Pella's Grant Judkins celebrates after scoring a run during the fifth inning in a Class 3A Semifinals game at Principal Park in Des Moines, Iowa on Friday, July 31, 2015. (Photo by Dylan Heuer/Iowa Cubs)

A Pella High School baseball standout is beginning his season in the Minor Leagues. Class of 2016 Graduate Grant Judkins is flying to California to play for the Stockton Ports in Low-A classification.

Judkins signed a contract in June 2020 to play in the minor league system of the Oakland Athletics. Judkins says the opportunity came after his name wasn’t called in a significantly reduced MLB Draft, that was dropped from 40 rounds to five due to the pandemic last summer. Had the MLB Draft occurred as normal, there was a good chance Judkins would have joined former Pella baseball players Wade Van Vark and Rich Schulte as alumni who had their name called by a Major League team in the draft process.

Judkins was widely regarded as the best Iowa High School baseball player in his senior season at Pella in 2016, earning Iowa Gatorade Player of the Year and Iowa High School Baseball Coaches Association Player of the Year that season, and has been a top of the rotation starter for the Iowa Hawkeyes over the past few seasons. Judkins led Pella to two straight state tournament semifinals as one the state’s top batters and pitchers, racking up 99 career extra base hits with a career average of .431 and sporting a career 1.34 ERA with 337 strikeouts and 240 ⅔ innings as a four-year starter for the Little Dutch.

When Grant stepped off of a high school mound for the last time — at Principal Park no less, he did so having not given up a run in his final 39 in ⅔ innings, 3rd most all-time in Iowa High School baseball history in terms of a scoreless streak. In fact, he’s on that list twice, as during his junior year, he gave up no runs over a 35 inning span — which is the 6th best ever scoreless pitching streak.