Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
January 14, 2008
The Draft's the Thing

Blez at Athletics Nation explains why Oakland has to be great, not good, at drafting players:

I would say that has to be an area of grave concern to Billy Beane as he's trading away the few successful players that the A's have drafted to try and restock a barren system. That should be an area that the Oakland A's focus on extensively. Yes, they've had Ethier and used him to get Milton Bradley and Travis Buck is turning into a great pick as well. I'm not saying that the A's scouting and drafting department hasn't done a good job. That's not it at all. They just need to be better than the other teams out there in order for the A's to remain a viable and competitive franchise. The A's rely on getting a player like Bobby Crosby to replace a Tejada when he leaves for a greener wallet (Crosby is another one who hasn't worked out as expected thus far). And if it doesn't work out, you wind up with a team that can't compete with Yankees West down here in Anaheim.

At this point, the way of drafting described in Moneyball hasn't delivered superior results.


Posted by David Pinto at 05:17 PM | Management | TrackBack (0)
Comments

The baseball draft is a real crapshoot. You can have first rounders never make the big leagues, and 50+ round catchers become HoFers.

The question is, why is the baseball draft so much more uncertain than basketball or football (Ryan Leaf excepted)

Posted by: rbj at January 14, 2008 07:29 PM

Well, maybe not so much anymore, but back in the day, because of hijinks like David Clyde and his, ahem, remarkable journey through the minor leagues.

Of course, in football you see a guy like Tom Brady coming out of the low rounds, so I don't know if I'd make them the emblem of regularity.

Posted by: Andrew at January 14, 2008 11:55 PM

The question is, why is the baseball draft so much more uncertain than basketball or football (Ryan Leaf excepted) Because you're drafting guys at different ages who have different levels of experience - plus who would say the NBA draft isn't a crapshoot?

Posted by: Bandit at January 15, 2008 08:08 AM
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