Article: Brewer Fanatic 2022 Draft Coverage, April 28

[Jeremy Nygaard]

We’re another week closer to the mid-July draft, and activity is starting to pick up. As we get into May, the focus begins to tighten. While the picture still appears very broad to almost everyone, the tea leaves begin to drop occasionally. But that’s the fun of drafts: It’s up to you whether you want to believe them or not.

There’s been enough on the national level for Baseball America, MLB Pipeline, and ESPN to update their prospect rankings. 

Baseball America expanded its listing to a Top 300. That covers, roughly, the Top 10 rounds. However, unranked college seniors will be trendy choices in the second half of the top 10 rounds as it significantly helps teams stretch their bonus pools. But if you’re wondering if a guy might go in the Top 10 rounds, this is a great resource. 

MLB Pipeline updated their Top 150. The biggest headline here is Jackson Holliday's big jump since their last rankings, going from 51 to 4. Jackson, the son of Matt, plays a premium position (shortstop) and will likely continue to move up the board (even though there’s only so much room left to go). He made it into my Top 10 a few weeks ago, and while Baseball America was higher quicker, MLB has now caught up.

ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel pushed out his second set of rankings. Kiley's thing that I appreciate is trying to tie draft classes into the big picture of prospect rankings. His top-eight draft prospects would all slot into the Top 125 prospects in the minor leagues, with his top prospect, Druw Jones, slotting into the 4-22 range.

It’s been written about plenty, but these rankings reflect the biggest story of the 2022 draft: There’s a complete lack of college pitching prospects. 

The top college pitching prospect by publication:

Baseball America - #20 Blade Tidwell, RHP, Tennessee. Tidwell seems like the only first-round lock, assuming that his medicals check out after having some shoulder issues.

MLB Pipeline - #19 Gabriel Hughes, RHP, Gonzaga. Though he’s ranked in the Top 20 here, he misses the Top 40 for the other two publications.

ESPN - #19 Connor Prielipp, LHP, Alabama. Prielipp had Tommy John surgery last season and is throwing bullpens but may not even be able to throw for scouts before the draft. 

Baseball America also completed its first staff mock draft of the season. 

The first version has the Brewers selecting Brock Porter, a prep pitcher from Michigan, 27th overall. Porter would be an excellent value pick as a consensus Top 15 draft prospect. Prep pitchers usually have a wide range of draft outcomes as many have signability questions, not to suggest Porter does at this point.

EDIT: Within an hour after this article was submitted, Kiley McDaniel dropped this bombshell. As a huge Lesko fan, we'll dive deeper into this next week.

We’re status quo in the Top 10. When you feel like you have a pretty good handle on the current climate when 10/10 matches MLB and 9/10 matches Baseball America and ESPN (though the order is different).

JEREMY'S TOP 10 PROSPECTS

1.) Druw Jones, OF, Georgia prep (Vanderbilt commit)

2.) Termarr Johnson, 2B, Georgia prep

3.) Elijah Green, OF, Florida prep (Miami commit) (Baseball America breaks down his game.)

4.) Dylan Lesko, SP, Georgia prep (Vanderbilt commit) (Baseball America breaks down his game.)

5.) Brooks Lee, SS, Cal Poly

6.) Jacob Berry, 3B, LSU 

7.) Kevin Parada, C, Georgia Tech

8.) Jace Jung, 3B, Texas Tech

9.) Andrew Susac, C, Arizona 

10.) Jackson Holliday, SS, Oklahoma prep (Oklahoma State commit)

MOCK DRAFTS / PROSPECT BOARDS

• Baseball America - v2.0 (4/1/22) /  v1.0 (2/10/22) / Top 300 (4/27/22) / Staff Draft v.1.0 (4/20/22)
• MLB.com - Callis - Top 10 (12/15/21), Mayo - Top 20 (7/20/21) / Top 150 (4/25/22)
• The Athletic - Law Top 30 (3/10/22)
• ESPN - Early Draft Rankings (7/26/21) ($$$ - ESPN+) / McDaniel’s Draft Rankings (2/24/22) / Draft Rankings 2.0 (4/27/22)
• Fangraphs - The Board / 2022 MLB Draft Rankings and Offseason List Primer (11/30/21) 
• Just Baseball v1.0 (2/10/22)
• My MLB Draft (1/18/22)
• Prospects Live v1.0 (1/4/22)

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