ESPN.com’s Keith Law provides his ranking of the top fifty amateur players (Insider link) who are eligible for selection in this summer’s Rule 4 draft. The group as a whole has generally disappointed, Law writes, perhaps leading teams to “flee to safety” by looking at safer collegiate performers with their top selections. Of course, such a strategy would also open up some greater opportunities for organizations with multiple early selections to take some risks on higher-upside, younger prospects.
- Like most analysts, Law has called right-handed pitcher and shortstop Hunter Greene the top overall draft prospect. As has been suggested previously, he will indeed no longer take the hill in high school competition in advance of the draft, as Hudson Belinsky of Baseball America writes. That’s unlikely to impact his stock, as teams have already seen plenty of triple-digit heaters and will continue to watch him play in the field — where he’s also considered a top talent. Greene and his family are taking a very active role in assessing organizations and their approaches to developing pitchers, Belinsky explains, with the Twins (who sit at first overall) and Padres (third) seemingly making for a better match than the Reds (who choose second).
- One of the draft’s other top prospects, South Carolina righty Clarke Schmidt, has unfortunately been diagnosed with a torn UCL and will undergo Tommy John surgery, as Belinsky also reports. The junior starter had risen to be seen as a clear first-round selection before this rough news. Of course, he could still end up being taken with a lofty selection; we have seen several hurlers nabbed quite early in the draft in recent years despite serious arm injuries.
The twins have an acceptable method of pitcher development?
That was my thought…
He wants to stay in socal
“active role in assessing organizations and their approaches to developing pitchers, Belinsky explains, with the Twins (who sit at first overall) and Padres (third) seemingly making for a better match than the Reds (who choose second).”
Hmm be taken 1-1 and go play ball or pout and sit out because you didn’t get to go to your preferred team? Kids these days.
yes you stink with the twins and then go to a new team and become good …. Dickey, Liriano, Lohse, garza, Balfour, Hawkins, Neshek, Hendriks,
Wow what a heavyweight list of names lol
I’m not going to pretend the twins have good pitching, but your list is ridiculous. Neshek and liriano were both good with the twins until they suffered long term injuries. Liam Hendricks had one decent season as a reliever and otherwise hasn’t been good with anyone. Latroy Hawkins had several great seasons with the twins before he left. Dickey was a journeyman who spent one season with the twins in the bullpen before he was good.
Yeah, I was going to respond to that one but didn’t even know where to start… the only ones on that list who did anything surprising after leaving the Twins was Hendriks and maybe Balfour. Dickey barely counts… he wasn’t even with the Twins a whole season.
lohse was a 4.90 era with the twins leaves the twins and becomes a 4.05 era pitcher i dont care no team would say no to a pitcher that has a 4.05 era over 9 years. and garza gets traded and has 4 straight years averaging 200 innings with a 3.65 era. so i both of those were above average starting pitchers after they left the twins
You are basing your opinion on the former regime. Twins overhauled their entire front office this last off season along with changing much in terms of analytics and player development.. It remains to be seen if this will lead to any substantive changes in overall player performance, but lets at least give them a chance.
Please do not incorrectly tell me what I am basing my opinion off of. I am well aware that they have changed things in their organizational structure, but there are no results to show what will come of it for them and I have not heard anything special about their new development yet. So my question remains.
They might have one now, but it just started this offseason. Before the Twins hired Falvey there were articles in many places giving Falvey all or most of the credit for the pitching throughout Cleveland’s organization. I think the Indians have been top five in MLB for the last five years.
Before these good years the Indians were bottom 10, with a few bottom fives mixed in. So the Twins have been worse with more bottom fives I believe but it doesn’t seem like they are in way worse of a situation than the Indians were five years ago. And now they’ve added Falvey who supposedly turned the Indians around.
Bingo…
The Twins have been mostly terrible scouting for years and what good raw talent they have managed to come up with has suffered from the Twins dismal coaching and development. It’s shown itself with position players too but pitching has gotten the worst of this by far… going back even to their good years. Besides Santana and occasionally Liriano, the Twins have had only a handful of halfway believable starters.
Now Falvey supposedly got the job largely because of an ambitious vision to overhaul pitching in the organization, so I’m hopeful that will change. It’ll just take time.
and once again, the resident blowhard is shown to be completely offbase – hey chet, your act is so tired yet you evidently continue to think you know everything about every team. Well done Twins fans in illustrating this loser’s ignorance of your team.
Still sick to think Braves went from 1st to 5th in September and 2nd to 5th in just the last few days
I wonder if his high school is any good. It would suck if they were in contention to win the district or go far in the playoffs.
I understand the players decision though.
They are, but they had other pitchers emerge, making a move like this have much less of an impact on the stretch run. On top of that, Greene was an interesting case coming into high school – several schools were recruiting him. Proper management, and prioritizing the kid’s draft status over league games could help lure more high-profile guys away from other schools. Yep, they start recruiting them young.
With how often pitchers get hurt, if I was a potential/likely 1-1 w/o having to risk throwing, I’d do it too.
If Clarke survives until Nationals pick, I bet they draft him. They love their TJ guys.
If Clarke falls to number 5, that’s a very braves-like pick. High upside pitcher they can likely nab below slot value
I think his parents would just prefer he pitch in Target or Petco over Great America.
Don’t be surprised if the Padres offer over slot money or even record signing bonus to Greene, and say this money is available to you this year or next when they most likely pick #1. And thus Greene can use the Harper/Aiken academy route and be available next year.
The massive volume of signings in latin america has given flexibility to sign quality over volume and sacrifice picks in the 2-10 round range for the Padres.
Yeah I could totally see that happening. Just seeing how the Padres handle these next couple years of drafting is going to be very interesting to watch. Getting a guy like Greene is going to boost the value of their farm up even more than it already is.
Why do you think Greene is better for the Twins or Padres over the Reds? I heard Greene wants to play for the Padres but the Reds are very interested in multi-position players!!!