Braves rated the best farm system of the decade by MLB

https://www.mlb.com/news/mlb-top-farm-systems-of-decade

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1. Braves
At the beginning of the decade, Atlanta spawned Freddie Freeman, Andrelton Simmons, Jason Heyward and Craig Kimbrel. At the end, the Braves unveiled Acuña, Ozzie Albies and Mike Soroka, who appear destined to star throughout the 2020s. They also developed several longtime starting pitchers in Julio Teheran, Mike Minor and Alex Wood and more intriguing youngsters such as Dansby Swanson and Max Fried.

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https://media0.giphy.com/media/14ceV8wMLIGO6Q/giphy.gif

I'm surprised the Dodgers are that far down on the list. They seemed to have a top 10 farm for the entire decade and churned out a ton of quality players and stars.

And where did that get us?

Golden Wren Era

For a pitching factory, the Braves sure did churn out a lot of star position player talent.

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Originally Posted by nsacpi

Golden Wren Era

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It's funny, I was just thinking about how they bracketed out the Wren era so politely.

At the beginning of the decade, Atlanta spawned Freddie Freeman, Andrelton Simmons, Jason Heyward and Craig Kimbrel. At the end, the Braves unveiled Acuña, Ozzie Albies and Mike Soroka, who appear destined to star throughout the 2020s.

The 3 guys on that list who entered our system during the Clark-interregnum are the two Curaçao guys and Acuña. Wren seems to have been poor on the domestic front*, but we may have underestimated his international genius.

*Simmons was drafted of course, but all players from Curaçao are destined to be Braves. Wren must have sensed this, which was why his first trade was for Jair Jurrjens.

Simmons and Wood were the most productive Wren draftees. We didnt have many high picks in those years.

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Originally Posted by nsacpi

Golden Wren Era

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Gold-standard organization.

Imagine Wren with this payroll.

https://i.imgflip.com/1i2c76.jpg

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Originally Posted by Enscheff

For a pitching factory, the Braves sure did churn out a lot of star position player talent.

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We were all worried about the amount of pitching they were drafting too. They hit on the bats about as well as you could dream of.

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Originally Posted by Hudson2

We were all worried about the amount of pitching they were drafting too. They hit on the bats about as well as you could dream of.

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It’s almost like the correct move would have been to stockpile bats with higher success rates, and then trade them for pitchers that were finished products. Let other teams deal with pitcher attrition.

Almost like value charts have shown us for many years that position prospects are much more valuable assets than pitching prospects.

Weird. Who could have possibly foreseen that being the case and stated as much over and over years ago when the Braves were grabbing up all those arms? Braves way!!

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Originally Posted by thewupk

Imagine Wren with this payroll.

https://i.imgflip.com/1i2c76.jpg

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Donaldson and MadBum would be Braves by now. We would have traded half the farm system for Realmuto last year and the remaining pieces would have been traded for Lindor this year. Snitker would get a 5 year extension.

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Originally Posted by nsacpi

We didnt have many high picks in those years.

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come ahhhn. can't believe this is still used as an excuse lol

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Originally Posted by Super

come ahhhn. can't believe this is still used as an excuse lol

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the 10th pick of the draft on average is worth more than twice as much as the 30th

the 5th pick is worth more than three times the 30th

the 3rd pick is worth about four times as much as the 30th

so having early picks and having multiple early picks is a pretty big deal

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/an-updat...e-draft-picks/

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Originally Posted by nsacpi

the 10th pick of the draft on average is worth more than twice as much as the 30th

the 5th pick is worth more than three times the 30th

the 3rd pick is worth about four times as much as the 30th

so having early picks and having multiple early picks is a pretty big deal

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/an-updat...e-draft-picks/

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that's all fine.
still doesn't excuse the undeniably bad drafts from those years.

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Originally Posted by nsacpi

the 10th pick of the draft on average is worth more than twice as much as the 30th

the 5th pick is worth more than three times the 30th

the 3rd pick is worth about four times as much as the 30th

so having early picks and having multiple early picks is a pretty big deal

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/an-updat...e-draft-picks/

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Okay, but the point is we did pretty bad with the first round picks we did have. So from 2010 - 2014 (Clarkless, solo-Wren years) here's what we did with first rounders:

2010
Matt Lipka: 0 WAR ($8.8m if taken today)

2011
Sean Gilmartin: 1.7 ($10.7m) - Though, this "value" was for his 3rd team, after being traded for the desiccated husk of Ryan Doumit and then lost in the Rule 5

2012
Lucas Sims: -0.2 ($14.1m)

2013
Jason Hursch: -0.2 ($9.8m)

2014
Braxton Davidson: 0 (9.5m)

So for picks "worth" ~$53m, we got essentially nothing, give or take a Braxton Davidson renaissance. It's honestly kind of shocking how much better our picks in the next tier were (Simmons, Ahmed, Wood, Caratini). Imagine if we hadn't blown the top ones.

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Originally Posted by Metaphysicist

Okay, but the point is we did pretty bad with the first round picks we did have. So from 2010 - 2014 (Clarkless, solo-Wren years) here's what we did with first rounders:

2010
Matt Lipka: 0 WAR ($8.8m if taken today)

2011
Sean Gilmartin: 1.7 ($10.7m) - Though, this "value" was for his 3rd team, after being traded for the desiccated husk of Ryan Doumit and then lost in the Rule 5

2012
Lucas Sims: -0.2 ($14.1m)

2013
Jason Hursch: -0.2 ($9.8m)

2014
Braxton Davidson: 0 (9.5m)

So for picks "worth" ~$53m, we got essentially nothing, give or take a Braxton Davidson renaissance. It's honestly kind of shocking how much better our picks in the next tier were (Simmons, Ahmed, Wood, Caratini). Imagine if we hadn't blown the top ones.

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Yeah, the later picks tended to be more productive in the Wren drafts. Wood (2nd round). Simmons (2nd round). Ahmed (2nd). La Stella (8th). Drury (13th). Gattis (23rd). I think you have to look at all of it in making an evaluation.

Some of the early picks in the pre-Wren years were also busts: DeVall, Stovall, Spruill, Gilmore, Cody Johnson, Rasmus, Dustin Evans, Chase Fontaine were all taken in the first two rounds in the 2006-2008 drafts. That's quite a few busts.

And in the first 3 post Wren drafts we have had some very high picks who look like they are not likely to generate much value: Allard, Wentz, Wright (#5 in the whole draft!). Herbert has already busted.

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Originally Posted by nsacpi

Yeah, the later picks tended to be more productive in the Wren drafts. Wood (2nd round). Simmons (2nd round). Ahmed (2nd). La Stella (8th). Drury (13th). Gattis (23rd). I think you have to look at all of it in making an evaluation.

Some of the early picks in the pre-Wren years were also busts: DeVall, Stovall, Spruill, Gilmore, Cody Johnson, Rasmus, Dustin Evans, Chase Fontaine were all taken in the first two rounds in the 2006-2008 drafts. That's quite a few busts.

And in the first 3 post Wren drafts we have had some very high picks who look like they are not likely to generate much value: Allard, Wentz, Wright (#5 in the whole draft!). Herbert has already busted.

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Don't forget fellow Golden Wrens, Jacob Webb was an 18th rounder.

Sobo was a 4th rounder.

These lists of names contain a lot of failed pitching prospects. Almost like they are a poor use of draft resources.

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Originally Posted by Enscheff

These lists of names contain a lot of failed pitching prospects. Almost like they are a poor use of draft resources.

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You have to draft some pitchers. But yeah the Braves took too many during the rebuild and I would argue also they took too many HS pitchers in parts of the draft where the relative yield for that demographic is especially poor. And they did this during a time period when the rest of the baseball industry was wising up to the fact that HS pitchers carried a lot of risk and adjusted their draft boards accordingly.