does Jordan need to change his drafting philosophy?

[DocJJ]

He seems to like toolsy high schoolers. (perhaps not when there's an obvious polished college product available like Matusz and Wieters, but in general he seems to like toolsy high school types). With the exception of Brandon Snyder, none of our high school guys have accomplished much. Granted, it's much too early to write off Avery and Hoes, but they're hardly setting the world on fire at the 2nd lowest rung of the ladder...

I was thinking of Kolodny, Pope, Henson, Adams (granted, he showed some signs of life before getting hurt) etc....

Maybe we should focus on more polished college products?

[Frobby]

Wasn't Pope drafted by DeMacio? I don't really see a trend here.

[BringBackMagic]

He seems to like toolsy high schoolers. (perhaps not when there's an obvious polished college product available like Matusz and Wieters, but in general he seems to like toolsy high school types). With the exception of Brandon Snyder, none of our high school guys have accomplished much. Granted, it's much too early to write off Avery and Hoes, but they're hardly setting the world on fire at the 2nd lowest rung of the ladder...

I was thinking of Kolodny, Pope, Henson, Adams (granted, he showed some signs of life before getting hurt) etc....

Maybe we should focus on more polished college products?

It's posts like this that led me to my post a week or so ago about rushing to judgment. Less than 25 games into the season and we are already getting worried abotu Avery and Hoes? I know you said it's too early to write them off, but it really shouldn't be a concern at all. The 2nd lowest rung? They are 19 years old and neither was a BJ Upton type of high schooler that was expected to rise quickly. IMO, I think both should be in Aberdeen, not Delmarva.

I think Jordan is doing just fine. He has mixed polished college players (Matusz, Weiters) with younger toolsy guys with high upside. We can question the Avery selection as there were more polished players many of us would probably have liked to see, but Jordan has put our farm system on the map. I'm not questioning him at this point.

[Sports Guy]

I like the idea of going for high upside HSers after the first 2 or 3 rounds....But in those first few rounds, go for the college guys...Now, their are always exceptions to this but as a general rule, that is what I would like to see.

I thought the Matusz and Avery picks were wrong...Not because these guys didn't have talent but because I felt they should go another way.

I thought the Avery pick was awful and I will be very surprised if he ever becomes much.

I hate the idea of getting athletes and trying to turn them into baseball players...It rarely works.

[DocJJ]

I'm saying the ones we pick don't!

I'm not sure it's an inability of our scouts/crosscheckers to find good talent. I'm concerned it's a coaching/teaching issue that plagues the system.

[crawdad]

Well, the Avery pick -- which I also did not like -- is about risk analysis. If one thinks Avery has the tools to excel with the proper development into a 1st round baseball talent, then you select him. That is a qualitative choice. It is difficult for us quantitative types to make that selection because it is difficult to hone a scouting eye without solid instruction. That said . . . the Orioles took a guy with great talent, a strong commitment to a football program, and, supposedly a good work ethic.

What I like about Jordan, and it shows in this pick, is that he prefers to select guys who drop in the draft, but have 1st round potential. I think that is important with regard to how often prospects fail to materialize. One system that sort of screams this out is the Blue Jays system. Ricciardi went hard core toward drafting college bats and arms. The idea being that scouting college kids was less expensive and you had more data to project what kind of player they would become. This technique minimizes risk, but it also minimizes potential. I think his technique would work well if a team required 50 players active for each game and involved greatly in play. The way a team really works is with limited slots. In this case, taking on risk in order to come up with a top tier player is important.

So, what I am getting at is this.

Did I like the Avery pick? No.

Do I agree with the concept behind it? Yes.

Do we have enough data to determine if Avery was the wrong pick? Absolutely not. He is a project.

What about the other raw talent picks? It is sort of selective evaluation to pick out all of the toolsy picks. That said . . . again, you do not need a high success percentage for this to be a good technique to help build depth in a system.

[QBsILLEST1]

The thing with Jordan is, he even said it himself, he knew about Avery and fell in love with his skill set. He said himself, (paraphrase) "If Avery was available, I was going to pick him". IMO there were better candidates for 2:4 last year, but we have someone with major major upside. IMO, we got someone in round 3 though that had atleast 2nd round talent(Hoes). I personally wish we would take chances on some of these HS pitchers in the 2nd and 3rd rounds every once in a while.