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First Pitch: The Death of the “Pirates Can’t Draft” Narrative

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A few weeks ago, MLB held their 2016 draft. The Pirates have now signed almost everyone from their class, with the lone holdout being Competitive Balance pick Nick Lodolo. There are a little over two weeks remaining to sign picks, and the Pirates can offer Lodolo up to slot, or a little over, and avoid losing a draft pick. The two sides have started negotiations, although it seems like a more difficult sign than the other picks.

The draft taking place brings up the usual arguments you hear about the Pirates’ track record. I didn’t get a chance to write about this following the draft, since I was on the road for a few weeks, and busy with MLB coverage. I tweeted a few things out over the weekend when Chad Kuhl and Adam Frazier were called up. But it was this tweet today that reminded me of the subject:

Shortly after that tweet, Alex Dickerson was called up by the Padres, giving another big leaguer, although Dickerson had been up previously, unlike the four listed by Eddy. Also, Dickerson was not drafted while DelliCarri was the Director of Amateur Scouting, so he wouldn’t fit that list. But he would fit the topic of the Pirates being able to draft players.

There has been a narrative going around that the Pirates can’t draft. I know that Dejan Kovacevic adds a big voice to this argument, but it doesn’t start and stop with him. I know by talking with him that there are some arguments being made about their draft track record where he agrees with me (a few of those I go over towards the end of this article), even though we disagree on the overall results. The idea that the Pirates can’t draft is pretty widely held, and there are a few reasons why this line of thinking still exists.

For one, the Pirates got off to a poor start. The 2008 draft wasn’t bad, but it could have been much better if Pedro Alvarez worked out as expected. The 2009 draft was a disaster, which I’ve said many times. And the Pirates were hurt in 2010 by MLB delaying signings and players backing out of deals to go to college, plus the wave of Tommy John surgeries delaying prospects rising to the majors. (Jameson Taillon would have about two years of service time right now, while Nick Kingham would probably be in the rotation at the moment as well. They would even have Brandon Cumpton and Casey Sadler as depth out of Triple-A.)

As I wrote leading up to the 2016 draft, the early results were poor. A lot of that probably had to do with the scouting department Huntington inherited. In that article, I mentioned how much turnover there was in the scouting department from the early draft days under Huntington, including most of the 2009 group having been replaced in the years following that draft. And since that point, it’s easy to see the clear improvements the Pirates have made, which I detailed when looking at the 2012-15 results.

First impressions are hard to break, and the first impression the Pirates gave with the draft was a bad one. But their success rate has been rapidly improved since the first two or three drafts, with the 2011 and 2013 groups being potential franchise changers. So why does the idea still exist that the Pirates can’t draft?

I think the biggest reason for that is because of a lack of understanding or appreciation for how long it can take draft picks to reach the majors, especially when you’re drafting high school players. And that is exactly what the Pirates were doing up until recent years.

We’re in a season right now where Pirates fans are calling for Tyler Glasnow to come up and save the rotation, and for Josh Bell to come up and replace a productive John Jaso — while also thinking highly enough of him that it’s not even a question that he could do it. Those guys were both prep players drafted in 2011, and both had reasonable and somewhat aggressive pushes through the minor league system. Jameson Taillon just came up, and the only reason it took him a bit longer was because of the injuries.

As Eddy noted above, we’re currently watching Adam Frazier come up to upgrade the bench. Frazier was a 6th round pick in 2013, and while I think his upside is a super utility player, there should be no question that he’s provided a spark, and has been a better option than Cole Figueroa. We’ve also seen Chad Kuhl get the call, and he’s going to be sticking around in the rotation. Kuhl was also taken in 2013, in the 9th round. Jacob Stallings came up briefly to fill in as a backup catcher, after being a 7th rounder in 2012 who was drafted for the sole purpose of saving money for Mark Appel (money that later went to guys like Max Moroff, another draft pick who could help sooner, rather than later, from Indianapolis).

The Pirates are starting to see guys reaching the majors from those 2010-13 drafts, and none of them have really taken an unreasonable amount of time to arrive in the majors. This isn’t the NFL, where draft picks immediately join the team and take on a big role, becoming stars in a year or two. The path from high school or college baseball to MLB is a long road.

I think those are the two big reasons we still have the “Pirates can’t draft” narrative. They had a bad first impression, and the strong results since those first few years are just now starting to reach the majors, while fans expected help sooner.

But there have been some very flawed arguments that aren’t as understandable when evaluating the draft. These are arguments which discredit areas where the Pirates clearly got value from the draft. Just to run through these real quick:

**If the player is no longer on the team, he doesn’t count. Pedro Alvarez is probably the biggest example here. I’ve seen arguments criticizing the 2008 draft because the only player they have from that class now is Jordy Mercer. But that ignores that they got value from Alvarez along the way.

**If the player is traded for someone who does help, he doesn’t count. This is the cousin of the previous one. Using that 2008 draft again, Justin Wilson provided value while he was in Pittsburgh, then was traded for a guy named Francisco Cervelli, who has provided a lot of value. The typical lazy way to evaluate the drafts would be to add up the WAR of the signed players and compare it to other teams. But that ignores the 9.5 fWAR the Pirates have received in value from players who were acquired for draft picks. And I’m not even considering deals like Brock Holt going in the Mark Melancon/Joel Hanrahan deal, or Vic Black going in the Dilson Herrera/Marlon Byrd trade, since it would be difficult to evaluate how much those prospects should count in the return.

**First round picks don’t count. The first round picks are seen as picks you should have success with. Miss on a first rounder, and it’s a failure. Draft a good player who reaches his upside or becomes a star, and that’s what is expected. Nevermind that the bust rate of first round picks is incredibly high. This article on FanGraphs has the bust rate of picks 1-5 at 60%, going all the way up to 85% in the second half of the first round. The Pirates have one bust as a first rounder — Tony Sanchez — and that pick gets weighed extremely heavy in these evaluations.

Meanwhile, Pedro Alvarez had 6 fWAR with the Pirates. Gerrit Cole and Jameson Taillon are emerging as two top of the rotation pitchers. Austin Meadows is one of the top prospects in baseball. Reese McGuire is a top 100 prospect and the best defensive catching prospect in baseball. Cole Tucker is showing off a lot of tools in A-ball, and has really improved his stock since draft day. Kevin Newman hits absolutely everything, and has also improved his stock. And yet these guys don’t count, even though finding a guy with a 2.5 fWAR per year happens 20-29% of the time in the top ten picks, and 9-13% of the time in the second half of the first round. Writing off the first round picks that work out, and overly criticizing the one pick that doesn’t work out just ignores that a large majority of first round picks — even the top five picks in a draft — just don’t work out.

**If a player is less than a star, he doesn’t count. No one actually comes out and says this directly, but it’s implied. Try suggesting that Adam Frazier or Chad Kuhl are evidence of the Pirates drafting well, because they were sixth and ninth round picks. You’ll get responses that they’re only bench players and back of the rotation guys. Yet when the Cardinals get success from a bench guy like Tommy Pham, the complaint is that the Pirates can never find middle round talent to help boost the team.

In fact, the middle round has led to some hypocrisy the last few years. When the Pirates didn’t have their drafted pitchers ready to step in and help, or didn’t have help from other positions for the bench, the complaint was that they couldn’t draft because they couldn’t fill their exact need with drafted players. Now they’re doing that (Taillon and Kuhl stepping into the rotation, Frazier helping the bench) and the complaint has shifted to the fact that they have holes to fill, rather than acknowledging that the draft picks are starting to arrive.

Taking a Step Back

All of the above reasons are reasons why the Pirates’ draft record gets distorted. The MLB draft is complex, takes a long time to yield results, and the majority of the time, players are expected to fail, even in the first round. The expectation for the draft is that it will yield your impact players, but also trade chips, role players, depth options, and other valuable pieces. If you eliminate the trade chips, role players, depth options, and the first round picks from the impact player group, then I don’t think there would be a team in baseball that would be considered good at drafting.

The draft is a big picture event. Analyzing it by looking at specific players, specific needs, or specific draft years really misses the entire story. When you take a step back from the Pirates’ draft picture, you see just how good they have been.

Right now, three out of the five rotation members are made up of drafted players. One more will eventually be on the way when Tyler Glasnow is ready. And these aren’t weak starters. Long-term, this is a young rotation most teams would dream about having. Add to that the fact that the Pirates have other options in the minors, including two other potential impact arms in the lower levels in Mitch Keller and Gage Hinsz, and the pitching is looking good.

The draft has yielded a player who was traded for their starting catcher. The first base of the future, Josh Bell, was drafted, and will make the jump to the big leagues at some point in the next year to take over the position. The starting shortstop was drafted, and his eventual replacement options (Kevin Newman/Cole Tucker) were also drafted. One of those guys might end up the starting second baseman, or that role could go to one of a number of drafted players (Adam Frazier, Max Moroff, Erich Weiss, Kevin Kramer — although I’d say all of these guys are safer to project as bench players at best). The outfield has two players from the international ranks, but the guy who will be replacing Andrew McCutchen eventually was a draft pick, and is one of the best prospects in baseball (I’m guessing seven of the eight teams drafting ahead of the Pirates in 2013 would have taken Austin Meadows if they had a do-over, with the Cubs being satisfied with Kris Bryant).

In a year or less, this team is going to be largely built from the draft, and it’s going to look like a great team in the short- and long-term. It’s really difficult to look at that future and suggest the Pirates are bad at drafting. At a time when so many Pirates fans are calling for a fifth round pick to save the rotation, and a second round pick to replace a productive John Jaso, it’s hard to suggest the Pirates are bad at drafting. When Pirates fans are already accepting a future where the best player to play in Pittsburgh in years could be replaced, and that Austin Meadows is good enough to make it a smart baseball decision alone, it’s really hard to suggest the Pirates are bad at drafting.

I don’t know when the “Pirates can’t draft” narrative will die. I do know that the facts go against that narrative now, and it’s only going to get worse going forward.

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**Pirates Sign 11th Round Pick Max Kranick to Over-Slot Deal. Speaking of the draft, the Pirates now have three of their four prep pitchers from the top 11 rounds signed. The remaining pick is Competitive Balance Pick Nick Lodolo. If they sign him, things will be looking better for this group, with good odds that one of these guys will work out just based on the numbers game. If they don’t sign him, they could turn to 24th round pick Austin Bodrato (3B) or 33rd round pick Austin Shields (RHP). However, they’d only have about $100,000 in pool money to spend, meaning those guys would need to sign for $200,000 or less. They could also turn to 14th round catcher Hagen Owenby or 19th round JuCo RHP Pearson Mcmahan. But there’s a chance that the Pirates are now done if Lodolo doesn’t sign. If that happens, they’d get the 42nd pick in next year’s draft as compensation.

**I was originally hoping to have the mid-season top 30 prospects around this time. However, we’re waiting on a few things. For one, I want the draft situation to be resolved. I also want to talk with the players and get some of my own info. I talked this week with Travis MacGregor and Braeden Ogle, and will be talking with Max Kranick on Thursday. The interviews with MacGregor and Ogle were great, and definitely impact how I look at the players and the picks. I don’t know how we could give a rating without the other writers getting that info, and without talking to Kranick. I also want to see how things go with Kuhl and Frazier, and whether they project to stick in the majors. Then there’s whether Tyler Glasnow comes up anytime soon. Add in giving more time to the mid-season promotions to adjust, and there are a lot of reasons to wait. I’m thinking around the All-Star break would be a good time to shoot for, leading to much stronger and better researched overall rankings.

**Gage Hinsz Seems to Be Over the Hurdles of Injuries. While on the subject of prep pitchers, that 2014 group is looking good, with Gage Hinsz joining Mitch Keller in having breakout stuff. Abigail Miskowiec writes about how much it has helped Hinsz to get over his injury issues from the last year.

**Early Struggles for Will Craig Rooted in Transition Back to Wooden Bats. Will Craig is off to a rough start in pro ball, although Abigail Miskowiec notes this isn’t a surprise after talking with Craig, who tends to struggle initially when switching back and forth from wood and metal bats.

**Austin Meadows and Dovydas Neverauskas Named to Futures Game. The selection of Neverauskas is a bit surprising. If you’re going with the best international talent in the system, I’d take a few players over him. However, it will be interesting seeing him showing off his new fastball velocity (up to 99 MPH) on the big stage.

**Pirates Lose Cole Figueroa off Waivers to Dodgers. They’ve moved on to Adam Frazier, so it didn’t really matter if he stuck around.

**Morning Report: Updates on the 2013 Draft Picks Who Were Traded Away. John Dreker looks at how the 2013 picks have done since being traded away, one day after Buddy Borden returned to the organization.

Tim Williams
Tim Williams
Tim is the owner, producer, editor, and lead writer of PiratesProspects.com. He has been running Pirates Prospects since 2009, becoming the first new media reporter and outlet covering the Pirates at the MLB level in 2011 and 2012. His work can also be found in Baseball America, where he has been a contributor since 2014 and the Pirates' correspondent since 2019.

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