Last season, the Gamecocks got almost all of its top 10 recruiting class to campus in large part because of a shortened MLB Draft.

With only five rounds, the probability of high school players or most college players getting plucked, while also getting their desired signing bonus money, was relatively low.

It worked out for South Carolina, returning the bulk of last year’s team plus enrolling a deep recruiting class, but with the draft expanding this year it could affect things differently.

“I think so. I think all you have to do is look at the last 10 years in our program. There are a good number of guys drafted in the first 20 and there are a good number of guys drafted after the 20th. That will continue,” Mark Kingston said. “With the older guys, I think it could impact some guys on our current team.”

Also see: Latest scoop on the football recruiting trail

This year’s draft, which will be later than normal this year running July 11-13, will go from five rounds to 20 rounds, which is still 20 rounds shorter than the typical drafts.

So with the expansion, it could affect the roster but likely not much. The Gamecocks have had 66 players on that year’s current roster picked, 41 of which came in the first 20 rounds of the draft.

Generally speaking if a college player gets drafted in the top 20 rounds then he’ll likely sign professionally while after the 20th round it’s still likely they sign but a little more unclear.

Of the 25 South Carolina players the last decade drafted after the 19th round, nine were seniors. Of the other 16, six returned to South Carolina with Wil Crowe in 2016 the most recent.

Who it likely won’t affect will be the high school class, though.

Also see: Gamecocks in the mix for top 200 running back

“Whether it’ll affect the high school kids, probably not,” Kingston said. “Generally high school kids that have a clue don’t sign and give up the SEC experience if they’re not a top three or four round pick. I don’t think it’ll affect that group that much.

Usually if a high school player is going to sign, teams know and will draft him easily in the top 10 rounds, if not the top five.

The Gamecocks have a few signees ranked in Baseball America’s top 300 prospects: shortstop Michael Braswell at 90, infielder Cooper Kinney at 162, outfielder Thad Ector at 238 and junior college righty 283.

It’s becoming a trend now, though, for more high-end high school talent to come to school before going into minor league baseball.

“Number one, the statistics show there are more college guys in the big league than there are high school guys,” Kingston said. “On top of that you get an education to fall back on when baseball’s over. On top of that the next three years after high school you’re improving social development cause you’re on a college campus. There are a million reasons.”

Also see: Thoughts and observations from the Arkansas series

The Gamecocks did get all of their high school class on campus last season, bringing in a slew of top 500 prospects that included Brandon Fields, Will Sanders, Alek Boychuk, Jackson Phipps, Jack Mahoney, Travis Luensmann, Mag Cotto, Cade Austin, Jalen Vasquez and Sam Swygert.

The hope moving forward is to continue getting their best high school players on campus.

“We share (reasons) with our recruits, as most schools do, I would assume,” Kingston said. “The data all shows that unless you’re a first round pick or getting completely life-changing money, the better option is to go to college and attack your pro career after that for a million different reasons.”