Why draft out of high school... ever?

[Sanfran327]

Why do teams ever draft players right out of high school? It seems kind of silly to me. I'd prefer to draft a quality player that's proven himself in college against other soon-to-be pro baseball players. With high schoolers, they've spent the spring beating up on a bunch of kids that probably won't go anywhere at all.

I understand the "ceiling" thing being higher for a HS kid, but a lot of them aren't even done developing physically by the time they're drafted. They can peak early and never get better than they were their junior or senior year. I also understand that when you draft a player that young, you get to mold him into the exact type of player you want him to be in your organization. That's a definite plus. You can more easily break bad habits and form new ones as they've just played less baseball than college kids.

But, to an extent, isn't the risk just too much to make that gamble? I'm pretty happy with our past two first-round selections because I know we're getting a catcher and a pitcher. When the M's drafted AJ, they thought they were getting a SS out of high school. Now he's a bad mofo in CF for us. Too many variables for me to want to take the risk.

What do you guys think? I know baseball prospects are a huge gamble for the most part no matter where you're getting them, but do you prefer high school prodigies, or more polished, accomplished college prospects?

[McNulty]

I'm not going to list off all the prospects from high school that have worked out (ARod, for example), but I'm pretty sure the "body hasn't stopped developing" stuff is taken into account and has been for some time.

[Stotle]

1. There are some outstanding baseball talents that have no real desire to go to college

2. There are many top college programs whose primary concern is not developing a player for their pro career, but rather winning -- that means a lot of pitchers especially are run pretty hard with high pitch counts and potentially throwing on little rest. To add to this, many of the top prospects that end up at these schools are also coming from competitive HS programs and travel teams/summer teams that likewise put a premium on winning rather than development and protecting arms.

3. You get your hands on a premium talent and you can start shaping him right away rather than relying on colleges to get the most out of players

4. Your prospect's one and only focus is baseball -- from 18-20 he is focusing on becoming a better baseball player and that's basically it. In college, in addition to baseball, he's focusing on classes, friends and potentially other sports.

5. Even if the body isn't developed, you can get a very good sense of a body's frame, and how much weight you can eventually hang off of it.

Those are just some positives for HSers.

[Sanfran327]

I'm not going to list off all the prospects from high school that have worked out (ARod, for example), but I'm pretty sure the "body hasn't stopped developing" stuff is taken into account and has been for some time.

Sure, there are plenty of examples of guys who have MORE than worked out. Griffey Jr is another one. But for every ARod or Griffey, there's got to be DOZENS of guys you've never heard of, right? Wouldn't you think a stud college prospect is a safer investment than a stud high school prospect? Does it really make no differnce whatsoever?

[Ruzious]

1. There are some outstanding baseball talents that have no real desire to go to college

2. There are many top college programs whose primary concern is not developing a player for their pro career, but rather winning -- that means a lot of pitchers especially are run pretty hard with high pitch counts and potentially throwing on little rest. To add to this, many of the top prospects that end up at these schools are also coming from competitive HS programs and travel teams/summer teams that likewise put a premium on winning rather than development and protecting arms.

3. You get your hands on a premium talent and you can start shaping him right away rather than relying on colleges to get the most out of players

4. Your prospect's one and only focus is baseball -- from 18-20 he is focusing on becoming a better baseball player and that's basically it. In college, in addition to baseball, he's focusing on classes, friends and potentially other sports.

5. Even if the body isn't developed, you can get a very good sense of a body's frame, and how much weight you can eventually hang off of it.

Those are just some positives for HSers.

Yup, and if you have coaches in the low minors who can teach 18 and 19 year olds, that's a huge positive. If you don't, they're not going to develop.

[Sanfran327]

Yup, and if you have coaches in the low minors who can teach 18 and 19 year olds, that's a huge positive. If you don't, they're not going to develop.

I guess this is more to the point. We need to get better at the lower levels in order to groom our top picks. Good point.

[McNulty]

Sure, there are plenty of examples of guys who have MORE than worked out. Griffey Jr is another one. But for every ARod or Griffey, there's got to be DOZENS of guys you've never heard of, right? Wouldn't you think a stud college prospect is a safer investment than a stud high school prospect? Does it really make no differnce whatsoever?

The Braves have been drafting high school kids for years. They are good at developing them. Other teams aren't as good at it.

But the bigger points were all brought up by Stotle. I was too lazy to lay it out like he did.

[Stotle]

Yup, and if you have coaches in the low minors who can teach 18 and 19 year olds, that's a huge positive. If you don't, they're not going to develop.

Eh, you need to have the talent in order to develop it. BAL hasn't really stocked its low minors with much. A big reason for this is the low profile on the international scene.

[Bosibus]

Greg did some analysis on this early this year:

http://forum.orioleshangout.com/forums/showthread.php?t=57155

[Greg Pappas]

My draft research over a twenty year period, exclusively looking at the first round, that HS hitters were even with college hitters as regards ML success (roughly a 45% chance), and while all pitchers had only a 25% chance at success, collegiate hurlers had a noticeable edge on their younger counterparts.

Taking a HS hitter works out as well as any, but these HS pitchers far more often than not leave you holding the bag.

Many great HS pitchers have excelled at the ML level, and many are currently among the best prospects in the game, so perhaps the chances/percentages are changing somewhat.

I think scouting just gets better and better, and teams are incorporating non-traditional stats and methods into their evaluations more and more, which could also be a reason for the apparent improvement.

[orioles327]

Why do teams ever draft players right out of high school? It seems kind of silly to me. I'd prefer to draft a quality player that's proven himself in college against other soon-to-be pro baseball players. With high schoolers, they've spent the spring beating up on a bunch of kids that probably won't go anywhere at all.

I understand the "ceiling" thing being higher for a HS kid, but a lot of them aren't even done developing physically by the time they're drafted. They can peak early and never get better than they were their junior or senior year. I also understand that when you draft a player that young, you get to mold him into the exact type of player you want him to be in your organization. That's a definite plus. You can more easily break bad habits and form new ones as they've just played less baseball than college kids.

But, to an extent, isn't the risk just too much to make that gamble? I'm pretty happy with our past two first-round selections because I know we're getting a catcher and a pitcher. When the M's drafted AJ, they thought they were getting a SS out of high school. Now he's a bad mofo in CF for us. Too many variables for me to want to take the risk.

What do you guys think? I know baseball prospects are a huge gamble for the most part no matter where you're getting them, but do you prefer high school prodigies, or more polished, accomplished college prospects?

Adam Jones was not moved to outfield because of fielding deficiencies. He moved beacuse of organizational needs.

http://www.minorleagueball.com/2008/3/6/133615/8460

He looked good with the glove but by the end of the year the Mariners had decided to make him an outfielder due to organizational needs.

[allstar1579]

Adam Jones was not moved to outfield because of fielding deficiencies. He moved beacuse of organizational needs.

http://www.minorleagueball.com/2008/3/6/133615/8460

I don't buy that. That might have been their excuse at the time, so they didn't look bad for drafting a guy that couldn't cut it at short, but everything I read about Adam said that he couldn't handle the footwork and groundballs at SS so they had to move him to an OF spot. He's been great in CF though, so it's worked out great, but they should just admit they took a good athlete without much concern for his defense at SS, and they found a spot for him. Their loss, our gain.

Besides tons of guys come up as infielders and get moved to the OF to excel there.

[allstar1579]

Not to beat a dead horse, but scouting Donovan Tate made something else occur to me. You really can't scout or try to predict HS kids until May or June anyway. They are so young, and you are drafting on potential more than statistics with such a small sample of them. Kids can change SO much from year to year and that change will completely alter their draft status. Tate, for example, is the best HS bat in the draft right now, legit 5 tool talent, but if he struggles this year for whatever reason, he will drop like a rock. The flip side of that is a kid you've never heard of through his Junior year, can go out and belt 15 or so HR his senior year and all of a sudden show up on the radar in the higher rounds.

A guy like Jeff Koenig comes to memory. He had been a steady, decent player, and then his senior year set the state record for HR in a season (to be shattered by Tex the next season). From not having a sniff of college or the pros, he was suddenly facing calls from scouts and colleges frantically trying to gauge where he might play the next year, all in the span of a month from when the season ended until the draft.

We can try to project or get an idea of the raw tools these kids have, but ultimately, how they perform in those 20 games or so is going to have such an impact on their draft status that is more informational than actual projection at this point.