Is Elias/SIGBOT and crew really good at drafting and development after the 1st round?

[LookitsPuck]

52 minutes ago, RZNJ said:

@Greg Pappas  I wouldn’t even say we should draft HS hitters.  If we have possibly come up empty as far as a ML regular in the last 4 drafts rounds 2-4, there isn’t much to lose by going college pitching, HS pitching, or HS hitting in those rounds.   The worst you can do is pretty much what we’ve done, at least 2020-2022 and maybe even 2023.  At least in 2023 they went with the two college pitchers in 2 and 3.

You don’t even need to draft pitchers high. Just let others take the risk and trade for them. You can gamble, but they get hurt far too often. 

The O’s added 4 pitchers to their top prospect rankings in 2022 alone. They added players to their major league roster as well. 

As for college vs high school hitters, I think the O’s focused on getting players that could contribute ASAP. My gut is they’ll adjust going forward to include more HS players especially since they have such a position player heavy treasure trove that are ready for the majors. It’s a perfectly valid approach by Elias. Excited to see this draft.

[LookitsPuck]

The Orioles rotation right now: Burnes (college), Bradish (college), Kremer (college), Irvin (college), Grayson (high school).

In the running: Cade Povich (college), McDermott (college), eventually Johnson (college)

Recent: Wells (college), Means (college)

You don’t need HS arms.

[LookitsPuck]

Of the O’s hitters, only Gunnar and Mounty were drafted out of HS. 

McKenna was, but he’s gone.

Holliday was, but he’s back in the minors.

Have they had another HS position player on the 25 man this year make an appearance? 

[kidrock]

11 hours ago, Tony-OH said:

None of this has anything to do with the points I've made. Sure, some of you can stick your head in the sand and just go "The draft is a crapshoot" but then if you do, you can't give Elias credit for any of his draft picks because that means he just go lucky.

Just like I don't think they were lucky in drafting Rutschman, Gunnar, Westburg, Cowser, Mayo, Kjerstad, etc. I also don't give them a pass for not drafting and developing one major league pitcher in 5 years of drafting. 

They passed on a lot of arms to draft a lot of college bats that have not worked out. they did not balance their drafts with pitching and hitting, but went with a college bat philosophy and as I shown, they've had little success with that philosophy while there are a ton of major league pitchers who were drafted in these same drafts and passed on.

Now 2023 was a shift in philosophy on the pitching side and we'll see how that works out. Now I'd like to see them give more high school hitters shots in the early rounds.

I'd rather strike out on High school guys more often and then find a Gunnar or Mayo once in awhile, vs going college heavy and getting decent bats that are defensively flawwed like we have with Kjerstad and Norby or guys that have low ceilings.

I fully agree Tony.  All your points are valid and fair.

[RZNJ]

24 minutes ago, LookitsPuck said:

You don’t even need to draft pitchers high. Just let others take the risk and trade for them. You can gamble, but they get hurt far too often. 

The O’s added 4 pitchers to their top prospect rankings in 2022 alone. They added players to their major league roster as well. 

As for college vs high school hitters, I think the O’s focused on getting players that could contribute ASAP. My gut is they’ll adjust going forward to include more HS players especially since they have such a position player heavy treasure trove that are ready for the majors. It’s a perfectly valid approach by Elias. Excited to see this draft.

We just drafted pitchers in round 2 and 3 last year so someone decided it was time to take some risks.

[LookitsPuck]

7 minutes ago, RZNJ said:

We just drafted pitchers in round 2 and 3 last year so someone decided it was time to take some risks.

Yeah, I thought they’d do something similar. I wrote about this in 2022 because people back then were saying Elias couldn’t identify young talent and hated their position player approach. lol

And those people were wrong. Still are.

https://open.substack.com/pub/stephenpauladams/p/what-is-mike-eliass-draft-strategy?r=84kpj&utm_medium=ios

I was very wrong about them picking Johnson or Jones in 2022. I did think they’d go HS.

Anyways, you can tell that I don’t buy into any one narrative (I.e. we have to draft HS players). There are so many ways to build a team successfully. In 2022, we had…what…half the top international prospects in our top 30 that we have now?

 

Edited June 6 by LookitsPuck

[SilverRocket]

I'm not entirely convinced yet that there was a particular strategy of taking hitters over pitchers, vs simply wanting to take the top player on their list regardless of position and that's how the chips fell. But regardless of whether it was intentional, there's no need to be balanced from the draft given the number of years between the draft and the big leagues. You can move excess positional talent for pitchers like we did for Burnes and Irvin (and Flaherty, though that didn't work out). And you can make an argument with all the pitching injuries these days, you'd rather acquire pitching through short-term investments and hitting through long-term.

It's true that from 2020 on there hasn't been much result (yet), but 2 of our starters, including our ace, were acquired using 2019 picks from rounds 2+. I don't know if we can keep that going but I would call it a success so far when you look at Elias's complete draft history.

[Billy F-Face3]

Gunnar Henderson and Coby Mayo are pretty good. Stowers is decent enough to start for 2/3 of the teams in MLB.

The OP dissed John Rhodes and Jud Fabian but I like them. Every time I've seen them play in the minor leagues, they did something to help their team win. John Rhodes has flashed some power with his bat. Fabian is Jackson Holliday's draft class so he's still got time to prove what he's capable of. And I think he will make it to Major League Baseball. 

I do agree with the criticism of drafting only college bats. At some point you run out of pitchers and you need alot of good arms.  Also, high school prospects allows for a higher ceiling with the ability to develop a player in your system. Their younger age allows more time to develop a better career inside your franchise.

[Philip]

I think all will be well if Mike trades effectively, and part of trading effectively is being timely and getting back things you need. 
we need pitching. We need it right now.

good solid pitching.

 

[LookitsPuck]

11 hours ago, Billy F-Face3 said:

Gunnar Henderson and Coby Mayo are pretty good. Stowers is decent enough to start for 2/3 of the teams in MLB.

The OP dissed John Rhodes and Jud Fabian but I like them. Every time I've seen them play in the minor leagues, they did something to help their team win. John Rhodes has flashed some power with his bat. Fabian is Jackson Holliday's draft class so he's still got time to prove what he's capable of. And I think he will make it to Major League Baseball. 

I do agree with the criticism of drafting only college bats. At some point you run out of pitchers and you need alot of good arms.  Also, high school prospects allows for a higher ceiling with the ability to develop a player in your system. Their younger age allows more time to develop a better career inside your franchise.

I'm a big fan of Jud Fabian, too. There's a reason why both the Red Sox *and* the Orioles drafted him in back to back years so highly.

He's 23, folks. He has plus power, a plus arm, plus speed. I still am holding out hope that he can be a plus defensive outfielder with some pop as a starter, but I think his floor is more like Ryan McKenna. 

I really dislike how people throw away prospects after a portion of a season or after they are hurt. There were so many people writing off Kjerstad. And people were doing the same w/ Cowser whenever he'd start off at a new level and start very slowly, which has been his MO pretty much every year in the minors and majors.

This is my main takeaway:

• If you're judging the 2022/2023 draft based on 1 1/4 seasons, you're doing it wrong
• There have been 5 drafts under the Elias administration, one of which was hampered by COVID and had a very short selection (of which Elias did extremely well: Kjerstad, Westburg, Mayo, and potentially Baumler all being impact picks). 
• The 2021 draft featured Connor Norby in the 2nd round, Creed Willems in the *8th* round. And I know some people might not like him, but Billy Cook is an interesting piece and he was drafted in the *10th* round. And Tavera is a potential BP arm to me and he was drafted in the 5th. Did Elias miss on Rhodes and Trimble? Potentially, but I'm not willing to 100% write these guys off, and certainly not John Rhodes.
• 2022 draft: Beavers, Fabian, Bright I'm high on, and I still believe in Wagner. Nolan McLean was a really good pick that didn't sign. Showalter was used in a trade. 

Was 2023 a gangbusters draft *on paper* for the Orioles? I'm a bit bearish compared to previous years, but it's so damn early. People were absolutely fawning over Dylan Crews, and his numbers for the Nats AA team aren't jaw dropping. If you look at the other names from that draft that were picked prior to Enrique Bradfield, outside of Skenes, Jacob Wilson, and Kyle Teel, nobody is really tearing things up. Even the guys who made it to the majors (Langford, Schanuel) have been awful. Hell, Bradfield had a decent first year last year and he's not having a bad year in Aberdeen. Everybody knew what we were getting in him: zero to no homers, elite speed (on the bases and in the field), excellent defense with the potential to add some pop. Basically Kenny Lofton is probably his ceiling. 

Point being - these guys are far too young in their careers to write them off. Give it a few years.

Edited June 6 by LookitsPuck

[now]

I know it's not fair to add judgements based on one day, but--today (7 June) serves as a reality check of the poor showings on the farm to date, by most of our prospects. A quick perusal shows pretty good games and stats lately for Etzel, Basallo and Bright... after that, basically zilch (oh yeah, except for hometowner and org. filler Costes showing life). Now that the cream of the crop has mostly graduated, it's pretty slim pickings down on the farm.  

[skanar]

Not sure about the broader strategic questions raised in OP (pitcher/hitter, HS/college), but thought I'd add two cents about appropriate expectations for results in the draft.

I analyzed all picks in the first 5 rounds from the 2001-2010 drafts by sorting the players picked in each into four categories by career rWAR: >10 WAR, 1-10 WAR, <1 WAR, and didn't make the majors. I broke the first round down further into top 10 picks, 11-20 picks, and the rest of the round. Supplemental picks were just grouped into the round, and I didn't remove players who didn't sign.

Looking specifically at later rounds, only 11% of 2nd rounders went on to produce over 10 WAR; and only 6%, 5%, and 3% of 3rd, 4th, and 5th, rounders respectively.

Since 2019, the Orioles have had 4 top-10 picks, 1 11-20 pick, 2 other 1sts, 9 2nds, 6 3rds, 5 4ths and 5 5ths (32 total). The expected result of this set of picks is:

• 3-4 players who produce >10 WAR
• 4-5 players who produce 1-10 WAR
• 8 players who produce <1 WAR
• 16 players who don't make the majors

Note that a lot of this comes from the first rounders. Looking at the 2nd-5th rounds only (25 total), the expected results are:

• 1-2 players who produce >10 WAR
• 3 players who produce 1-10 WAR
• 6-7 players who produce <1 WAR
• 14 players who don't make the majors

In other words, a GM who develops 2 solid-or-better major leaguers out of the picks Elias has had in rounds 2-5 over the last 5 years has done better than average. Three such players would be excellent; four would be exceptional.

For reference, Rutschman and Henderson are already over 10 WAR; Westburg (3.7) and Ortiz (1.6) are in category 2. Six others have made the majors with <1 WAR so far: Stowers, Hernaiz, Kjerstad, Cowser, Norby, and Holliday. Of these, Henderson, Stowers, Ortiz, and Norby were all after round 1. And of course these are all relatively recent drafts, so career WAR values will change for many over the next few years.