The Detroit Tigers selected Franklin Community High School (Franklin, Indiana) outfielder Max Clark with the No. 3 overall pick in the 2023 MLB draft.

Before Clark, the Pittsburgh Pirates added LSU right-hander Paul Skenes with the first pick and the Washington Nationals followed by taking LSU outfielder Dylan Crews with the second pick.

"I did not know how it was going to go down until 10 minutes prior to when I was selected," Clark said Sunday. "We had a ton of great conversations leading up, from February to July 9, but getting that phone call was one of the coolest moments of my life."

The Tigers passed on Florida outfielder Wyatt Langford.

"We think Max is an elite talent," Tigers president of baseball operations Scott Harris said. "He was the best player on our board at that pick, and we are thrilled that he got to our pick. We think Max is a five-tool player. I think that label gets thrown around way too much in our industry. We think Max has all five."

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Clark, 18, hit .646 with nine doubles, five triples, six home runs, 52 walks and five strikeouts in 28 games as a senior with Franklin Community High School. The left-handed hitter is an elite athlete who appears to be above-average defensively in center field with top-tier sprint speed and quality arm strength.

On offense, Clark is praised for his pure hit tool and bat-to-ball data.

"I want to be the guy who can change a clubhouse," Clark said, "be the guy that's playing 110% every single day, having an absolute blast doing it, encouraging others to play as hard as they can and have as much fun as they can at the same time. That's what we want to do."

The Vanderbilt commit was named the 2023 Gatorade National Baseball Player of the Year. He was also named Indiana Gatorade Baseball Player of the Year as a sophomore and junior in high school, when he served as an outfielder and a pitcher. He played football as a wide receiver, too.

Clark played for Team USA in the WBSC U-18 World Cup in September 2022, hitting .280 (7-for-25) with one home run, three walks and three strikeouts in eight games. He collected three hits in the championship game and helped the United States beat Chinese Taipei, 5-1, to claim the gold medal.

The Tigers hosted Clark on June 13 for a workout at Comerica Park.

"It was very, very personal," Clark said. "It was very man-to-man, which I really enjoyed. We all got to learn a lot about each other, kind of the philosophy of the Tigers and how everything was going to go down if it went our way. Looking back at that, it was super-cool to see where we are now on a personal level."

Clark is expected to sign an under-slot deal with the Tigers for a $7,698,000 bonus, which is the value of the No. 4 overall pick. The No. 3 overall pick came with an MLB-determined bonus slot value of $8,341,700.

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The Tigers have $15,747,200 to spend on their 21 draft picks this year, the second-most in baseball. Teams are allowed to exceed the allotment for picks by 5% before paying a 75% fine on the overage. No MLB team has exceeded the 5% limit since the slots were created.

"As far as how important the number was, it was not that important," Harris said. "We had him evaluated at a place on our board that we were very excited when we got to No. 3. This was, by no means, an attempt to drive down a bonus. Any position bonus savings will be reinvested into the rest of the draft. ... The short answer is, it was not important."

The Tigers — under Harris, assistant general manager Rob Metzler and scouting director Mark Conner — were believed to want a college position player with the No. 3 overall pick, with an eye on Crews and Langford at the top of the draft.

After Clark, the Texas Rangers drafted Langford at No. 4 overall.

"He can impact the game on all sides of the ball," Conner said of Clark, "offensively with the hit tool and emerging power, the range and speed that he plays with on defense and the arm that he has."

Clark is represented by Wasserman agent Sam Samardzija.

"Being selected by him was an honor," Clark said of Harris, in his first year leading the Tigers. "I'm super-excited to be his first guy, and we're going to make some things right here in Detroit."

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The Tigers have selected in the top five in five of the past six drafts.

Those five picks were used to select Clark (2023), high school right-hander Jackson Jobe (2021), college first baseman Spencer Torkelson (2020), high school outfielder Riley Greene (2019) and college right-hander Casey Mize (2018).

"I think it's important for everyone to remember some of the most talented players in our entire organization were high school drafts," Harris said. "Some of those guys have moved quickly, perhaps not quickly enough for some of our fans. ... In this situation, with Max available at our pick, he was the clear pick for us. We're thrilled that he's a Tiger."

Greene, the previous high school outfielder drafted by the Tigers, needed three years, from 2019-21 (minus the 2020 season, in which the minor-league season was canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic), before making his MLB debut in June 2022. (An injury in spring training forced him to miss the 2022 Opening Day roster.)

In 2023, Greene is hitting .305 with six home runs in 54 games.

He is the Tigers' primary center fielder.

"We have a really big outfield, so foot speed can be an asset for us," Harris said. "We have some pretty talented defensive outfielders, both in the big leagues and in our system, but we can always use more. We want players that can create runs and prevent runs. We feel like, in adding Max Clark, he has a chance to do both."

Contact Evan Petzold at epetzold@freepress.com or follow him on Twitter @EvanPetzold.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Detroit Tigers select Max Clark with No. 3 pick in 2023 MLB draft