I’ve always stuck up for the Pirates. When numerous friends always reminded me of how bad they were over the years, I’d say that they were going in the right direction. I was certainly wrong a lot of those years, but I sincerely believe that the Pirates are actually going in the right direction at this point in time. My optimism is more about the way that the Pirates are approaching the draft and international signing than the fact that they were playing meaningful baseball after the All-Star break in the past two seasons. Seeing first round draft picks Walker and Alvarez contribute and watching McCutchen’s emergence as one of the best players in the game is a nice change from having every first round pick be more or less a complete bust.
Certainly the MLB draft has no certainties. Even more than the NFL or NBA drafts, it is harder to predict which potential draft picks will become great and which will never even crack the big leagues. One of many factors is that there are high school players being drafted along with college juniors and seniors. Generally high school players are more risky picks though there is potentially more reward. Pitchers are also generally considered more risky than hitters.
Additionally there are financial concerns now involved with the new slotted spending limitations. In previous drafts the concern was over whether a team could sign a client of, say Scott Boras, or if the player would re-enter the draft as a college junior or senior if they did not receive the money that they wanted. The Pirates signing of Josh Bell in the second round was a big reason for the new spending limitations. Bell was a high school player who made it known that he intended to play in college. Bell was probably a first round talent, but teams didn’t draft him because they didn’t think that they could sign him. The Pirates took a chance in the second round and offered him more money than he could pass up. I liked the aggressiveness, but the MLB offices seemed not to and created a cap on the draft where teams were given a limit of what they could spend before they incurred fines or the loss of future draft picks depending on how far over the cap they went. The Pirates tried this aggressive strategy last year when they drafted Mark Appel at number 8 overall. Largely because of the new system, the Pirates were unable to offer him enough money to sign without being penalized a future first round pick. Appel returned to Stanford for his senior season and the Pirates were awarded an additional pick at number 9 overall in this season’s upcoming draft.
The problem is that the Pirates were not always this aggressive in the draft. My lowest point as a Pirates fan was when they drafted Tony Sanchez in the first round of 2009. While Sanchez was rated by many scouts as a late first rounder or supplemental pick instead of number 4 overall where the Pirates drafted him, my disappointment wasn’t necessarily completely about Sanchez himself. My problem was that in 2007, the Pirates held the number 4 overall pick. That year a highly-touted catcher named Matt Wieters was drafted with pick number 5. While the Pirates mentioned other reasons for choosing relief pitcher Daniel Moskos over Wieters, many of the fans felt that the Pirates were just trying to save money by avoiding negotiations with Wieters’s agent, Scott Boras. The big reach for Sanchez in 2009 showed me that the organization really felt the need for a catcher and could have had a great one in 2007.
As mentioned earlier, I think that the Pirates are beyond this kind of foolishness. But for fun’s sake, let’s take a look back in time at the first round draft picks involved in the futility of the past 20 seasons. Certainly hindsight is 20/20, but I’ll go through the Pirates picks from 1993 through present and look at who we got and who we could have drafted. There were definitely risk factors such as position or whether the player was in high school or a college junior. Additionally, certain positions are considered more valuable than others, for example it’s more rare to have a hitter like Robinson Cano at second base or shortstop than at first base or right field, but I’m not going to consider team need very much for this article. Finally we have to consider that some organizations are/were probably better at developing players than others, but again this is just for fun to look at players who were drafted after the Pirates pick.
1993– The Pirates drafted Charles Peterson (OF) at #22 in the first round. Jermaine Allensworth (OF, 34) and Andy Rice (1B, 42) were chosen in the compensatory round. Allensworth was the only one who made the majors, but he certainly didn’t make up for the loss of Barry Bonds. There actually weren’t any real superstars drafted in the first round after Peterson, but Scott Rolen, 3B was drafted at 46 after all of these players.
1994– The Pirates drafted SS Mark Farris at 11. The Red Sox drafted SS Nomar Garciaparra at 12, Dodgers drafted C Paul Konerko at 13 and Mariners drafted OF Jason Varitek at 14. I’d have liked to see any of these 3 as Pirates, though it’s weird to picture Varitek in the outfield or Konerko at catcher. Nomar would have been nice if we were locked into picking a shortstop.
1995– I guess the Pirates really were locked into shortstop, picking Chad Hermansen at 10. Again, the Nomar thing would have been nice the year before, but there was a pitcher named Roy Halladay taken at 17 by the Blue Jays.
1996– With the First overall pick, the Pirates chose pitcher Kris Benson. A career 70-75 record with a 4.42 ERA isn’t terrible, but less than you hope for from of a first overall pick. No future hall of famers in the first round, but Mark Kotsay, Eric Chavez and Jake Westbrook have all had solid careers. R.A. Dickey was taken at 18, kind of took him a while to emerge.
1997– Pirates took OF J.J. Davis at #8. SS Michael Cuddyer was taken at 9, 1B Lance Berkman was selected at 16 and C Jason Werth was taken at 22. Also notable was that Jason Grilli was taken at 4, took him a while to break through too, but Pirates fans are glad that he did.
1998– You remember #15 overall Clint Johnston right? Me neither, MLB.com has him as a 1B, Wikipedia has him as a LHP. I couldn’t tell you which was right considering he has no official stats in the majors, but I’d got with MLB.com over Wikipedia for credible information. I do remember CC Sabathia (20) and Brad Lidge (17) though.
1999– Bobby Bradley P at #8. Pitchers that actually pitched in the majors chosen after him included Barry Zito (9) Ben Sheets (10) Brett Myers (12).
2000– The Pirates started off the new millennium on a better note. Unlike the last 3 picks, Sean Burnett (P, 19) actually played in the majors. Though he’s still pitching for the Angels and has a career ERA under 4, the Pirates might have been better off with Adam Wainright, taken 10 sports later.
2001. John Van Benschoten P at #8. It’s good when your overall pick number (8) is lower than your career ERA (9.2) right? Oh. Well the good news is that in the first round, only first overall pick Joe Mauer has had a great career so far. There are a few recognizable major leaguers who were chosen in the first round after him, but you have to go down to #38 where 3B David Wright was chosen in the compensatory round for another star.
2002– Bryan Bullington P, first overall. Now if his ERA was lower than his pick number, I’d take it. It wasn’t at 5.62 with 1 win and 9 career losses. B.J. Upton at #2 is still up for debate, but Prince Fielder (7) is pretty well established as a star and Nick Swisher (16) has had a very solid career. If the Pirates were stuck on pitching, they probably would have preferred the production of Cole Hammels (17) or Matt Cain (25). Also Joey Votto was chosen 2 spots in the second round after the Pirates P Blair Johnson. Would have been nice to have Fielder or Votto produce for us, rather than being division rivals or have Cain or Hamels as they each have at least 87 more wins than Bullington and Johnson combined.
2003– The Pirates chose Paul Maholm #8 and Tom Gorzelanny at #45 overall in the second round. They really could have done worse. Both of these guys at least contributed to the Pirates and Maholm is having a decent enough season for the Braves this year with Gorzelanny relieving against us for the Brewers. There were a few guys who played in the majors taken in this draft, but the most notable players taken early in this draft were Carlos Quentin as a late first rounder and Adam Jones, who was taken as the last compensatory pick by the Mariners.
2004– Neil Walker C, 11th overall. A couple notable players taken after Walker, include Jered Weaver (12), Billy Butler (14) and Stephen Drew (15). Sure it would be nice having Weaver pitch for the Pirates or having Butler hit for us. And Drew is hitting 13 points lower over his career, but has more than double the homeruns and over 100 more RBI’s. But Neil has been pretty solid for the Pirates, so we really can’t complain here.
2005– Some great players in this class, Justin Upton (1), Ryan Zimmerman (4), Ryan Braun (5), Troy Tulowitzki (7) and even Jay Bruce at (12). The Bucs ended up with Cutch at 11, and I’m certainly happy with the way that it worked out.
2006– The Pirates picked Brad Lincoln at #4, the Blue Jays picked Travis Snider at #14. Clayton Kershaw was #7 and Tim Lincecum was #10. Kershaw is currently one of the game’s best and we can’t be sure if Lincecum will return to form. On the bright side Lincoln and Snider were both drafted with big expectations from their respective teams. I think both of those guys still have the potential to develop into solid players. With the way that the Pirates have been pitching, I’m glad we are gambling on the hitter.
2007– Daniel Moskos at #4 overall as a RELIEF pitcher. As mentioned before, Matt Wieters was the correct pick here. Also drafted were Jarrod Parker (P, 9), Madison Bumgarner (P, 10) and Jason Heyward (OF, 14). I’m fairly confident that those guys will out produce Moskos over their respective careers. Also what organization doesn’t know that starting pitchers are much more valuable than relief pitchers? The Pirates in 2007.
2008– Pedro Alvarez at #2. Pedro was the right move here. We had to deal with Boras and almost didn’t get him. Pedro’s flashes of brilliance at the plate show you why he was so highly thought of as a pick. Sure Buster Poser (C, 5) has already been an MVP and would have also solved that catching problem, but Pedro was the guy to have back then and we don’t know how he’ll end up over the course of his career. The Yankees also took a chance on a high school pitcher named Gerrit Cole at #28. Luckily, it didn’t work out for them.
2009– Tony Sanchez C, #4. As mentioned earlier, this was considered to be a big reach. Also mentioned earlier, the Pirates could have had either Wieters in 2007 or Posey in 2008. While these players can still be evaluated on potential, Mike Minor (P, 7), Mike Leake (P, 8), Drew Storen (P, 10), Shelby Miller (P, 19) and of course Mike Trout (CF, 25) have already made positive contributions to their teams.
2010– Jameson Taillon (P, 2). #1 Bryce Harper is already a star, #3 Manny Machado is already well on his way and playing in the majors, #7 Matt Harvey has shown his brilliance this season and #13 Chris Sale is emerging as a staff ace for the White Sox. What to make of Taillon then? While Harper and Machado were also drafted at high school age, they are absolute phenoms. Sale and Harvey were drafted out of college. This draft class has to still be evaluated on potential and Taillon certainly has it with being ranked as the #15 overall prospect in baseball at the beginning of 2013.
2011– Gerrit Cole, #1 overall, Pitcher. #3 pick Trevor Bauer was Cole’s teammate at UCLA, made the majors before Cole and was ranked ahead of Cole at one point before falling back behind Cole and Taillon to #17. #4 pick Dylan Bundy was the top overall rated pitching prospect to start this season. Bundy is already having arm issues and Bauer has walked 15 batters in 16 major league innings this season. All 3 of these guys may end up as elite pitchers and I’m fine with having Gerrit Cole as our guy.
2012– The Pirates took a chance on pitcher Mark Appel at #8. Appel was maybe the best player in the draft. They weren’t able to sign him due to the new rules that were largely created because of their drafting of Josh Bell the year before. I’m fine with the Pirates taking chances to draft the best players. We get an extra pick at #9 next year, plus it’s not the first time that we’ll get no major league production out of our first draft pick for a particular year.
Looking at these drafts, we can learn a few things. First we can see why the Pirates have struggled for the past two decades. First round picks aren’t slam dunks, but you need solid production out of at least some of them. From 1993-2002, the Pirates got no or minimal production out of their first round picks. Think about the core of the San Francisco Giants, Matt Cain, Tim Lincecum, Madison Bumgarner and Buster Posey were all drafted after the Pirates picked. Hindsight is 20/20, but when you draft well, you can win championships, when you get no production, you can’t compete, especially as a small market team. On the bright side, things are definitely improving. From 2003-2011, the Pirates have gotten actual production from their first round picks, other than Moskos and Sanchez, or are top rated prospects in all of baseball. We can’t go back and have some of these guys play for the Pirates and maybe Matt Cain flops if the Pirates draft him and Bryan Bullington thrives for the Giants. What we can do is see part of the reason for the futility of the past decade and hopefully learn from it.
