Moved up 19 rounds since he was first drafted by the Brewers. Did well for himself at Michigan.
Interesting draft so far, especially for the Tigers. A ton of HS arms being taken early.
This is pretty amazing to me. I know the scouts know how to evaluate talent but all these high school guys have been playing against other high school guys. The first pitcher the Cubs got didn't even have that great of a record or ERA. Again, I know their eyes see a lot more than my eyes, but there is a long way between high school and the MLB. I wonder how all these guys will pan out.
The MLB draft really is a crapshoot. Only ten percent of second rounders make it to the majors and the percentage goes down from there for each round.
If you’re a Cubs fan, Wicks, that first pitcher they took has a devastating changeup from the left side. Sometimes all it takes is one elite pitch. Can’t have enough pitchers and lefties.
Jobe, who the Tigers took third overall has only been a pitcher in HS for a single year, but has a slider with a spin rate of 3000 rpms, which would already be elite in the majors. As a scout, you see that and probably can’t resist.
Also, if you take a HS player, especially a pitcher, you can get them in your system at a young age and monitor mechanics, before another coach possibly screws it up.
HS baseball is a sideshow. Pitchers do not get drafted based on striking out a bunch of not very good HS batters.
It is all about travel teams in showcase Perfect Game tournaments, etc. Scouts see these guys pitch, bat, etc. against other elite HS-aged players in the showcase tournaments and elite travel teams.
If anything, MLB scouts see HS-aged ball players in games against other elite talent a lot more than CFB coaches see HS football players in games against elite talent. And CFB is really the same as minor league baseball--a bunch of guys that fit certain defined metrics but must be developed.
They are really drafting these guys as a series of lottery tickets for the minors, hoping 5% of them work out.
So drafting 18 y/o pitchers based mostly on velocity and spin rate is standard. If they can't pitch strikes, who cares? They will learn that in the low minors (or not). Teams only need 1-3 guys per year to make it to the majors and stick anyway.
So they draft HS aged pitchers who already show that they are on the way to MLB level velocity and other metrics, and then see which ones can learn throw strikes, develop quality breaking pitches, mix pitches, etc., in the minors.
That 18 y/o with pinpoint accuracy, three good pitches, already pitches intelligently as Maddux, and was unhittable in HS games, but is 5'10", has average spin rate, and tops out at 84 mph? He plays college ball. And not elite college ball either. Maaaaybe a few of those guys can get to 94 mph etc. by their third year in college baseball.
The part about throwing strikes isn’t true. A vast majority of HS pitchers drafted in the early rounds are dominant stats guys. Yes, the harder they throw the likelier they get attention, but the kid better also have a high k/9 ratio and low ERA if he wants to go early. My HS had a few pitchers taken in early rounds in the past two decades—our program is historically top in the state and sometimes nationally ranked. We’ve had more than a dozen guys who throw in 90s that weren’t ever drafted. They had decent ERAs and good frames—better than the guy who went in round 1 and pitched in the majors for years. Yet, he had 161k’s in 80 innings and won the Gatorade HS player of year twice. These guys like Jobe aren’t getting drafted high just because they can throw hard—they have dominant stats, too, that support their shown tools. Throwing in 90s isn’t as rare as it was 10-20 years ago.
Yes and no.
A lot of HS pitchers with high velocity have good SO/9 ratios in part because they are facing mostly overmatched regular HS batters who rarely step in against that velocity. When the average HS batter faces a guy in the mid-90s, he has almost never seen that and ends up just swinging and hoping at anything that looks close.
But to get out of the lower minors those pitchers are not going to get SOs so easily. They are facing drafted batters that are not obviously overmatched. They have to learn to pitch strikes that actually are getting the edges of the plate in order to get batters out.
True, there are HS pitchers that are in the 90s that have poor control. They are not getting drafted. But the HS pitchers that have pinpoint control (etc.) but lower velocity and a regular frame... they also are not getting drafted.
I guess I should add that these comments are really more for pitchers that get drafted beyond the first few rounds. Guys in the first few rounds (Jobe) are drafted high because they have more than just velocity, spin rates, etc.
This is the sort of content that is MGoBlog at its best, nice back and forth.
Two more Michigan players drafted: ss Benjamin Sems in the 15th round by the Rockies; pitcher Blake Beers in the 19th round by the A’s. BTW, I’m pretty sure Beers is the brother-in-law of former Met captain David Wright.
Sems was a solid shortstop with a strong arm. He’s got good plate discipline with bat control.
I’m astonished Beers got drafted, let alone that early, he struggled mightily this year. He got demoted from 3rd starter and ended up with a 8.42 ERA (I had to look it up, I knew it was bad, that’s terrible).
I hope to see both of them in the big leagues some day!