As others have said, kudos to you bro. As far as the rest of your take, a lot of it's pretty reasonable, but I still you think you put WAAAAAYYY to much emphasis on draft position. In the history of the MLB draft, I'd be surprised if there were more than a dozen draft picks that were just "plugged in" right away and produced. It just doesn't work that way. At all. *Do* go back and look at the last few drafts. Look at the big names, then look at when their rookie seaosons actually took place, and get back with me as to whether or not that is "immediate".
Look, if you are not going to the playoffs, then what do you prefer? drafting in the late teens or at one or two with a reduced payroll. The baseball draft is getting more important all the time. If for nothing else, then when you are drafting high, you always can trade down and pick up extra picks where you increase your odds of finding a star by having multiple picks. Doesn't it make more sense to cut salary and draft at the top of the draft board then to hang on to salary, draft in the middle of the draft board?
Dude, teams don't "trade down for extra picks" in the MLB draft. It's like you're an NBA fan trying to talk baseball. The draft is *not* "getting more important all the time"; it's as important as it always has been and no more so. For every top-10 pick that is a perennial MVP candidate there are at least three non-top-10 picks who are *also* perennial MVP candidates.
I actually think the draft actually is getting more important due to the ridiculous escalation in salaries for average talent. I think in the past, you had more options on how to build a team. Today, you almost always have to have a good chunk of cheap, homegrown players to fill your roster (along with a few free-agent star level players). Unless you have a ridiculous budget, it's difficult to compete having to fill out your roster with $7MM average players. With the Astros, for example, you've got $47MM tied up in Oswalt, Berkman, and Lee. Let's say we add a $17MM Sabathia or Sheets and you're up to $64MM. If you have a $100MM payroll, that leaves $36 MM for 21 players - an average of $1.5MM a piece - even an Ausmus costs more than that. You definitely can't afford to have a $6MM Woody Williams type on your roster. For that reason, the good teams going forward will be the ones with massive budgets or great farm systems, even moreso than in the past. I think it is getting much more difficult to do a Marlins 1997 and just buy up a good team.
i agree with everything you just said. i think we're already working on putting pieces back into the farm system. that won't happen quickly. they'll have to survive on free agents to make them competitive and interesting to the casual fan on the big league level for a while.
Baseball (unlike the other major sports) does not allow you to trade picks. In addition, I do not ever recall any teams making pick(s) and then weeks or months later, making trades of the players picked. It just doesn't happen. This is one thing that is generally on the table at the owner's meetings.
This alone proves that you know NOTHING about baseball. I mean nothing. Zero, zip, zilch, nada. Name me ONE guy who got drafted and totally bypassed all levels of the minor leagues. Lance freaking Berkman spent 2 years in the minors, and that is extremely rare. If you draft a guy today, don't expect him to contribute at the major league level for at least 4 to 5 years.
Are you seriously comparing the Brewers, a team that hasn't even made the playoffs in forever to the Angels and Red Sox? The Brewers still have a lot to prove, and getting swept by the Cubs at home isn't the way to do that. Those pointless examples you gave me, were they all at home with their best pitchers?
Boston hadn't won anything in forever before 2004 either. They made the playoffs sure, but they got bounced every single time before it really counted.
No...I'm suggesting that anyone can get beat 4 times in a row...even a championship caliber team. I have no idea who pitched..I just looked back over schedules/results....but for the red sox of 04 or 07 to lose 4 in a row means they had good pitchers being beat. There's only 5 pitchers in a rotation, after all. Oh, and good pitchers get beat all the time. A 4 game sample size (whether 4-0 or 0-4) doesn't tell you much in a 162 game season. But after watching the Cardinals win in 2006...and knowing that any team can get hot in baseball at the right time...assuming the Brewers make the playoffs, they have every bit as much chance as anyone else to win it. Wouldn't shock me in the slightest.
Yeah, but it HAS happened. Kudos to those who proved me wrong on that point. The main point is that for every 10,000 major league players, 9,999 of them are going to go through the minor league system. What I think is funny is that the OP talks about rebuilding the farm and then immediately talks about getting a draft pick and ignoring that he would be in the farm. Also, when you plug an 18 year old in the starting rotation, you get David Clyde. A guy who had great promise, but they ruined his arm. Or you get Pete Incaviglia, a guy who had tremendous power, but never developed discipline at the plate. Teams tend to be much more careful with prospects these days.
One to one and a half minor league seasons before promotion, though, isn't that abnormal. Guys from the 1st round 2006 draft who are already in the majors: Greg Reynolds Evan Longoria Brandon Morrow Andrew Miller Clayton Kershaw Tim Lincecum Max Scherzer Ian Kennedy On that list, you have guys like Andrew Miller who pitched 5 Minor League innings before promotion to the majors, and Tim Lincecum with 60 Minor League innings. Basically if you select a college pitcher in the first round, you should expect him in the majors within a year or something has gone wrong. There are only 1 or 2 college pitchers from that draft who aren't in MLB. And from 2007 you have guys who are right now breaking through and will be in the majors before next year, like Ross Detwiler and David Price. Of course, if you draft a bunch of high school guys, it is different (though Kershaw was a high school pitcher). But the idea of drafting near-major league ready guys, especially if you get an early 1st round draft choice, seems reasonable. And it does seem to make a difference drafting early in the first. From that list, the only notible late first rounder was Ian Kennedy, who slipped because he went way over 'slot'. Top 15 college guys seem to have a very good chance of getting to the majors within a year or so. And from this year's draft, they are already talking about several players, like Ryan Perry, making it to the majors before the end of the year.
But by relying on free agents, you significantly weaken your chances of rebuilding the farm system. The MLB draft is a crap shoot, but the more picks you have toward the top of the draft, the better your chances are of finding a player who will actually helpp the team down the line.
