Keith Law on the Orioles draft

[Tony-OH]

On 7/19/2021 at 1:51 PM, webbrick2010 said:

Yes, according to multiple draft ranking boards, none of the O's top 5 picks were ranked at above the position the O's took them.

According to BA

Cowser picked 5, ranked 10

Norby picked 41, ranked 58

Reed picked 65, ranked 148

Rhodes picked 76, ranked 135

Higgins picked 257, ranked 230

No one else ranked

People can defend the O's and claim the Elias is smarter than everyone else and got 20 great picks for less than he would have had to pay for 20 highly regarded prospects.... but it's the O's / Angelos and they have been trimming costs all year (Covid, getting ready to sell, need more cash flow with failing law firm, who knows).

 

So you trust a BA rankings over a professional scouting department with many full time employees, scouts, and analysts because it fits your agenda? 

Guess what? Some of the players Elias selected are not going to make it, and in fact, most won't. That's exactly how the MLB draft works. Despite all the advancements, it's still a bit of a crap shoot and after the first 5 rounds or so, it's definitely a crap shoot. 

Since I don't scout 1000s of players nor do I have a staff of scouts and analysts, I'll take a wait and see approach to how Elias' scouting team has done, but you know what I won't do? I won't assume a publication has more data and information than a professional scouting department so I take these rankings with a grain of salt.

When you read up on the players selected by Elias, you can see the tools and promise in each. Now it's up to them and the Orioles development staff to try and shape them into major leaguers. 

Don't get me wrong, you can have any opinion you like, and I won't argue with slashing of money at MASN as being just plain cheap, but we have a minor league team owned by a HoF former Orioles legend that is too cheap to have a radio announcer and graphics for balls and strikes for their terrible three camera broadcast on MiLB Tv, so let's remember, they aren't the only cheap owners around here.

[Tony-OH]

18 hours ago, Sports Guy said:

Hobgood was an ownership pick.  They didn’t want to spend money.

That being said, it’s such an annoying discussion without context.

The thing about that sucked and the only part that really matters is that they were being cheap and it’s just another feather in the cap for the worst owner arguably in sports the last 25 years.

However, most of the first round sucked that year.  Yes, we could have had Trout and yes, the Orioles and 24 other teams completely missed on that.  But outside of that, you had mostly guys who failed and some guys who had a modest career.

Overall, it was a pretty poor draft.

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_Major_League_Baseball_draft

This is completely not true. I've spoke ad nauseam over why Jordan selected Hobgood and although money was a factor, it was not because Angelos limited his budget or told him to pick.  

[Sports Guy]

3 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

This is completely not true. I've spoke ad nauseam over why Jordan selected Hobgood and although money was a factor, it was not because Angelos limited his budget or told him to pick.  

When I say an ownership pick, I don’t mean PA said take this guy..I mean that PA wasn’t going to spend larger dollars on one player, so it made Jordan look for cheaper alternatives.

[Tony-OH]

Just now, Sports Guy said:

When I see an ownership pick, I don’t mean PA said take this guy..I mean that PA wasn’t going to spend larger dollars on one player, so it made Jordan look for cheaper alternatives.

But again, that was not the case. I had a good relationship back then with Joe and spent hours watching minor league games with him and chatting. Matzek and Wheeler were the other two guys he was considering but If I remember right, Wheeler had makeup issues he was concerned about and Matzek's contract demands scare him and many other teams off. Remember, this was before the slotting system and back when agents could hold their high value high school clients out for huge sums of money throughout the whole winter if they wanted to.

I think Joe allowed Hobgood's personality and story to affect him too much. He told me that he felt all three were about the same talent wise, but that Hobgood's character and known contract demands helped him become the pick. Obviously Joe would like that pick back and he and his scouts obviously missed on the talent level of Hobgood though I think injuries sapped his stuff as well.

The one thing to note, neither Wheeler or Matzek really worked out for their drafting teams. 

So was money a factor, sure, but it was more because Matzek's demands were reportedly outrageous (that's why he fell to 11 and then he settled for the 5th highest bonus) and Wheelers' "makeup issues +sketchy salary demands) made Hobgood seem like the safer pick with similar talent. Jordan ended up wrong, but his risk assessment was that Hobgood was the safer of the picks to sign of the three "equally talented" pitchers. 

 

[Tony-OH]

Heck Hobgood wasn't even the worse pick in this draft. The Padres took high school CF Donovon Tate and gave him $6.25 million only to see him slash .226/.331/.321/.652 in 1229 PAs while never getting above High-A. 

[RZNJ]

5 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

Heck Hobgood wasn't even the worse pick in this draft. The Padres took high school CF Donovon Tate and gave him $6.25 million only to see him slash .226/.331/.321/.652 in 1229 PAs while never getting above High-A. 

As I recall, Tate had a very high ceiling!  

[Sports Guy]

2 hours ago, Tony-OH said:

Heck Hobgood wasn't even the worse pick in this draft. The Padres took high school CF Donovon Tate and gave him $6.25 million only to see him slash .226/.331/.321/.652 in 1229 PAs while never getting above High-A. 

Well that’s the thing..in hindsight, the first round was terrible even if it produced Strasburg and one of the greatest players ever.  
 

That partly why I can’t stand the conversation about Hobgood.  They pretty much miss on any player they could have taken there.  You can blame them for Trout and that’s fine but they share that blame with most of the league.  

[Hank Scorpio]

2 hours ago, RZNJ said:

As I recall, Tate had a very high ceiling!  

He was a "tool shed."

[RZNJ]

2 hours ago, Hank Scorpio said:

He was a "tool shed."

Minus the rake.

[OriolesMagic83]

On 7/20/2021 at 12:55 PM, Frobby said:

Let’s say you’ve got two types of players.   One has a midpoint projection of 6 and a ceiling of 8.    The other has a midpoint projection of 5 and a ceiling of 9.   Which do you take?   

If you are Elias, you consistently take the first type, because over many players that gets you the best overall result, even if you miss out on the occasional 9.

Elias might be looking to trade for the guys with the ceiling of 9.  I'm not saying it will work, but Houston did some of that.  Maybe 1 in 10 of the guys w/ a ceiling of 9 reach it (probably far less than that).  Elias could be waiting till those high ceiling players have been developed by another system (with a high failure rate) before trading for them. 

[odogs101]

 

 

[Can_of_corn]

6 minutes ago, odogs101 said:

 

 

So, if true, that means plan A fell through.

Side benefit, they screwed with Boston.

[LTO's]

They were either screwing with Boston or saw tools they could work with. The guy is totally helpless against breaking balls. 

[Sports Guy]

31 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

So, if true, that means plan A fell through.

Side benefit, they screwed with Boston.

Again

[7Mo]

1 minute ago, LTO's said:

They were either screwing with Boston or saw tools they could work with. The guy is totally helpless against breaking balls. 

I'm thrilled we didn't get him. I'll be shocked if he ever gets out of AA.