How a Team in Transition Drafts
By Jon Skilbeck - Contributing Writer
03/30/2005
DETROIT - Five seasons after inheriting a team led by such legends of the game as Scott Brosius, Francisco Cordova, Travis Fryman, and Omar Daal, solid drafting and the occasional trade resulted in my team approaching respectability last season. As such, I found myself in unfamiliar territory heading into this year’s draft, namely without a pick in the top 10. Picking out of the 12 hole, I managed to identify a tier of 11 players I would feel good about getting. My only other predraft maneuvering involved moving some corner (Ben Broussard) and bullpen (Scott Linebrink) depth for a few extra second rounders in the hopes of redistributing my talent a bit. Before looking at how I did, a few of my draft philosophies:
Need, shmeed – The most effective way to take care of needs, be them positional or ABs/IPs, is trading. With all of the uncertainty in the draft, your best bet is to position yourself to be able to take the best player available.
Upside – I will almost always take the player with the most upside available at my pick. Determining who this is often involves what I call pedigree. Simply put, I prefer players with a history of good scouting reports over those who recently put it all together. This means a guy like Casey Kotchman appeals to me more than Dallas McPherson, other things being equal.
Value – Another simple principle. It doesn’t matter how you value a player as much as how others value that player. Don’t take a player earlier than you have to unless you are so set on him that you can’t risk losing him.
Hitters over pitchers – When faced with choosing between a pitcher and hitter of similar value, take the hitter. They tend to be much more reliable, and you are a lot more likely to get lucky with a late round pitcher than a late round hitter. Yeah, yeah, I know that you aren’t interested in getting lucky with any pitchers not named Jennie Finch.
DRAFT EXPECTATIONS
Pick 1 (#12)
Targets – Grady Sizemore, Alexis Rios, Casey Kotchman
Again, my short list for my pick at #12 consisted of eleven players. Unfortunately, these three guys above were picks 11, 9, and 10, leaving me shut out of my top 11 and calling into question one of my secondary tenets of drafting, namely that there will be at least 1 awful pick in the top 10.
Candidates
Kaz Matsui – 2B is a tough position, but he is older and looks to have 800 OPS upside.
David DeJesus – Nice solid player, but I read 4 or 5 too many scouting reports projecting him as a 4th outfielder.
Nick Swisher – Nice walks, nice power, mediocre upside. Twelve is too early for mediocre upside.
The Pick: Gavin Floyd
He’s had solid prospect ratings since day 1, has good size, and showed some improvement last year after the Phils let him take the wraps off of his devastating hook.
Pick 2 (#29)
Targets – Jason Kubel, Erik Bedard
Kubel offered lots of upside for this point in the draft but went at 27. In the past this would have resulted in me rooting for his knee injury to not heal properly, but I’ve matured. Bedard’s numbers were mixed, but I love his Ks. He was a terrific prospect pre Tommy John surgery, and I almost look at those as a positive at this point. Think about it. No one goes through that procedure twice, so there’s less risk of losing him in the future. Also, I’ll cop to liking his innings a little bit.
The Pick: Bedard
Pick 3 (#38)
Targets – Scott Hairston, Daniel Cabrera, Denny Bautista
In what was becoming a recurring theme at this point, these guys were scarfed up right before my pick.
Candidates
Brandon Claussen – Another former uber prospect waylaid by Tommy John surgery. His command was an issue in 04, and I decided to roll the dice on him being around at pick 49.
John Buck – Showed some power in the second half, but I have Michael Barrett and would like to think that he put it together last year.
The Pick: Ryan Wagner
I’m not crazy about taking a reliever this early, but Wagner was so highly thought of heading into the season that I couldn’t get past his upside. There’s also a fair chance he’ll do some closing as soon as this season.
Pick 4 (#49)
The Pick: Claussen
In a surprise turn of events, something went according to plan and Claussen slid down to this spot. Big upside here. His Ks were strong in Triple A, and I’d like to think that some of his control problems were the result of rushing back from surgery in 2003. He’ll also likely get 100+ innings this season.
Pick 5 (#63)
The Pick: Chris Snyder
My first positional player. A former second round pick with terrific Double A numbers and a solid big league debut last season. With good D and pop, he’s still in the running to break camp with the Dbacks 8 days before the start of the season. Even if he doesn’t make it, there’s no clear cut guy in their system so he’ll get a shot at some point this season.
Pick 6 (#89)
The Pick: Brendan Harris
A little buyer’s remorse here. I kinda sorta forgot he was blocked by Vinny Castilla when I made the pick. I’ve seen him compared to Joe Randa. Now he’ll need a chance to show that. Worst case, I’d like to think that he has super sub potential.
Pick 7 (#115)
The Pick: Brian Bruney
Bruney is a power arm in a bullpen without an established closer. I considered him with both of my 2 previous picks but elected to go player over pitcher both times. As such, I was elated to get him here. Nice Ks, so-so command, closer makeup.
All in all, I was satisfied but not elated with my draft. I was counting on getting a positional player with my first pick and was disappointed when no one worthy of the pick was left on the board. While I like Floyd, I’m not expecting to see much return on the pick for the next few years. Unfortunately, my window of opportunity is opening now. Bedard should fit into the bottom half of my rotation and Wagner should fit into the back of my bullpen next season. Claussen is risky but could be a top of the rotation guy. Snyder may give me another option at catcher in the next few years, and Bruney will give me bullpen innings and possibly a bargaining chip next off-season.