Draft Day One Recap
We’ve made our opinion on drafting a college reliever in the first round known, so let’s move on to the rest of the picks the M’s made today. Here’s a quick recap of the players taken and a preliminary opinion on what their futures may hold.
First Round: Josh Fields, RHP, Georgia
Fields has good velocity and a big hook of a curveball despite being undersized, and when talking to people about him tonight, the name Troy Percival came up several times. Of course, the name Blaine Boyer came up just as often as a reminder that a 95 MPH fastball and a 12-6 curve doesn’t make you a guaranteed all-star. In reality, his command problems shouldn’t be that big of a deal, because 9th inning walks aren’t a serious problem if no one is hitting you. His ceiling isn’t that high, but he should be in Seattle in 2009, so that’s something.
Best Case Scenario: Troy Percival
More Likely Outcome: Taylor Buchholz
Second Round: Dennis Raben, OF, Miami
I’ll just quote Scout Friend on this one: “Fifteen years ago, Ben Grieve was the #2 pick in the draft with this exact same package. Grieve had a shorter stroke and more bat speed, but Raben’s pretty much a Grieve clone. That kid got a lot of crap for not living up to the hype, but he had a pretty decent career, and where you guys took him, that’s a good value.”
Best Case Scenario: Pat Burrell
More Likely Outcome: Ben Grieve
Third Round: Aaron Pribanic, RHP, Nebraska
Let’s get the negative stuff out of the way quickly; he’s a tall and fall guy who doesn’t get the most out of his leg strength and doesn’t repeat his delivery very well. That said, he’s got the classic pitchers frame, good arm strength, sits in the 91-94 range with his fastball, has a useful slider and change, and he doesn’t have much wear and tear on his arm. He’s not your typical college pitcher – there’s untapped talent here. He’s got some similarities to Tony Butler, and if the coaching staff can clean him up a bit and improve his secondary stuff, I think he could be a solid major league arm.
Best Case Scenario: Kyle Lohse
More Likely Outcome: Phil Dumatrait
Fourth Round: Steven Hensley, RHP, Elon
Not as big a fan of this one, unfortunately. Hensley is a short-armer whose velocity is more 87-91 and telegraphs his breaking ball with a wildly different arm action. He might as well just yell curveball during the wind-up. He’s going to take a good amount of work to make it.
Best Case Scenario: Francisco Cruceta
More Likely Outcome: Rich Dorman
Fifth Round: Brett Lorin, RHP, Long Beach St
This is a Bob Fontaine special right here. A couple of years ago, he snagged Kam Mickolio in the 18th round as a guy that few teams had seen much of, but the M’s saw sitting at 95 late in the year when most teams had taken him off their follow lists. Lorin fits the Mickolio mold, though obviously, the M’s felt the need to take him off the board earlier. At 6′7 and 245, he’s a huge kid, and his size has always intrigued scouts, but he’d been a career disappointment. He went to Arizona, struggled, transferred to Long Beach St and couldn’t find a home there either, even after working with pitching guru Troy Buckley. Barely used and almost never effective, Lorin was basically an afterthought for most teams. But he pitched the best baseball of his life the last two weeks with M’s scouts in attendance, and they believe that with a few tweaks, they can get his velocity up to 94. If they’re right, this could be a steal.
Best Case Scenario: J.J. Putz
More Likely Outcome: Dennis Sarfate
Sixth Round: Jarrett Burgess, RF, Florida Christian HS
The first non-collegian taken by the M’s, he attended the same high school as Denny Almonte, last year’s second round pick. Burgess doesn’t have Almonte’s raw physical skills, but he’s a better hitter. Of course, considering that Scout Friend asked me last week if Almonte was “the worst draft pick ever”, that’s not saying much. Generally, when you take a high school position player this late, you’re gambling that you can sign him, because you’re not going to be offering him that much money. It’s possible that Burgess ends up in college instead of joining the M’s.
Best Case Scenario: Someone Good
More Likely Outcome: We Never Talk About Him Again
Comments
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Would you say that Fontaine drafted well (the whole class, not just the top pick)?
This is something of a weird draft. There are a few guys with upside, but they’re both college arms who need mechanical help. The first couple of picks are low upside, low risk players with little star potential. Usually, the M’s grab some guys who you can get excited about their best case scenario, but in this case, it’s more meh on potential and short on risk.
But, really, Fontaine knows way more about this than I do, so when we disagree, default to him being right.
Great recap. I guess at best we should be nonplussed. It will be years before we know if it was any good anyway, but maybe Fields will surprise us. Please join me in grasping at straws.
3… the problem is that if Fields is good, he’ll probably get traded for an overpriced vet.
So we got a JJ Putz hopeful in the fifth round while nailing down a Troy Percival wannabe in the first. Awesome how we’ll be paying one potential closer millions of dollars while we end up paying the other scraps. I love the Mariners!
Dave, have you answered the question of who you think we should have taken with our first round pick?
Bodhizefa,
I don’t think there is a quick answer to that question. If you look at the draft comments you can see who he liked and whether or not he thought they would slip as far as 20.
Any idea Dave what the Mariners saw in Almonte? He’s struggling so badly at Wisconsin it’s like he’s never played baseball before.
Do the Mariners just not see their position player weakness the same way we do, based on the fact that four of their first six picks were pitchers?
Or am I overstating when I say “we”?
Pretty excited about a Bob Fontaine special …
So, are they going to move Raben to 1B, or are they still clueless about the importance of defense?
I’d rate this draft overall a D- so far. A few decent picks, but some awful misses.
Funny Raben is drawing the Ben Grieve comparison – I definitely recall the hype surrounding that ballplayer – never thought I would hear Grieve’s name again.
Isn’t it Benjamin Pribanic not Aaron?
Dennis Raben
Some candid footage there
Dave, have you answered the question of who you think we should have taken with our first round pick?
Not a reliever. Reese Havens, Christian Freidrich, Shooter Hunt, Jake Ordorizzi, Zach Collier, Conor Gillaspie… the list is long.
Any idea Dave what the Mariners saw in Almonte? He’s struggling so badly at Wisconsin it’s like he’s never played baseball before.
Tools. He’s athletic. He can run and throw, but he can’t hit.
Do the Mariners just not see their position player weakness the same way we do, based on the fact that four of their first six picks were pitchers?
Fontaine likes drafting pitchers – always has, always will.
So, are they going to move Raben to 1B, or are they still clueless about the importance of defense?
Raben will play the outfield.
Isn’t it Benjamin Pribanic not Aaron?
He goes by Aaron.
Thanks for the great information about the picks. I actually like what I hear about the first three picks. A power arm at #20 (Baseball America listed him at #18) who can help in a fairly short timeframe, a power hitting outfielder with good tools and upside in Raben (first team university all american going into 2008 college season)who should come up behind Saunders pretty quick and a big body power arm who projects as middle of rotation guy at this point but also has some upside. Not bad – we are all down on the big league club and Bavasi but this looks like a decent draft to me.
Do not give Bavasi credit for this. Please no.
Raben does not have “good tools”. And Pribanic doesn’t “project as a middle of the rotation guy”. He has a 5-10% chance of being that. College guys who project as middle of the rotation starters go in the top 15 picks.
Oh, ok. Thanks for the write up Dave. Depressing.
The thing I like least about this draft is it makes me doubt Fontaine’s credibility. I suppose I should follow my rule for NFL drafts and not get too worked up about the apparent quality of the picks until they’ve had time to prove themselves.
July 2 can’t come fast enough.
I am guessing this will not be a great draft. Kind of like the second rd guy just because he is LHanded and powerful. I usually play devils advocate but its hard to get excited about a reliever. I wonder what the chances of Putz being traded could be, or if/when would be the best time to do it.
I’d rank today’s picks an overall “meh.” Fields seems to be pretty good, but why invest a 1st-rounder on a Troy Percival clone, especially when one of Bavasi’s few strengths is building a reliable bullpen on the cheap? It’s so counter-intuitive.
If Raben turns out to be anything like Pat Burrell, I’ll be ecstatic. But as it stands, the Ben Grieve comparison probably isn’t too off.
Lorin sounds intriguing. Everyone else is meh.
I have heard mixed reviews of Raben. Many scouts thought he wasn’t the best OF on the Miami team. I hope the guy is great, but he doesn’t have much upside really. A pal who plays at Miami Dade CC, and will be drafted high next year, said Raben is a good baseball guy, but his tools are weak. Pretty good fielder, def has good arm, below average speed, good contact, and not too much power. Buddy said many Miami boys were suprised he went this high.
The only reason we should have drafted Fields is to trade JJ. We could get a ton for Putz if comparing it to what Texas got from Boston for Gagne. Arizona, Atlanta, Tampa Bay (if Percival is out), St. Louis, and others need a true closer. Also, you know some big name guy is going to go down. Scherzer for JJ???
That scouting report couldn’t be any more different than the ones I heard. Pretty much everyone I talk to calls him a bat-only player, and “pretty good fielder” isn’t coming out of anyone’s mouth. Likewise, “not too much power” is the complete opposite of the truth here.
Nothing against your buddy, but he’s going 180 degrees from the rest of the planet on this one.
With Fields being apparently close to major league ready, does he come with the added benefit of allowing Morrow to spend some time becoming a starter?
To be entirely honest, I looked at Greive’s BR page and thought to myself ‘Hey, that guy didn’t suck at his peak’, though his bat was goodish-mediocre for a corner infielder to an extent that good defense makes him really shiny and bad defense makes him replacement level. If Raben turns into Greive, eh, I can live with that. Though re-reading, apparently his defense is nothing special at best, so I am more meh.
Fields is such a bad choice that my theory is we’re now witnessing performance art.
C’mon rocinante, you know we are gunning for the best bullpen a perennial loser ever had.
While this is pretty much the only category where I give the M’s the benefit of the doubt, this still seemed like kind of a bust of a draft after even a perfunctory glance at the needs of this club. Still, I love watching young talent develop, so big thanks to Dave for putting this recap together.
Good point smb. Why I still look at this team from a glass half full perspective is beyond me.
Dave, OK, on the power issue my buddy said he is not hitting with the power he had. Dropped off a bit. I have not checked stats. He said Denny is not really an athlete but has a good arm. Also said, he will never play outfield in majors because he is just not the athlete. This guy has played against him for 10 years.
Also, just checked Churchill, and he quotes some very similar things….slow, not going to be OF, not enough power for 1B.
Look, I hope this guy is uneal, but I think he maybe a little over-rated. My buddy, former teammates younger bro, said he goes all out though and knows the game, contrary to what scouts say…..”"had no game plan at the plate.”
Dave, what do you think about trading Putz? I believe drafting Fields means it is forgone conclusion. Would like your analysis…
Well first of all, Putz has to show something this year before he has much trade value. But, I don’t think Arizona would trade a future top of the rotation starter for even last year’s Putz- especially after the king’s ransom they paid for Haren. Arizona didn’t get to where they are by making shortsighted moves. Bavasi only got HoRam for Soriano, does anyone think he could do much better with Putz? I’m sure all the competent GM’s in the league would love to see Bavasi direct a fire sale, but if the intention is to make Fields the setup man next year, then it appears as if Putz is in Bavasi’s longterm plans. If he has any.
I feel a hundred times more competent to judge NFL drafts than I do MLB drafts. So I’m willing to be happy about the picks except the first one. That one I feel qualified to be unhappy about.
But the rest basically mean some new ingredients in The Future Forty – and I’m excited about that.
Dave, what do you think about trading Putz? I believe drafting Fields means it is forgone conclusion.
Or maybe they drafted Fields with hopes of moving Morrow into the rotation. Who knows, really? I don’t think anything is a foregone conclusion based on a draft pick.
yeah I’m not buying the Putz thing at all. they’re trying to make Morrow a starter, that’s all.
Yeah, it’s like watching a friend compete in a triathalon. He’s a terrible runner, okay swimmer, but a great cyclist. Only he cramped up swimming, almost drowned, and staggered out of the water dead last. Still, you’re excited to see if can catch the field on the bike, ’cause he really can fly. He jumps on the bike, and rides straight into a fire hydrant.
Sigh.
You forgot the part at the end when he gets the Gritty Medal for hustling so hard and playing the game the right way.
I go to UM and have been to dozens of games, and in my opinion I would rate Raben as plus power, plus bat eye, plus arm, average defense, mediocre speed. He struggled early this year with injuries, but rebounded pretty well until a slight slump recently during the ACC tournament. He moves well for a big guy in the outfield and on the basepaths, and like most of Miami players takes a lot of pitches. His power is legit, not alumimum bat enhanced, but I do worry if he will develop enough to hit Major League breaking pitches.
Dave,
What do you think about DJ Hicks? I was reading about him and he seems like a good guy for us to look at. Does he have a strong college commitment?
I don’t get why you would go low risk low reward when your team and minor league sucks. We need to catch a break to get good again, why not give ourselves a chance to catch a break?
And why for the love of all things holy did they decide that our weakness was short relief?
The Mariners minor league system doesn’t suck. Much of its talent is a few years away, but it doesn’t suck.
Fontaine gets full props for rebuilding what WAS a godawful farm system. But picking Fields #1 makes me wonder if there’s some kind of stupid virus going around the M’s offices. Something in the water? Sick building syndrome?
Guys,
Bavasi and Fontaine did NOT get a completely empty and barren farm system from Gillick…it’s just not true.
The system had very few if any prospects from the draft, BUT the international signings/scouts were doing a very good job before Fontaine and Bavasi got here.
So, how much do the M’s rely on the draft to fill their farm system vs. signing foreign kids from south america and other free agents (minor league or undrafted) outside the draft?
I’m wondering if the future 40 could also list how the M’s acquired each player or if there are any studies that track MLB careers and the path to the majors?
It would be interesting to correlate how many draftees make the show with their original team.
Is Nate Newman another guy in the Lorin mold? Meh stats, but picked it up at the end of the year?
He seems to have poor command, but showed flashes down the stretch, including this game against Arkansas.
Any idea what he throws?
42 – the system on the whole might not suck, but it´s the shallowest it´s been in several years. When your organization doesn´t have a single pitching prospect above low-A ball that projects as more than a back-end starter, it´s in trouble. Right now the system is solidly below average. Not one of the worst, but certainly not good.
Have there been any studies showing whether it’s a good idea to buy out college scholarships for the tough signs with high talent?
Put another way, does it make sense to increase the heck out of your draft budget and load up on those guys? I read at BA that their #25 draft prospect, #53, #57, etc. are all still out there because of signability concerns. But none are completely dismissing the chance they’d sign, it would just take a lot of money.
Why wouldn’t a team that wants to build its farm system, instead of paying some $7MM to Vidro or Jose Guillen or whatever, allocate that among three of those tough sign draft picks? Is that a good allocation of resources? Or is it cheaper to put the money into Latin America and Asia?
Dave– do you think that Raben’s success with a wood bat in the Cape Cod league carries much weight with the scouts / evaluators?
For example, is it be enough to look past his flaws and disappointment of his senior season?
And how would the draft have fixed that? Pretty much anyone that you draft is going to start out in the lower ranks anyway, and doesn’t address your stated issue that the system is below average because all of its best pitching talent is still in the lower ranks.
The M’s have spent the last few years tapping their system, so of course it’s bare. That doesn’t make the system bad, especially when there’s still a lot of talent in the lower ranks (after sending three top pitching prospects away in an ill advised offseason trade, in fact).
lol
Is it just me, or is the tall pitcher fetish working overtime in this draft? All I know about any of these guys is the data that shows up on the mlb.com draft-tracker, but it seems like Fontaine is picking a steady stream of 6′7″ RHP, 6′8″ RHP, 6′5″ LHP, 6′7″ RHP, and so on.
Fontaine doesn’t just like pitching, he likes big guys who can pitch.
Well, the “big pitchers” thing pretty much permeates baseball. I don’t think it’s Fontaine-specific.
It’s pretty widespread I realize, it just seemed like it was manifesting itself even more strongly than usual.
Dave, any words on the players picked today?
Should we be concerned that only 3 of 21 picks so far are from HS? Are we looking for short-term solutions to what look like long-term problems?
There are others who know more about this than I do, but I don’t think that it is accurate to think that choosing college = choosing the short term over the long term. Historically, it has almost always been better to choose college players, except when there is an obvious prodigy out there (a Griffey or an A-Rod). And with pitchers this was even more extreme. Recently, the gap between HS players and college players has narrowed, but from what I’ve read they still aren’t equal. And HS players are a lot harder to sign, especially in the late rounds where they are weighing baseball scholarship + possible higher drafting later + college education vs. minor league contract. It is awfully tempting to just go to college and hope to improve enough to rise up the draft ladder or at least get a decent education for free, rather than toil for minor league money for a few years without much to show for it afterwards.
I thought Callis at BA concluded that in general, college draftees are less likely to be busts but also slightly less likely to become stars.
50-
I´m not sure where you´re going with this, mostly since you´re projecting an argument onto my comment that I never made. There are several reasons the system´s in poor states. Pitching depth is the most dramatic, but the positional prospects are in a pretty sorry state, too. There´s enough high-risk upside to pull them out of the discussion of worst systems in baseball, but there´s really only 2 players in the system who are good bets to become major league regulars. One of those still has a lot of work to do to show he´s more than a tweener. The draft could have given us another potential impact talent. It didn´t. I think that´s kind of a shame.
Everyone knows why the system´s bad. That doesn´t change the fact that it´s years away from potentially contributing to a winning major league team.
You’re saying that the system is poor. I am saying that the system has a lot of good talent, only that much of said talent is in the lower ranks. I don’t agree that a system that contains the talent we have (Aumont, Ramirez, Pineda, Saunders, Triunfel, etc. etc.) can be considered ‘bad’.
If you sincerely believe the Mariners have one of the worst systems in baseball, then please cite some examples of what you’d consider the other worst systems in baseball, so that we can compare and contrast the talent bases.
Dave,
This question is more of an aside. What is your opinion of Baseball America’s content (and the content of the similar sites) concerning scouting reports. Are they generally trustworthy or should they generally be taken with a grain of salt?
Hm…my post includes the line: ¨There´s enough high-risk upside to pull them out of the discussion of worst systems in baseball…¨
Gomez responds with:
¨If you sincerely believe the Mariners have one of the worst systems in baseball…¨
You really need to work on understanding what people are saying before you respond to things they never said.
To be clear, I´m not saying the system lacks talent. The problem is that very few players in the system have anything resembling current major league skills, despite all the tools in the system. Clement is major league ready. Saunders has been impressive, but his swing is still long and whether he´ll really be more than average to slightly below at an outfield corner is up in the air. Valbuena has made the most of pretty average tools and could become a decent major leaguer, but he´s blocked by Lopez at least through 2010 so it´s tough to call him a potential impact guy.
Beyond that, Halman´s still one of the rawest players in baseball, Triunfel´s far more tools than skills, Aumont only has one major league pitch at present, and Ramirez´ pitchability grades very low. As a group of organizational top prospects, that really doesn´t compare well with other teams, even though they´re people I´m very glad to see in the system.
Good organizations have multiple players with star potential AND good prospects within a year or two of contributing. The Mariners have high-risk star potential, but nothing close to a future core until we see how those tools play out in the next few years. Given a system profile like that, it would really have been nice to add more impact talent in the draft to give the organization as many options as possible in the future.
What’s with the weird apostrophes?
Good points, JH, that make your stance a lot clearer to me.
It’s a shame, in watching Jay Bruce, Evan Longoria, Max Scherzer, etc. come up and contribute to their respective teams, to know that we had such a guy in our system in Adam Jones and that we traded him away, though that’s done and not much we can do now.
That said, I’m hard pressed to figure out who the Mariners could have taken with their initial pick that would have added high-end impact talent. I think, ultimately, there is little at best that the Mariners could have done short of adding more high-risk high-reward talent. They definitely could have picked better in the initial rounds, though… far better.
66 – Cole, Melville would add ‘high-end impact talent’ though it’d be high-risk too.
Friedrich would’ve been a decent pick more in the mold of the ‘close to contributing’ side of the equation, though I’m not going to argue he’s ‘high-end impact talent.’
65: I´m typing on a Spanish keyboard, using the draft to distract myself from he hurricane rains hitting Western Guatemala this week. If these keyboards have a straight aposrophe, I haven´t found it yet.
66: I would´ve been very happy with any of Christian Friedrich, Zach Collier, or Connor Gillespe personally, but as Dave said earlier when someone asked the same question there were dozens of guys with more upside available at pick 20. Clearly the scouting department wasn´t in love with any of them, though.
I love the Raben pick, personally. It´s about time the organization drafted someone like him.
Oh, gotcha. I was just trying to figure out if it was something weird with my browser or whatever.
I think Raben is getting bonus coverage on ESPN right now … Miami versus Arizona 11th inning. FYI