Article: 2024 MLB Draft Day 1 Thread

[brewers888]

5 minutes ago, nate82 said:

In order to draft the Pratt’s and Bitoni’s you have to do what the Brewers did in the first round.  You have to be able to sign someone to an under slot deal to do this.  You are not going to be able to do this with players ranked around where you are picking.  There seems to be this disconnect where people think you can do both when this is not the reality.

I think someone mentioned that you can no longer way underpay picks. So I don't believe the Brewers can save the 2 million or so that they should for taking a kid that belonged nowhere near the first round. Surely he won't get anywhere near the slot but he will still be grossly overpaid.

[nate82]

3 minutes ago, brewers888 said:

I think someone mentioned that you can no longer way underpay picks. So I don't believe the Brewers can save the 2 million or so that they should for taking a kid that belonged nowhere near the first round. Surely he won't get anywhere near the slot but he will still be grossly overpaid.

That is only if they did a pre-draft physical if they didn’t that rule doesn’t apply.  

[Fear The Chorizo]

I don't consider their first pick a throwaway at all, even after not including signability/slot/underslot considerations.  Signing bonuses for MLB draftees are more related to prying high schoolers away from collegiate commitments compared to "BPA" ordering, anyway. This isn't like the NFL where drafts are solely from college players and there's a huge concern about injury where if a guy declares and is draft eligible he's going to sign whether he's a 1st or 7th rounder.

Specifically to Payne - he's one of the youngest players in this draft and is arguably its best athlete.  I've got zero issues picking him where they did.  High schoolers with his tools turn into quality MLB players if they put everything together, and they are worth rolling the dice multiple times on those type of prospects until hitting on one.

 

[Soupbone]

In 2016 the Brewers took Corey Ray who was arguably the "best athlete in the class" Hope we didn't do that again

[brewers888]

31 minutes ago, nate82 said:

That is only if they did a pre-draft physical if they didn’t that rule doesn’t apply.  

I guess we'll all find out soon enough but this pick just doesn't make sense to me. I question whether he is even a top 10 outfield prospect in this system. Lets see how the rest of the draft goes but I do like the two young pitchers at least.

[brewers888]

I am never in favor of drafting slap hitting outfielders high. Hopefully this kid is the next Rickie Henderson but odds are he never reaches AA. 

[brewers888]

Everyone keeps bringing up drafting EBJ allowed us to overpay for Mis. My question is why didn't we just draft Mis first and pay what we did and then see what was available with the pick we ended up using on him. 

[nate82]

8 minutes ago, Soupbone said:

In 2016 the Brewers took Corey Ray who was arguably the "best athlete in the class" Hope we didn't do that again

Ray was the 6th ranked prospect in that draft and was rated as having a better hit and power tool than Payne. Maybe the Brewers should have did what they did this year and went with Bo Bichette the 90th ranked prospect in that draft.

[nate82]

2 minutes ago, brewers888 said:

Everyone keeps bringing up drafting EBJ allowed us to overpay for Mis. My question is why didn't we just draft Mis first and pay what we did and then see what was available with the pick we ended up using on him. 

Risk of him not signing and the Brewers losing that slot value.  Your first pick is your highest valued pick.  Any savings on that pick means more you can spend later on.  If you over spend on your first pick you have to subtract from one of the next two picks.  The lower you get in the pick order the less savings you can get.

[gregmag]

30 minutes ago, Soupbone said:

In 2016 the Brewers took Corey Ray who was arguably the "best athlete in the class" Hope we didn't do that again

That strikes me as a very odd comparison.  Corey Ray was nearly 22 (21 years, 9 months) when the Brewers drafted him.  My distant memory is that he was one of the oldest players high on draft boards that year.  What you saw with him was close to what you were going to get.  In that important respect, he was more like Matt LaPorta, Kenny Felder, or Todd Dunn.  Very different profile, but still an older college player with limited development time left.

Payne is like Ray in the sense that he's athletic and toolsy, but he's 4.5 years younger than Ray was on draft day 2016.  That difference dwarfs any similarities.  Age is the most important stat for any prospect.  Payne is the exact opposite kind of prospect from Ray -- a longer-term development project.  Ray just had a weird trajectory because you expect guys like him to be safe picks, and he ended up crashing.  Payne is high risk by definition, but I trust the scouts and analytics guys who see a potential impact player.

[Jenkins5]

In my eyes it is pretty clear that Payne was a kid they had on their personal board near the top and from their Intel around the league they felt there was a good chance he wouldn't make it to 34. Take the kid you love and believe most in and collect the savings for later. I tend to believe a front office's feel for where a kid may go rather than the draft industry. They simply have far more info. Then factor in the strategy of the draft, other teams are looking to also find guys they love who could be under slot. We can't say for sure if he would have been there at any other pick and they believe enough in his game they weren't going to roll dice. Scouts fall in love with kids and I have a feeling he was one of those that they felt they needed to get. 

Burke reaction is funny because people complain about not drafting 1Bs but then aren't happy when they pick one who has some of the best raw power and exit velos in draft. Plus had his k% down to 14.5% this year which was great to see. That is an elite tool, 

I think they found two awesome ones Meccage and Lavonas. They love areas that are less recruited like the Northeast. Mix what they have with the Brewers Pitching Lab.... They could be fun! I think the underslot early to help take a chance on these types of high school arms balances it out. 

[snoogans8056]

Made a spreadsheet comparing last years bonuses vs. this years so far. Ended last years at Round 6 (Pratt).

Assuming Payne and Burke took their physicals and sign for the minimum... We can sign the two high school arms to $2mil deals (well above slot, what we gave to Knoth last year) and still have $600k to play with.

DAY1_BONUS_POOL.xlsx

[Fear The Chorizo]

53 minutes ago, Soupbone said:

In 2016 the Brewers took Corey Ray who was arguably the "best athlete in the class" Hope we didn't do that again

But you've got to take shots like this - even if you wind up with guys who pan out like 10 straight Corey Rays or Brinsons, the 11th one might wind up being Mike Trout.  And that one hit is worth all the other misses

[mudbutt]

41 minutes ago, snoogans8056 said:

Made a spreadsheet comparing last years bonuses vs. this years so far. Ended last years at Round 6 (Pratt).

Assuming Payne and Burke took their physicals and sign for the minimum... We can sign the two high school arms to $2mil deals (well above slot, what we gave to Knoth last year) and still have $600k to play with.

DAY1_BONUS_POOL.xlsx 10.33 kB · 2 downloads

Thank you!  Also even if the Brewers don't do any 2 million dollar overslot type deals, they have shown from last year that they will buy high schoolers in the 10-20th rounds.  They signed 5 high school pitchers last year in those rounds, generally doing 300-500k deals over the 150k allocated for each.

[Soupbone]

Chourizo

Don't disagree with your reasoning at all. Here to hoping that Payne is the next Rickey Henderson, Mike Trout or someone close to as good as they are/were.

[CheezWizHed]

1 hour ago, nate82 said:

Ray was the 6th ranked prospect in that draft and was rated as having a better hit and power tool than Payne. Maybe the Brewers should have did what they did this year and went with Bo Bichette the 90th ranked prospect in that draft.

No Way!  It is impossible for pre-draft rankings (made by scouts not employed by MLB teams) to be wrong!

I think people are too used to the NFL draft where it is much easier to predict how players a player's impact at the next level (not perfect, just easier).  

The MLB draft is so much harder since you need to account for 3-4+ years of development of a player before they hit the MLB level.  There are far more misses in the 1st round of the MLB draft than NFL.  And far more valuable players found late in the MLB than NFL.  Especially when you consider there is a 26 man roster for MLB and a 53 man roster in the NFL; you basically get 2x the opportunity in the NFL. 

[SRB]

The discussion is part of the fun, but I'm always amused when people get mad at draft picks or think the Brewers made a "bad" pick. What is the thinking behind that statement? The front office unequivocally knows more about these players than we do (or any of the public rankings for that matter) and at the end of the day they are going to spend the entire bonus pool. There is no scenario where they are being cheap to save money or deliberately taking worse players.

In the old days there were more grounds for criticism, because "old school" teams would draft objectively worse players because they were "gritty" (or the Braves reaching for players because they lived within 100 miles of Georgia), but it doesn't work that way anymore. Just need to enjoy the ride and look at the upside of every pick.

[CheeseheadInQC]

1 hour ago, brewers888 said:

I guess we'll all find out soon enough but this pick just doesn't make sense to me. I question whether he is even a top 10 outfield prospect in this system. Let’s see how the rest of the draft goes but I do like the two young pitchers at least.

Outside of if you want to rank the older triple-A guys high, I think he slots comfortably between 3 and 5 among Brewers outfield prospects depending on how aggressively you want to rank the pop-up DSL guys. Unless I am forgetting someone, Rodriguez and Lara are really the only top outfield prospects stateside right now.

[biedergb]

1 hour ago, brewers888 said:

Everyone keeps bringing up drafting EBJ allowed us to overpay for Mis. My question is why didn't we just draft Mis first and pay what we did and then see what was available with the pick we ended up using on him. 

The general premise is that you select a player you like first knowing that they may not be available for the next selection, and then if that other player is still there (Miz in 2022; Bitonti & Pratt last year) you select them and do what you can with the slot money.  The other part is that if you take said player higher and they don't sign you lose a bigger piece of the slot pool (ie Pratt last year). But most teams know that they will sign their top 10 round selections, and the rates of non-signing is very low and the ones I recall are very unusual situations (injury; or occasionally I would guess it was miscommunication where a scout/team may have assumed a player was willing to for a set amount).

 

The Corey Ray comp stuff reminds me of the 2010 draft when Jimmy Nelson was selected and his comp was Jeff Suppan lol.

[LouisEly]

1 hour ago, Jenkins5 said:

n my eyes it is pretty clear that Payne was a kid they had on their personal board near the top and from their Intel around the league they felt there was a good chance he wouldn't make it to 34.

We should know by now that the Brewers place a high value on centerfielders with plus speed/range who can cover a lot of ground and that the Brewers place a high value on defense that can aid in run prevention.

[SoCalBrewfan]

I kept reading that this year's draft had a particular shape of talent distribution; top ten or so guys and then a big muddle where there wasn't necessarily much of a gap between, say,  number 18 and number 60. If you believe that, how would you proceed? Pay slot money at 17 for a guy who is not a lot better than the guy you like who is ranked in the 60s? 

What the Brewers did is an exceptionally rational strategy given that premise.  Seems like folks didn't understand that...many of the objections to the first picks seem to be based on the assumption that the player ranked 18 is objectively and unambiguously a lot better or more valuable than the player ranked 60. As plenty of folks have pointed out, 'best player available' is a much more complicated proposition in the MLB draft than, say in, the NFL. 

That said, there is clearly risk in their strategy too. An astonishingly good 2023 draft is no guarantee that they'll hit as frequently this time around. It takes a lot of luck and good information for a board to fall the way you want, and other teams are actively trying to beat you. The only sensible approach as a fan, with the limited information we have available, is to try to understand what they're doing and enjoy the ride. 

If you want to dream on Payne, maybe Carl Crawford is what you hope for? Never more than mid teens home runs but good average, lots of doubles and triples, defense, base running makes for a valuable package. At 6'2" with wide receiver comps, he's not a Dylan O'Rae, and he's young enough that you might expect more strength. Incidentally, none of the four picks are little guys by baseball standards, which might be a change in approach? 

[CheezWizHed]

32 minutes ago, biedergb said:

The Corey Ray comp stuff reminds me of the 2010 draft when Jimmy Nelson was selected and his comp was Jeff Suppan lol.

Nelson: 5.6 Career bWAR (1.5 /yr)

Suppan: 15.7 Career bWAR (1.2/yr)

😢

[biedergb]

26 minutes ago, CheezWizHed said:

Nelson: 5.6 Career bWAR (1.5 /yr)

Suppan: 15.7 Career bWAR (1.2/yr)

😢

I know but for a few years it looked like that was not going to be the case. Stupid pitchers hitting.

However, compare the Suppan Brewers years to those of Nelson: Nelson 4.6 to Suppan -0.7 (bWAR with MIL only)

[CheezWizHed]

3 minutes ago, biedergb said:

I know but for a few years it looked like that was not going to be the case. Stupid pitchers hitting.

However, compare the Suppan Brewers years to those of Nelson: Nelson 4.6 to Suppan -0.7 (bWAR with MIL only)

And it felt like a worse disparity as a Brewer fan through those years.  Nelson didn't require his own pillow either. But just when he looks like he was going to turn the corner on being a TOR starter... boom, he is injured. 

This was the injury that made me reconsider being a "baseball purist" and started hoping for the DH in the NL too. 

[Kripes - Brewers]

1 hour ago, SoCalBrewfan said:

An astonishingly good 2023 draft is no guarantee that they'll hit as frequently this time around. It takes a lot of luck and good information for a board to fall the way you want, and other teams are actively trying to beat you.

Begs the question of - can you actively play chess with another team (trying to pick someone they want) if you are playing the draft slot money game against the players themselves?! Like 4D chess! lol