World Series Alums: CA Crushes It

This year’s look at where World Series players went to high school is a domination for the Golden State. With the Milwaukee Brewers loaded up with seven from Southern California and three from NorCal, they have one of the highest totals for one team ever. Add in three for the Tampa Bay Rays and this year’s total of 13 dwarfs the totals from any other US state and any other nation in the world. We also got to look up two players from one school in the same World Series. Marina High of Huntington Beach has done it for this year. It has happened before. Read this post to find out more.

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The Milwaukee Brewers have always had a strong presence in Southern California high school baseball since the organization has sponsored a team for the annual Area Code Games held each summer in Long Beach. Brewers scouts pick the players for those teams and have tended to draft some of them the following summer.

Perhaps that’s a reason why the Brewers will have 10 of the players on their 26-man roster to start this year’s World Series who are from California high schools. And seven of those 10 are from Southern California. We know some of the seven were on Brewers’ Area Code Games teams, but don’t know the full list for that.

The Brewers, who swept the two-defending World Series champion Los Angeles Dodgers in the National League finals to reach their first World Series in 44 years, have one of the highest totals ever for having players from California. Our own year-by-year research of World Series alums goes back to 1968 and the only team in those nearly 60 years with more is the 1990 Oakland Athletics with 11. We decided to look up some other World Series teams going back to the 1930s and 1940s that we thought might have had a lot of California players and the only other one with 10 or more was the 1966 Los Angeles Dodgers with 11.

Tampa Bay, which eliminated the Cleveland Guardians (a team with twice as many or more California players) to win the American League pennant, only has three players on its 26-man roster from California. Still, the combined total of 13 in this year’s World Series completely dominates the total of four from Florida and Georgia, three from Texas and four from the countries of Venezuela and the Dominican Republic.

The last time there were 13 or more California players in the World Series was in 2002 between the Anaheim Angels and San Francisco Giants. For that one, there were eight on the Angels and seven for the Giants for a two-team total of 15. There also were 15 California players in the 1985 World Series between the Kansas City Royals and St. Louis Cardinals and the 1984 World Series between the Detroit Tigers and San Diego Padres.

Two players on this year’s Brewers’ roster, Jake Bauers and Trevor Megill, are both from Marina High of Huntington Beach. Two from the same high school in a World Series is rare but has happened before. The last time, in fact, was in that 2002 World Series and there was not one but two separate high schools that had two alums in that World Series. One was Los Alamitos with Robb Nen and J.T. Snow (both on the Giants). The other was Montclair Prep of Van Nuys with Brad Fullmer (Angels) and Russ Ortiz (Giants). The 1972 World Series also had two players from Los Angeles Fremont, Bobby Tolan of the Cincinnati Reds and George Hendrick of the Oakland A’s. L.A. Fremont is the school believed to have the most MLB alums in the nation. There also were two players from Oceanside on the 1978 New York Yankees — Chris Chambliss and Gary Thomasson.

Here’s a complete list of this year’s World Series Alums:

Jake Bauers (Marina, Huntington Beach) Brewers INF
We were there at Dodger Stadium for the 2013 CIF Southern Section D1 championship game when Bauers and team at Marina played and lost a tight 1-0 game to Harvard-Westlake of Studio City. Junior Jack Flaherty (future MLB star) pitched for the Wolverines. Bauers was an all-state player himself. Jake later went to Hawaii and was drafted by the San Diego Padres. He made his MLB debut in 2018 for the Rays and had never had a breakout season until this year with the Brewers. He at one point retired from the game after the 2024 season. He hit 26 homers this season.

Jonny DeLuca (Agoura, Agoura Hills) Rays OF
A four-year starter at Agoura from 2013 to 2016, Jonny batted .374 for the Chargers during his career. He went to Oregon for college (known for his speed) and was drafted by the Dodgers in 2019. He debuted for the Dodgers in 2023. He was traded to Tampa before the 2024 season in the deal that landed the Dodgers pitcher Tyler Glasnow (Hart of Newhall grad).

Robert Gasser (Oak Ridge, El Dorado Hills) Brewers P
The former standout of the Trojans pitched five scoreless innings in one of the Brewers’ wins over the Dodgers in the NLCS. He was a promising but not dominant high school pitcher at Oak Ridge but struck out 51 batters in 61 innings facing strong competition in the Sierra Foothill League. Robert went to the University of New Mexico, then bounced back to the very strong program at Delta College in Stockton and then went to the University of Houston.

Kyle Harrison (De La Salle, Concord) Brewers P
He was the top pitcher when he was a junior on De La Salle’s 2019 team that won its last 28 games, only lost one game by one run, and was the State Team of the Year. Kyle was originally drafted by his hometown team, the San Francisco Giants, but was traded before the 2025 deadline to the Boston Red Sox as part of the deal that sent Rafael Devers to San Francisco. Harrison was traded from the Red Sox to the Brewers in a six-player deal prior to the 2026 season.

Trevor Megill (Marina, Huntington Beach) Brewers P
He was one year ahead of Jake Bauers at Marina, graduating in 2012, which was the year before the Vikings played for the CIFSS D1 title at Dodger Stadium. Megill went to Loyola Marymount for college after high school. He had Tommy John surgery while in college, but eventually was a 7th round pick in the MLB Draft by the Padres. He’s now developed into one of the key relievers in the Brewers’ bullpen.

Garrett Mitchell (Lutheran, Orange) Brewers OF
He’s one of the best players to have come out of the OLu program that also has pitcher Gerrit Cole, who was the first pick in the 2011 MLB Draft. Garrett, a four-year starter for the Lancers, was picked at No. 14 in the first round of the 2020 MLB Draft. That was after he played at UCLA. Derek Curiel of OLu was the fifth pick overall in the first round of the 2026 draft. Garrett, who has Type 1 diabetes, has overcome numerous injuries in his career. In the NLCS vs the Dodgers, he hit was proved to be the game-winning homer.

Joey Ortiz (Pacifica, Garden Grove) Brewers INF
After graduating from Pacifica in 2016 where he had six triples as a senior, Ortiz went to New Mexico State for college. He was drafted by the Baltimore Orioles after the 2019 season and made his debut with the Orioles in 2023. He was traded to the Brewers prior to the 2024 season as part of the Corbin Burnes deal that sent him to Baltimore. Ortiz has seen his playing time in Milwaukee go up after Willy Adames left the Brewers as shortstop to sign with the Giants.

JoJo Romero (Oxnard) Brewers P
He’s another top arm in the Milwaukee bullpen. In fact, JoJo was the winning pitcher when the Brewers notched the first ever 100th win in franchise history and he was the winning pitcher in their NLCS title-clinching win over the Dodgers. Romero, also a soccer player at Oxnard, struck out 280 batters in his baseball career over four seasons. He also played for the University of Nevada.

Cole Sulser (Ramona) Rays P
We remember Cole and younger brother Beau when they were playing at Ramona more than 10 years ago. He was picked in the 2013 MLB Draft by the Cleveland Indians and was traded to the Rays in 2018 in a deal that also included Jake Bauers (now a member of the Brewers and a player that Sulser could face in the World Series in a relief appearance).

Brice Turang (Santiago, Corona) Brewers INF
While Brice was a freshman phenom at Santiago in 2015 and was covered extensively by Cal-Hi Sports on all-state teams after that, the family was not unknown to us. We also cover softball and before Brice his sister Brianna was one of the top softball players in the state. She later played at Oklahoma and helped the Sooners win a national title. Brice had signed to play in college at LSU, but instead signed with the Brewers after they picked him in the first round of the 2018 MLB draft. Turang had a breakout MLB season in 2025 and is now one of the Brewers’ top clutch hitters.

Andrew Vaughn
(Maria Carrillo, Santa Rosa) Brewers INF
Not all of the Brewers’ top players are from Southern California. Vaughn is one of them who’s from the north. A longtime friend of Santa Rosa area MLB player Spencer Torkelson from Casa Grande of Petaluma (the No. 1 pick in the 2020 MLB Draft), Vaughn was the third pick in the first round of the draft the previous year. That was after he won the Golden Spikes Award as an All-American at Cal. Vaughn was obtained by the Brewers prior to the 2025 season from the Chicago White Sox in a trade.

Tyler Wells (Yucaipa) Rays P
The Rays also have shortstop Tyler Walls (who is from a high school in Georgia) so it’s can be confusing to look up info on each one. Tyler Wells is a 6-foot-7 pitcher while Tyler Walls is a shortstop. Wells came to Yucaipa from West Virginia, but is known for having a 0.28 ERA during his senior season in 2012 for the Thunderbirds. He later went to Cal State San Bernardino and was picked in the 15th round of the 2016 MLB Draft by the Minnesota Twins.

Christian Yelich (Westlake, Westlake Village) Brewers DH
A multi-year all-state selection, Yelich was a first team all-state outfielder and All-American at Westlake back in the 2010 season. We remember him for sure as well playing for the Brewers’ Area Code team. Christian was a first round MLB pick, however, by the Miami Marlins. Milwaukee got him before the 2018 season. He went on to win the NL MVP award after that 2018 season and was on a tear to start the 2019 season when he suffered a dislocated knee cap injury that would end his season. Yelich had 25 homers and 103 RBI in 2025 and remains one of the top batters in the Brewers’ lineup.

Mark Tennis is the co-founder and publisher of CalHiSports.com. He can be reached at markjtennis@gmail.com. Don’t forget to follow Mark on the Cal-Hi Sports Twitter handle: @CalHiSports