on the day, raising his average on the young season to a remarkable .478.

He also hit a towering home run to give the Gators a 5-0 lead in the 4th inning:

Caglianone entered the year as a potential top pick in the 2024 MLB Draft, and has only helped his stock to start the year. He’s an elite prospect with both his arm and his bat, but scouts wanted to see improvement in certain areas this spring in Gainesville.

As a pitcher, Caglianone walked too many batters last season — 55 in 74.2 innings to be exact. That led to a WHIP of 1.42 despite allowing opponents to hit just .190 against him. He also needed to show a bit more strikeout upside this year after sitting down 87 batters a year ago.

As a hitter, it’s hard to find flaws in someone who hit .389 with 33 bombs and a strikeout rate just over 20%. But one area where Caglianone needed to improve was his chase rate, according to ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel. Caglianone has just 4 strikeouts in 46 at-bats so far this season, so it appears he’s taken steps toward improving his approach as well.

Here’s the full analysis from McDaniel on Caglianone’s draft stock:

Caglianone is the tools unicorn of this class, a video game create-a-player run amok. He has shown triple-digit velocity from the left side on the mound along with a plus slider and traits to start, and top-of-the-scale 80-grade raw power from the left side at the plate that shows up in games. He even has enough variety to play the outfield, if needed. His scheduled season pitching debut was rained out last weekend, but he could answer a big question this season by proving that he has the command and consistency to turn a lineup over. At the plate, he’ll become a lock to go in the top five if he can cut his chase rate from among the worst in the class to around average — even ignoring his ability on the mound.

It’s still too early to know which side of the ball Caglianone will focus on at the next level — or if he will be allowed to live up to his “Jactani” nickname in the pros. But in the mean time, Florida fans will get to enjoy college baseball’s greatest show.

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