Rice Pitchers Take Major League Draft by Storm

Humber, Niemann, and Townsend Among Top 10 In Nation

It’s not quite the same as winning the national championship, but the 2004 baseball season did finish on a record-setting note for the Rice Owls.

Jeff Niemann

On June 7, just one day after their season’s abrupt end in the opening stage of the NCAA playoffs, Rice pitchers Philip Humber, Jeff Niemann, and Wade Townsend were selected in the first round of the Major League Baseball amateur draft. Even more impressively, all three were among the top 10 picks in the nation.
Humber was selected third by the New York Mets. The Tampa Bay Devil Rays took Niemann with the very next pick, while Townsend was taken eighth overall by the Baltimore Orioles.
Those selections made Rice the first school in history to produce three top-10 draft choices in a single season. Indeed, since the amateur draft was instituted in 1965, only two other schools have produced three first-round picks in the same year: Michigan in 1979 and Fresno State 10 years later. And never before has one school had three pitchers go in the first round.
“It’s a big honor,” Humber says. “We’ll definitely all be linked by this for some time. I don’t foresee anything like this happening again—three pitchers from one college staff going so high. It’s pretty heady stuff to think about.”
“For the three of us to be called in the top eight is something special,” echoes Niemann. “We take pride in the things we’ve accomplished as a group.”
This historic honor provided some consolation for the disappointing end to the Owls’ season. After winning the WAC championship for the eighth year in a row, Rice entered the NCAA regional at Reckling Park seeded sixth in the nation. But a stunning upset by unheralded Texas Southern and a nail-biting 7–5 loss to Texas A&M brought a sudden halt to Rice’s defense of its 2003 national title.
Three other Rice players were selected in the draft’s later rounds. Josh Baker, the fourth ace of the Owls’ outstanding pitching staff, was taken in the fourth round by the Milwaukee Brewers. The Cincinnati Reds claimed shortstop Paul Janish in the fifth round. And outfielder Chris Kolkhorst, the Owls’ emotional sparkplug and a fan favorite during his four years at Rice, was the 10th-round pick of the San Diego Padres.
As is customary for late-round selections, Baker, Kolkhorst, and Janish each quickly agreed to contract terms and now are playing in the minor leagues.
On July 13, Janish got a hit off his former teammate in a game between the Billings Mustangs and Baker’s Helena Brewers in the Class A Northwest League. “It was weak single,” Baker insists, “but it was good to see a familiar face.”
Rice’s three first-rounders still are in negotiation, waiting eagerly for the teams to move forward. Their situation is not unique, as fewer than half of this year’s 30 first-round picks have signed contracts. Each team seems to be waiting to see what sort of salary and bonuses the other teams will offer.
The foursome of Humber, Niemann, Townsend, and Baker may well have been the best pitching staff in the history of college baseball. Their combined record at Rice was a phenomenal 105–17, including two perfect seasons: Townsend’s 12–0 mark in 2004 and Niemann’s incomparable 17–0 record during the 2003 championship run. Townsend’s 2.05 career ERA is the second best in Rice history, as is Humber’s career mark of 422 strikeouts.
Their list of individual honors is daunting. Humber, a three-time all-America, was the National Freshman Player of the Year in 2002. Niemann and Townsend were two-time all-America honorees, and each was named WAC Pitcher of the Year in his undefeated season.
Townsend, a triple major in history, economics, and managerial studies with a 3.59 GPA, closed his Rice career as the national Academic All-America of the Year in baseball.
As much as Rice will miss these memorable players, they leave no doubt that they will miss Rice as well.
“I already miss playing for Rice,” says Kolkhorst, an Academic All-America who graduated with a triple major in economics, managerial studies, and kinesiology. “I miss the camaraderie and the mature group of guys I was with. And I miss the team concept. In the minors, it’s more every man for himself. That’s the biggest adjustment I will have to make.”
The other draftees all are juniors who plan to complete their degrees during the off-season. Townsend, for example, has just one semester of work remaining.
“My experience at Rice was that the other students are 100 percent behind the athletes, and the athletes are 100 percent behind the students,” Townsend recalls fondly. “And the professors bent over backward for us, just as we did for them. I am very thankful for all the people I met at Rice who have been so great.”

—George Webb III