Ohlendorf's Draft Value Analysis

[Arthur_Bryant]

Maybe it's old news, but Tim Kurkjian has an interesting piece on Pirates RHP Ross Ohlendorf and his senior thesis at Princeton, in which he analyzed investment vs. return for the first 100 picks in each amateur draft from 1989 to 1993, using bonus and salary as a measure of investment, with Win Shares as the basis for value.

Kurkjian article on ESPN.com

Kurkjian's explanation is a little unclear, but the study seemingly shows that the draft approach returned exceptionally good value relative to investment.

Kurkjian treats the thesis as if the difficulty is on the level of groundbreaking quantum physics. From his explanation it doesn't seem all that esoteric to me; I'd say it seems more like journeyman SABRE research -- though that's not a slam by any means.

But I do think it's interesting that a player was thinking about these matters.

I wonder if senior theses at Princeton are publicly available...