A Shocking Team Mimics the Brewers' Draft Strategy

When the Brewers drafted seven of the 55 prep pitchers taken in the 2023 draft (and five of the 40 who signed), I thought it might be a fluke. It was seen as a great draft class, and perhaps the amount of depth suppressed bonuses a bit, opening up a door for an opportunistic Brewers front office.

When they drafted nine of the 47 prep pitchers taken (and signed six of the 35), it was clear this was a trend, an instance of an organization choosing to zig while everyone else zagged. Coming into this draft, therefore, it felt likely that the strategy would continue. The question was, would any team rise to challenge their dominance, at least numbers-wise, in this area of the draft? I had my reasons to be skeptical. Since the draft dropped to 20 rounds, the total number of prep pitchers picked hadn't even hit 60, which would be two per team. The 40 who signed in 2023 represented a high-water mark.

If a team was to challenge the Brewers, they had to:

1. Have a willingness to buck the conventional approach to the draft.
2. Be willing to devote an overwhelming portion of their draft to pitching, because everyone takes some college pitchers.
3. Have already freed themselves from the notion that the latter rounds of the draft are where you fill out organizational depth charts, a remnant from the 40- or 50-round era.
4. Be aggressive enough in their promotions where a glut of high-school pitchers doesn't complicate roster-building, in an era of condensed minor leagues and player caps.

Looking back at this list, perhaps what transpired shouldn't have been as shocking as it initially seemed. Maybe you could even call it inevitable.

It was always going to be the Angels.

The Unusual Suspects

The Angels, of course, are not associated with picking high schoolers. They are the team that generally takes the most big league-ready option available in the first round or two, and if they are still in the minor leagues come the following draft, well, things have gone horribly awry.

Because of this (and the insane rate at which they try to push some of their younger top prospects through the system), I've even joked that they view the levels between the DSL and Double A as an inconvenience. It's why the surprising pick of Tyler Bremner at No. 2 overall was less shocking than had it been any other team. It seemed to be met with more bemusement than anything else. "It's the Angels; whatcha gonna do?"

Then a strange thing happened. The Angels started picking prep arms. It started innocently enough, with Johnny Slawinski in Round 3. I barely noticed, because even the Angels take a couple of high schoolers.

Slawinski was followed by CJ Gray and Luke Lacourse in Rounds 5 and 6. Then they turned on the afterburners starting in Round 12, picking Talon Haley (12), Xavier Mitchell (13), Mikey Cascino (15) and Cole Raymond (17).

Seven high-school pitchers in all, second only to the Brewers' eight. It was decidedly off-brand, to say the least.

Does It Matter? Maybe

I might have exaggerated when I said that no team has challenged the Brewers in the drafting of high-school pitching the last two years. The Guardians have signed their fair share, although not as many as the Brewers. However, the Guardians are also like the Brewers, in that they have a reputation for top-shelf pitching development. If either has success with the strategy, it will simply be chalked up to the strength of their pitching lab, rather than the draft strategy. The Angels don't really have that reputation.

There are plenty of reasons why teams shy away from prep pitchers. It is, quite simply, seen as the riskiest subset of draftees. It is why Seth Hernandez can generally be talked about as the top talent in the draft, but never seriously enter the conversation as the top pick.

A lot of development time is needed. As pitching injuries have surged, there is an increasing chance that development gets interrupted by a year of rehab. It is much easier to let them develop in college. You have a better idea of what velocity they will end up sitting at. You might get an elbow injury "out of the way" (a mindset I absolutely hate, by the way, for a number of reasons). You get better certainty. All of that opens the door for an organization like the Brewers, which is confident in its pitching development system, to have a greater choice of prep pitchers, especially in the $90,000-$300,000 range.

Success from a team like the Angels in this zone could inspire more teams to accept the greater risk, diluting the pool of available talent. The questions are:

1. Does the 2025 draft signify a mindset shift in Anaheim, or a one-year blip? Are the plethora of prep arms just a byproduct of happening to be higher than most everyone else on Bremner, or was the Bremner pick made with the rest of the draft in mind? It is easy to dismiss it as the former, but as much as I mock the Angels front office at times, the issue has never been an abundance of conformity. If any team was going to create a draft strategy that chops off the middle of the safety-risk bell curve in the draft to focus on the extremes, it might be them.
2. Are they willing to stick with the strategy if it doesn't bear immediate fruit? Besides the Brewers and the Guardians, the team that has been the most active in the prep pitching market in the draft is the Detroit Tigers. Of the seven prep pitchers the Tigers signed from the 2023 and 2024 draft classes, they have gotten a total of 15 ⅓ innings in full-season ball. That is one inning less than Ethan Dorchies, the lowest-signing bonus pitcher among the Brewers' group. Will an organization that seems to be the most instant-gratification focused in baseball when it comes to player development stick with it if a couple of the prospects don't immediately pop next season?

Ultimately, I'm not convinced they stick with it, although you might see them pop up occasionally when (like this year) one of the more big league-ready players is willing to sign under-slot. In a draft that seemed abundantly, well, normal in many respects, though, the Angels at least provided an interesting bit of macro-level weirdness and something interesting to watch going forward.

Check out our 2026 mock draft board, updated regularly, and with detailed player write-ups!