Kiley: What the Os need to do with this draft

[Sports Guy]

Baltimore Orioles

Day 1 picks: No. 17, No. 53, No. 63

2023 draft bonus pool: $10,534,800

Where their farm system ranks: second, $331 million

What they do well and a recent draft win: They draft position players and have settled on a pretty specific type. Power must be present, along with at least decent bat-to-ball skills, ideally with some physical skills and/or speed/defensive value. That might sound vague -- or like what every team is doing -- but search this article for "contact" or "hit-first," and you'll see that looking for power with some physical skills/speed (because you largely can't teach those) and then teaching the other stuff is both smart and somewhat novel.

What they need to accomplish in this draft: They have an exciting young big league team that's competing and are a rounding error from having the best farm system in baseball. Just keep doing that stuff.

Best fits: This could be the year the O's go pitcher with their top pick, with a chance Noble Meyer or Hurston Waldrep gets there. More likely, though, is that Colin Houck, Nimmala or Yohandy Morales ends up fitting the above description.

 

https://www.espn.com/mlb/insider/story/_/id/37939240/2023-mlb-draft-guide-best-fits-biggest-need-all-30-teams

 

[Moose Milligan]

Pitching. 

[CharmCityHokie]

1 hour ago, Moose Milligan said:

Pitching. 

I agree we desperately need pitching in the system, but if it's not there I hope they don't force it. I don't want to take a Cody Sedlock just because he's a pitcher when you could have Will Smith who went 4 spots later. Obviously that's cherry-picking and the draft is a crap shoot, but they've been successful so far even if their picks initially make me raise an eyebrow, so I'll give them the benefit of the doubt. 

[Gurgi]

I am going to go with "do what you have been doing"  pick the guys you have rated tops of your board.  Pitching be damned.   Elias deserves our patience and respect.  He has drafted extremely well.  

[Aglets]

Elias will keep doing his thing which as far as I can tell means don't take pitching early.

But we will see.

[btdart20]

I read Kiley's take as:  the O's should "draft for need" vs. draft talent that you're good at developing.

Let's take Skenes off the board and play at an unrealistic edge here a bit:  If Dollander falls and is there at 1.17, does Elias draft him?  I have my doubts.  But I think that's the type of valuation (in Elias' eyes) that will need to be on the board for Elias to take an SP in round 1.

[Alasdaire]

I want to say that pitching is possible because picking at 17 is presents a very different value proposition than picking 1-5. Because when you're at 1, 2, 5, and 1, you're guaranteed to have your choice of guys you a high degree of confidence in, which their model seems to churn out as hitters.

But that doesn't explain why they've invariably passed on pitchers with their second/third picks in years past too. Pitchers have fallen to those rounds in the past and they've chosen not to bite.

So we probably should expect a position player. Which should be fine by all of us considering how almost literally every single guy they've taken early has been a success.

[BohKnowsBmore]

16 hours ago, Aglets said:

Elias will keep doing his thing which as far as I can tell means don't take pitching early.

But we will see.

Here's the thing, he's never been at this spot in the first round, so the calculus may change a bit on how to approach the pick. #17 is different from #1, #2, and #5. This is a spot where the top prep arm in his estimation (or another different-from-the-norm-to-this-point profile) might make more sense.

[BohKnowsBmore]

11 hours ago, Alasdaire said:

I want to say that pitching is possible because picking at 17 is presents a very different value proposition than picking 1-5. Because when you're at 1, 2, 5, and 1, you're guaranteed to have your choice of guys you a high degree of confidence in, which their model seems to churn out as hitters.

But that doesn't explain why they've invariably passed on pitchers with their second/third picks in years past too. Pitchers have fallen to those rounds in the past and they've chosen not to bite.

So we probably should expect a position player. Which should be fine by all of us considering how almost literally every single guy they've taken early has been a success.

Perhaps the round positioning has caused them to miss the "wave tips" of value. Guys like Grayson and DL Hall, for example, were mid-1st rounders. The value for the top prep arms may just be better at that 11-20-ish range. Just one thought.

[odogs101]

In 2016, coming out of their rebuild, the Astros did draft Forrest Whitley out of HS with....the 17th pick.

So maybe a pitcher is a possibility. 

[odogs101]

And he wasn't even the first HS pitcher selected 

3. Ian Anderson 

4. Riley Pint

7. Braxton Garrett

9.Matt Manning

12. Jay Groome

Plus two college arms

6. A.J. Puk

8. Cal Quantrill

Maybe Whitley was the guy they were targeting. But going off industry consensus(dangerous) there may only be 4 or five arms off the board when Os pick. 

[sevastras]

Or do you go over slot with someone who may be viewed as having signability issues?

[Can_of_corn]

14 minutes ago, sevastras said:

Or do you go over slot with someone who may be viewed as having signability issues?

Will be harder when you are competing with teams that have larger draft pools.

[Just Regular]

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/2023-mock-draft-1-0/

Kiley's old colleague Longenhagen guesses us on a Georgia high school shortstop.

He also throws some shade on the Terp guy's physicality, going for a "bowling ball" description.

The big college aces all gone well before us in his guesses.

[MurphDogg]

On 7/4/2023 at 1:10 PM, CharmCityHokie said:

I agree we desperately need pitching in the system, but if it's not there I hope they don't force it. I don't want to take a Cody Sedlock just because he's a pitcher when you could have Will Smith who went 4 spots later. Obviously that's cherry-picking and the draft is a crap shoot, but they've been successful so far even if their picks initially make me raise an eyebrow, so I'll give them the benefit of the doubt. 

2016 will probably go down (along with 2017) as one of the weakest drafts ever.

Smith is the only player in the first round (42 picks) to accrue 6 rWAR.

In hindsight, the Orioles picked a decent time to be decent and not pick in the top 10 of the draft, because whoever they picked was going to end up as a disappointment.