We’ll round up the latest draft signings around the league:
Latest Signings
- The Dodgers have agreed to a deal with fifth-rounder Gavin Stone, as the right-hander announced himself on his Twitter feed. Mike DiGiovanna of the Los Angeles Times (Twitter link) reports that Stone will receive a $100K bonus, which is significantly below the $327.2K slot price attached to the 159th overall pick. Stone was the second-last player chosen in this year’s abbreviated draft, and wasn’t prominently featured in any pre-draft rankings apart from a 303rd-place spot on Baseball America’s top 500 draft prospects list. The Central Arkansas product pitched well in his first real season as a starting pitcher, including a no-hitter in his final start of the year.
Earlier Today
- Angels fourth-rounder Werner Blakely is expected to sign with the club for $900K, as first reported by Mason McRae of Prospects 365 (via Twitter) and confirmed by Robert Murray (Twitter link). Blakely, a prep shortstop from Michigan, ranked as the #297 prospect in the class on Baseball America’s pre-draft top 500. BA lauds his projectable 6’3″ frame, athleticism and power potential, but cautions that he’s exceptionally raw on both sides of the ball, perhaps not unexpected for a cold weather high schooler. Blakely’s draft position, #111 overall, comes with a slot value of just over $522K, so the Angels will go well over slot to woo the 18-year-old away from his commitment to Auburn.
- The Angels have also inked third-round choice David Calabrese, according to McRae. He’ll earn a signing bonus of $744K, the slot value of the #82 selection with which he was chosen. Calabrese is an outfielder from the Canadian high school ranks, and was regarded as the top Canadian prospect in this year’s draft class. An Arkansas commit, he’s just 17 and is therefore one of the youngest players in his class thanks to his reclassification for this year. He’s a small outfielder who provides high-class speed on the bases, though he doesn’t offer much in the way of power. Most scouts think his speed and instincts will allow him to play center field in the long-term.
This kids going to be a monster. The angels are incredible at picking athletes and turning them into baseball players. Now developing pitching though is another story.
Actually the Angels historically are one of the better organizations when it comes to developing pitching. If not for all the major arm injuries throughout the past decade, they would’ve had a full rotation of young and effective arms. Developing offense has been the Angels main problem during the franchise’s existence.
When you claim “historical”, come with facts to back it up.
This is not MLB History website, relax.
Arm injuries may have something to do with how the team develops its pitching.
The TJS epidemic has already been traced to youth baseball, with the majority of them occurring in pitchers age 19 and under.
If they were good at developing pitching they would be petco Park north of the 2000s.
They havent developed a single pitcher in 4+ years
Wait what? I’m confused. You said, “the Angels are incredible at picking athletes and turning them into baseball players.” It sounds to me that you are referring to the LA Dodgers. The only elite player that the Angels has developed is Mike Trout. They do not have an ace. They had to sign a third baseman, traded for a shortstop, signed Justin Upton and Pujols was signed as a first baseman. The promising star that they have is Jo Adell and Brandon Marsh. From that team other than Mike Trout I like Cam Bredosian. However, Werner Blakely has potential to become a very talented player.
Eppler loves to draft athletes. So far they haven’t developed up to the MLB level but most have been high school kids when drafted.
But between Adell, Adams, Marsh, Paris, Knowles, Jones, etc there’s athleticism throughout the system.
They said turning them into baseball players. Idk where you got elite baseball players from.
Randall Grichuk has turned into a solid regular. Sean Newcomb is a solid back end guy. Cj Cron is a solid 1B. Jered Weaver was an awesome rotation piece for years.
Other notables are Koke Calhoun, David Fletcher off the top of my head.
have you heard of mike trout?
Randal Grichuk is not a solid regular
.244/.295/.483 career line good for an OPS+ of 105. Belted 122 home runs. He’s a solid regular. You could find better production sure, but you could do worse as well.
Just because Jays decided to over pay him doesn’t mean he hasn’t put up decent numbers
Don’t think Mike Trout needed much developing. I’m still bummed my hometown Phillies weren’t in a position to draft him. Kid played 60 miles away in Millville, N.J., so I know they must have known about him.
Unfortunately, we forfeited our first round pick in that draft as compensation for signing FA, Jon Lieber. Lieber instead of Trout. Ouch!!!!!
Can you give some examples?
Outside of the obv mike Trout
Nick Adenhart (rip)
Patrick Corbin (traded away)
Will smith (traded away)
Tyler Skaggs (rip)
Garret Richards
Jordan Walden
Tyler Chatwood
As for hitters they developed
Mike Napoli
Jean Segura
Jeff Mathis
Randal Grichuk
Sean Rodriguez
Erick Aybar
Howie Kendrick
Mark Trumbo
Kendrys Morales
They may not all be elite superstars, but the Angel’s have had their fair share of prospects grace the diamond as productive above average players
lol at mathis.
angels grab other teams throw-away and develop them into solid bull pen pitchers, too.
“lol at mathis.”
Ya lol at being in the league for 15 seasons and being regarded as one of the most pitcher friendly catchers in the league…big lol at that
he needs a dh!
He has a career WAR of -1.5 and career ops+ of 48. I would definitely agree that his defense has been excellent, if it wasn’t, he would have been forced out of the show 10+ years ago.
Shoemaker, Newcomb drafted by the Angels.
And as ScottBoras pointed out,
Mike freakin Clevinger!
DiPoto!!! did just add much damage to the Angels as the injuries.
And as ScottBoras pointed out,
Mike freakin Clevinger!
DiPoto!!! did just add much damage to the Angels as the injuries.
Boras reminded us Clevinger too!
Is almost like Dipoto had it all planned out.
Destroy the Angels, move to Seattle.
I shouldn’t be so angry, at least he didn’t trade Trout!
Thanks guys for reminding me that the angels had Clevinger.. oof! 🙁
Dont forget about Darren O’Day
remember, Clevinger wasn’t Clevinger until the Indians got ahold of him and developed him.
The significant part of that list of players is in knowing the number of high draft picks the team forfeited in signing Pujols, Wilson and Hamilton. That meant the team was drafting lower than most of their peers, and having to develop 2nd and 3rd round talent as their best for that draft.
Likewise, the signing of Cuban “can’t miss future superstar” Baldoquin took the team out of the international free agent market for years, causing them to miss out on prospects like Vlad Jr (who may have been a cinch to sign with his dad’s history with the team and Vlad Jr’s time in SoCal), Juan Soto, and others. If not for that, the list above might well have one or two more names added. The Angels did sign Maitan and Livan Soto from the wreckage of the Braves, but Maitan is looking more and more like the sequel to Baldoquin, and Livan Soto is still a few years away, if he makes it at all.
That is why (omitted from the list) Matt Shoemaker was such an important part of the Angels rotation, since he was undrafted as an amateur and picked off the scrap heap by Angels scouts.
Shoemaker’s incredibly bad luck (including almost being killed by a comebacker and having a deformity in the nerve in his pitching arm) should not be held against him. He is a hard worker and very capable pitcher when his health allows.
Likewise, I’d add Fletcher to this list of players developed, since his numbers in 2018 and 2019 indicate a player in the Altuve/Pedroia mold, who can hit and run well, and play his defensive game at a similarly high level. Fletcher was a 6th round draft choice.
2nd year in a row the Mets killed the draft. Can’t really say the same about the yanks tho lol
Chicken parm?
watch Crow-Armstrong not sign
He will. But even if he doesn’t we get two first round picks next year basically.
Why wouldn’t he?
They’ve been “killing” the draft for years, just never get any payers
Has a Met fan ever said anything good The Yankees in general??? That’s why you’re a Mets fan you hate the Yankees
Have you ever met a yankee fan
Yes I have
Yankee hater = extreme jealousy
Really love the KC Royals draft. They nailed it with Lacy
The AL Central is going to have some incredible pitching in a few years. The Tigers and Royals have stockpiled a lot of good pitchers in the last few drafts, and the Indians are arguably the best them out there at developing pitching. Even the Twins and White Sox have a few young high-upside arms too, in addition to Berrios and Giolito.
*best team
I read his name wrong and thought it said Wesley Blake, but congrats to Werner on signing.
Snipes*
Off the top of my gead… Richards, Corbin, Skaggs, Shoemaker, Chatwood, Newcomb, Canning are some of the more notable MLB pitchers that the Angels have drafted and developed who are playing or should be playing. A few on the roster now as well.
Let’s not forget Mike Clevinger either.
Nice! Forgot that one.
Unrelated to this article, I’m surprised to see how many UDFA’s have already signed with teams for $20K. The updated list can be found here:
baseballamerica.com/stories/2020-mlb-undrafted-fre…
Probably mainly college seniors with no leverage. The Cubs five signings are all at least 22 years old.
But this is the one year where college seniors actually do have leverage, because the NCAA rolled over every baseball player’s eligibility to next year.
So yes, it is surprising how many players are signing.
A bit surprised there’s a couple of high schoolers on that list…..
I’m guessin’ they can’t be mistaken for Rhodes Scholars…..
I wonder what the percentage of draftees actually make it to the big leagues in any given year.
A good ole Canadian boy
I’m a little confused how Angels could go that much above the slot with Blakely. Only 5 rounds in this draft. Only 4 for Angels, b/c of Rendon. Not clear how much they would offer to their #5 pick who is supposed to be near signing (#3 signed for slot money, I see) but I don’t think there’s much room for savings there. How much below can they go below slot for Detmers realistically? How exactly does the money add up? Some help clarifying things here?
#5 signed for $250k below slot. Penalties don’t kick in until you go 5% over your allotment so there’s about $325k more. Will need #1 to take a minor haircut.
Thanks!
Looks like a pretty sweet deal for Stone — I’m basing that off of that he was probably not going to be drafted at all and thus would’ve only been eligible for a $20K bonus. But the Dodgers must’ve drafted him solely for the purpose of saving $227K to allocate elsewhere in their draft picks. But that works out for him because he winds up with $100K instead of $20K — in a normal draft year he probably would’ve fallen to the 15th+ round so now he gets to start his pro career and get a decent chunk of $ comparatively to non-drafted players. Of course it could be that the team really feels he was worthy of being selected that high in which case he would’ve liked more $ but assuming he signed so quickly I’d have to go with the latter presumption.