I'm going to do a series of Giants draft reviews. BA has Draft Databases back to 2003 so we'll start there. I will only list players who signed. I will list the Round, Overall Draft Rank, Players, Position, Current Status:
1. 22. David Aardsma, RHP. Closer for Seattle Mariners. Mishandled by the Giants who tried to rush him into the closer's role vacated by Robb Nen. Traded to the Cubs along with Jerome Williams for LaTroy Hawkins in 2005. Inconsistent career since then, but currently the Closer in Seattle.
1S. 34. Craig Whitaker, RHP. Still in the organization as a reliever. Pitched for AA CT last year. Has a 2010 Spring Training invite.
2. 55. Todd Jennings, C. I'm not sure if he is still in the organization or not. Good athlete, but too small to catch. Numerous injuries.
2. 63. Nate Schierholtz, 3B. Converted to OF. Seems to be #1 on the Giants RF depth chart right now.
3. 93. Brian Buscher, 3B. Grabbed by Minnesota a couple of years ago in the Rule 5 draft. Has played some in the majors.
4. 123. Brooks McNivan, RHP. Released last year.
5. 153. Mike Wagner, OF. Released a couple of years ago.
6. 183. Billy Sadler, RHP. Had a cup of coffee in the majors. Released last year. Good stuff, could never control it.
7. 213. Pat Misch, LHP. Released last year. Picked up by the Mets and pitched some very good games in the majors late last year. Could stick as the Mets #5 starter in 2010.
8. 243. Tim Hutting, SS. Released. Out of baseball.
9. 273. Kellen Ludwig, RHP. Released. Out of baseball.
10. 303. Jesse Schmidt, OF. Released. Out of baseball.
11. 333. Jeff Peterson, RHP. Released. Out of baseball.
12. 363. Ryan Sadowski, RHP. Pitched in the majors last year after RJ got hurt. Released after the season. Going to Japan.
13. 393. Nick Conte, C. Released. Out of baseball.
14. 423. Spider Martin, RHP. Released. Out of baseball.
15. 453. Ben Thurmond, RHP. Released. Out of baseball. Bad elbow.
16. 483. Mike Mooney, OF. Played last year for AA CT. Organizational player at this point.
17. 513. Marcus Sanders, SS. Signed in 2004 as a draft and follow. Showed great promise as a speedster with a good OBP early on. Career ruined by mulitiple shoulder injuries and surgeries. Shoulder originally injured playing football in high school.
18. 543. Patrick Dobson, OF. Released. Out of baseball.
19. 573. Jon Coutlangus, OF. Converted to LHP. He was added to the 40 man roster at one point and then DFA'd the same year. Picked up by Cincinnati, he has pitched in the majors.
23. 693. Mike Kunes, LHP. Released. Out of baseball.
24. 723. Brian Wilson, RHP. Giants current Closer! Had Tommy John surgery pre-draft causing his stock to drop. The Giants drafted him anyway and he has done a nice job of solidifying the closer position.
30. 903. Derek Barrows, 3B. I have no recollection of him playing in the organization. Out of baseball?
33. 993. Travis Nesmith, LHP. Released. Out of baseball.
36. 1083. Tim Alvarez, LHP. Released. Out of baseball.
Right now, I'd grade this draft a C+ with Brian Wilson being the big success story. It could go up to a B or better depending on how Nate Schierholtz does with his opportunity. If you count Aardsma's success with Seattle, it might rate a B+.
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In the Giants' Official Website, under the Roster page, there is a link to listings of Giants' drafts going back to 2000. I think most of the current major leaguers comes from 2000-2003 drafts. The Giants' drafts of those years will probably grade out very poorly.
ReplyDeleteI would like to see your opinion on the Spring Invitees. These guys are usually marginal major leaguers hoping to hang on, or hot prospects getting a first look. Whitaker and perhaps Fairley, falls in the category of former hot prospects getting one last look before the organization decides what to do with them.
Thanks for the tip. I hadn't ever seen that link on the Giants site before.
ReplyDeleteThere's Matt Cain from the 2002 draft, but other than him, I don't know of very many other Giants draftees from 2000-2002 who panned out.
I'll look over the Spring Training invites. Thomas Neal is the one guy I really hope gets more than 1 or 2 AB's, Brandon Crawford too. From Fred Stanley's comments on sjgiants.com, it looks like Fairley is slated to play in San Jose this year. I would say it's close to make or break for him.
The selection of Brian Wilson illustrates what the Giants seem to be doing now and must continue to do since they are drafting later in the order: take chances on high-ceiling talent that has fallen out of favor for whatever reason (draft-itis, injury, poor final season, less than ideal conditioning or make-up, etc.)
ReplyDeleteI looked up the years 2000-2002. In addition to Cain, there's Kevin Correia, Brad Hennessey, Fred Lewis, Dan Ortmeier and a few others that have played in the majors. No big stars though. I'll write up a condensed version of those years in the near future.
ReplyDeleteThe nice thing about the draft list on the Giants' website is that they post the list within a couple of days after the draft, and they periodically update it as the players sign. The update usually happens before the signing shows up on BA.
ReplyDeleteHow do you decide on the grade of a draft? If a roster needs to turn over every 5 years of so, then a draft must produce roughly 5 major league players. Assuming that on a given roster, you'll need 4 star caliber players, and 8 other solid players. That means an average draft will need to produce one star and two solid major leaguer, and two other major league players.
Then there is the production relative to the number and position of draft picks. When the Giants had 6 picks in the first two rounds, and come away with only Bumgardner, and may be Noonan, I am not sure the draft is a grade A even if it produces several major leaguers. I know that BA deliberately do not take this factor into account.
Anyways, I like to hear your grade process. Thanks again for the effort with this blog.
Where do you get that the major league rosters have to turn over every 5 years? Maybe you are thinking of football? Lots of major league careers last 10 -15 years. Maybe an individual team's roster turns over on average about every 5 years, but nobody gets 100% of their players from the farm system. More than that, farm systems are also stocked with international players signed outside the draft. Lots of drafts fail to produce even one solid major league regular, so if Brian Wilson, a starting closer, is the only product the Giants get out of the 2003 draft, I'd call it a C+ right there.
ReplyDeleteAs for a grading system, I don't have one. It's all just an estimate and for fun.
As for the 2007 draft, I agree that yield, considering we had 6 first and supplemental round picks is looking just a bit disappointing, but BA didn't take number of picks into consideration in their grading, only the impact and projected impact of players signed regardless of draft position and number of picks.
DrB
ReplyDeleteIt was good to find your site - I look forward to reading your posts. I miss your input on MCC.
I'd say that 2007 draft is looking worse and worse as time goes by. Given the six early picks, we should have done much better. And I don't agree with the argument that the team couldn't afford to sign six top picks - they knew for months what the situation would be, and they should have budgeted for that. And even more so, given the sad state of the major league team. That was a golden opportunity to jumpstart the system. It wasn't a total failure, assuming Bumgarner pitches in the majors with any degree of success. But it should have been much better than it was.
Jennings got signed again as minor league free agent. Surprised me after big injuries last year. Has not hit above single A.
ReplyDelete54