Braves Draft History: 1995-2014

I'm going to put together a retrospective on our last 20 drafts to give us some perspective on the upcoming draft. I'm going to organize things by draft segment and type of player. The segments are defined as follows: first round (picks 1-30), early (pick 31 to end of third round), middle (rounds 4-10) and late (round 11 onward). The types are high school pitcher, high school position, college pitcher and college position.

There are other organizing principles that suggest themselves and I certainly encourage discussion around those. We can discuss things by draft regime: Clark, Wren, etc. We can distinguish between JuCo and 4-year colleges. We can distinguish position players by catcher, corner infield, etc.

Anyhow let me start with first round. Here is who we have taken and signed in the past 20 years in the first round (the number in parentheses is their overall position in the draft):

HS pitchers: Wainwright(29), McBride(24), Sims(21)

HS position: Zapp(27), Cameron(29), Burrus(29), Thorman(30), Francoeur(23), Cody Johnson(24), Heyward(14),

C pitchers: Devine(27), Minor(7), Gilmartin(28)

C position: none

A couple initial observations jump out. In those 20 years, we had 13 picks in the Top 30. So we were more often likely to lose our first round picks than to gain them in this period. Second, we never picked a college position player in the first round in this period. But we did like HS position players (7). We also took 3 HS pitchers and 3 college pitchers.

Generally, we picked toward the end of the first round. Only two picks came before #20, Minor(7) and Heyward(14). This is a testimony to how good the major league team has been over this period.

The next question is how to characterize success rates or yields by group. I'll start of with something very simple, the proportion of the group that made the majors. This is a very low bar for first rounders, but is more meaningful for later picks.

Of the high school pitchers, all three have either made the majors or at this point in their minor league careers appear likely to do so. So the yield is 100% by that standard. However, only one of this group (Wainwright) looks like what you would call a success.

Of the HS positions players three (Thorman, Francoeur and Heyward) out of seven have made the majors. I would argue Francoeur and Heyward were successes. Let's try to avoid getting bogged down by arguments about whether they disappointed relative to early promise.

Of the college pitchers, all three made the majors. Minor is the one I would characterize as a success. His career WAR is 7.5 right now and for me that's not bad even if he does nothing more in his career. Of course he was the highest pick we've had in this period, so some accounting must be made of that.

The early group (pick 31 to end of third round) is the most interesting to me, doubly so given that we have 4 such picks this year. Here is who we have taken over the years:

HS pitcher (24): Marquis, Atilano, Beau Jones, Evarts, Rasmus, Deval, Nation, Belisle, Butler, Digby, Nelson, Bacot, Reyes, Lyman, Locke, Spruill, Stoval, Fulenchek, Bell, Morton, Harrison, Stevens, Rogers, Salazar

HS position (17): Herr, Kelly Johnson, Saltalamacchia, Freeman, Gilmore, Lipka, Davidson, Scharrer, Barthel, McCann, Campbell, Brignac, Velasquez, Langerhans, Manning, Schafer, de la Rosa

C pitcher (7): Meyer, Hursh, Evans, Wood, Kimbrel, Hale, Povse

C position (11): Richard Lewis, Fontaine, Simmons, Cunningham, Ahmed, Caratini, Stern, Holt, Hicks, Leonard, Kubitza

Other: Escobar

In this part of the draft we have favored high school players, though this changed a bit under Wren.

Of the 24 HS pitchers taken, about half have made it to the majors, assuming some of the ones in the minors make it. The most successful ones have been Marquis, Belisle, Harrison, Locke and Morton.

There have been greater successes among the 17 HS position picks: Freeman, McCann, KJ, Salty. Assuming a couple still in the minors make it, about half of this group will have reached the majors.

Among the 8 college pitchers, two have been very good picks: Kimbrel and Wood. Dustin Evans never made the majors, but the rest either have or still have a shot. The yield is pretty impressive for this group.

Among the 11 college players, there is one great success (Simmons), but an unusual one given that the Braves apparently thought he was going to be a pitcher. Slightly over half have made the majors or are likely to (Kubitza).

The most interesting finding about this segment of the draft is that the group to which we have devoted the most picks (HS pitchers) is the one with the least impressive yield. I'm tempted to say pick a high school pitcher in the first round (we have two such picks this year, #14 and #27), but be cautious about them with our next four picks. With those next four picks, I would focus on HS players who play premium defensive positions (C, SS, CF) and college pitchers.

Of the high school position players who didn't make it, Burrus is the only one who surprises me a bit, but he struggled right out of the gate. But he was highly-ranked. Zapp was a project of sorts (Indiana state high school tennis champion) who did make it to AAA. Cameron was a skills over tools hitting prospect who hit the wall in AA after playing pretty well in Low A and High A. I had to check the timeline, but a lot of these high school picks made me think they were Chuck Lamar picks, but Lamar was only on board for one of these drafts (1995), leaving the organization for Tampa Bay after the 1995 season.

I think the team's overall success and the size of its wallet that allowed the successful pursuit of coveted free agents put a crimp in the draft productivity to an extent. Curious to see if we go tools over skills or vice versa in the draft ahead, I prefer a mix and we have enough picks so that we can go for a few higher ceiling guys with questionable probability of meeting those ceilings. But we may need to opt for some guys with decent probabilities, especially on the offensive side of the equation.

Notice our history with picks in the 24-30 range. One great sucess and a bunch of busts.

The middle part of the draft (which I define as rounds 4 to 10) has generated 26 major leaguers so far from the 1995-2014 drafts. A couple more have a chance. So a little over one per year. Here are the results by type of player.

HS Pitcher: We took 29 of those and 7 made the majors (Parr, Davies, Miner, Osting, H Ramirez, McGlinchey, Andrew Brown). It is a pretty non-descript group.

HS Position: We took 22 of those and 2 made the majors (Romak, Aldridge). Very little value there

College Pitcher: We took 41 of those and 12 made the majors (Graham, Gearrin, Joe Nelson, Waters, Sobkowiak, Clemens, Martin, White, Oberholtzer, Medlen, Hoover). Medlen is the best of the group and a couple others have a chance to carve out decent careers.

College Position: We took 33 of those and 5 have made the majors (Gosselin, Terdoslavich, DeRosa, La Stella, Sammons). De Rosa has had a nice career, but otherwise no one of significance.

In terms of yield, in this segment of the draft we seem to do best with college pitchers and worst with high school hitters. So it seems right that we draft a lot of college pitchers in this part of the draft and relatively few high school hitters.

This little exercise confirms for me something I've believed about drafting high school hitters. It seems to me if you want to draft high school hitters, you want to get them in the first three rounds. After that it becomes difficult to sort them out and it is more of a crap shoot than it is with pitchers and college hitters. I've not saying you don't want to take any of them after the first three rounds, but it is wise to scale back how many of them you take. The Braves seem to take this approach and the overall data on types drafted by round suggests most teams also do this.

There has been a trend for the Braves to take more college pitchers and fewer high school pitchers in this part of the draft than was the case in the first half of our sample. This tendency began during Roy Clark's tenure. And the data on the yield of college pitchers and high school pitchers taken by the Braves seems to indicate that this decision was the correct one (assuming it was a conscious decision and not just a random artifact).

Seems like a good strategy. Go HS early for the upside, then go after college arms and bats later to get your #5 starter-types, bullpen arms, and bench bats.

smootness said:

Seems like a good strategy. Go HS early for the upside, then go after college arms and bats later to get your #5 starter-types, bullpen arms, and bench bats.

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Yup. With the caveat that there is some justification for being open minded about college pitchers in the "early" group. It is not a lot of data but hitting on Kimbrel (round 3) and Wood (round 2) is impressive. I do think we should avoid low ceiling college pitchers in the first round. The first round is really your opportunity to go for a player with a high ceiling and you don't want to waste that on someone like Gilmartin or Devine.

nsacpi said:

Yup. With the caveat that there is some justification for being open minded about college pitchers in the "early" group. It is not a lot of data but hitting on Kimbrel (round 3) and Wood (round 2) is impressive. I do think we should avoid low ceiling college pitchers in the first round. The first round is really your opportunity to go for a player with a high ceiling and you don't want to waste that on someone like Gilmartin or Devine.

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Sure. And you can go college bat as well. I wouldn't mind Ian Happ this year. Obviously guys like Braun and Longoria are fine, but you usually won't find them after the first 10 picks or so.

We got lucky on Simmons and his defense.

The rule of thumb on football drafts (where you can conceivably draft for need) is you grade the draft after three years. I think in baseball, that timeline is extended to at least five. I've always thought that you want to have your premium picks in AA by the time a decision has to be made whether or not you put them on the 40-man roster (4 years for college guys, 5 years for all but a few high school guys).

The problem with high school kids--and I still think that's where the focus should be--is that it can be difficult to judge how much physical and/or skill growth you will see. I think this is especially true in the year-round baseball states like Florida, Georgia, Texas, and California. You see a ton of kids whose skills are very polished, but you don't know if they've capped out on their physical growth. They look like men playing against boys in high school because they really have their game down, but when they hit the minors, they may not have the physical tools to compete as the toolsy kids get their games together. I think that was the case with a kid like Troy Cameron, who was a very polished high school hitter.

50PoundHead said:

The rule of thumb on football drafts (where you can conceivably draft for need) is you grade the draft after three years. I think in baseball, that timeline is extended to at least five. I've always thought that you want to have your premium picks in AA by the time a decision has to be made whether or not you put them on the 40-man roster (4 years for college guys, 5 years for all but a few high school guys).

The problem with high school kids--and I still think that's where the focus should be--is that it can be difficult to judge how much physical and/or skill growth you will see. I think this is especially true in the year-round baseball states like Florida, Georgia, Texas, and California. You see a ton of kids whose skills are very polished, but you don't know if they've capped out on their physical growth. They look like men playing against boys in high school because they really have their game down, but when they hit the minors, they may not have the physical tools to compete as the toolsy kids get their games together. I think that was the case with a kid like Troy Cameron, who was a very polished high school hitter.

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And then you have a guy like McCann. Also very polished high school hitter. I believe his father was a college baseball coach. How do you separate the McCann's from the Cameron's? Not easy. I think there are two things that have to weigh a lot. One is you really need to look at the upside of the hit tool. And the second the upside of the glove, ie ability to stick at a premium position. We've had some luck in the "early" phase of the draft taking guys who play a premium position. Not all of them have turned into stars like McCann and Simmons, but quite a few have reached the majors.

nsacpi said:

And then you have a guy like McCann. Also very polished high school hitter. I believe his father was a college baseball coach. How do you separate the McCann's from the Cameron's? Not easy. I think there are two things that have to weigh a lot. One is you really need to look at the upside of the hit tool. And the second the upside of the glove, ie ability to stick at a premium position. We've had some luck in the "early" phase of the draft taking guys who play a premium position. Not all of them have turned into stars like McCann and Simmons, but quite a few have reached the majors.

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I think position does play into that. If nothing else, McCann projected as a better than average hitter for a catcher (with solid, though not spectacular receiving skills). For a guy like Cameron to contribute, he had to hit. I think one thing that does get lost in the Braves' tremendous run is the fact, to which you allude, that we got above average (oft times way above average) offensive production out of C, 2B, SS, and CF.

I tend toward high school hitters that have shown success at a reasonable level of competition (high school, summer league, and showcases). You never know exactly what you have with anyone you draft, but I think projected high ceiling is more important (at least early in the draft) than a reasonably certain high floor and lower projection.

The last group I want to look at is the late rounders (round 11 onward). This part of the draft has produced about 1.5 major leaguers a year for the Braves.

The notable ones include a couple high school hitters (Giles and Garrett Jones), a high school pitcher (Venters), a couple college hitters (La Roche and Gattis) and some college pitchers (Hanson, James, Shae Simmons). Brandon Drury (a high school hitter taken in 13th round in 2010) could also have an impact.

We used to take a mix of high school and college players in this part of the draft, but it has become much more skewed toward college players in the Wren era. The abolition of draft & follow undoubtedly contributed to the reduction in the number of high schoolers taken in the late rounds. Based on the results, I'd like to see us take a few more high school players in this part of the draft going forward. Probably not all the way to a 50-50 mix, but the yields suggest there are some gems to be found in the late rounds among high schoolers as well.

nsacpi said:

The last group I want to look at is the late rounders (round 11 onward). This part of the draft has produced about 1.5 major leaguers a year for the Braves.

The notable ones include a couple high school hitter (Giles and Garrett Jones), a high school pitcher (Venters), a couple college hitters (La Roche and Gattis) and some college pitchers (Hanson, James, Shae Simmons). Brandon Drury (a high school hitter taken in 13th round in 2010) could also have an impact.

We used to take a mix of high school and college players in this part of the draft, but it has become much more skewed toward college players in the Wren era. The abolition of draft & follow undoubtedly contributed to the reduction in the number of high schoolers taken in the late rounds. Based on the results, I'd like to see us take a few more high school players in this part of the draft going forward. Probably not all the way to a 50-50 mix, but the yields suggest there are some gems to be found in the late rounds among high schoolers as well.

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The new draft pool limits also make it a lot more difficult to take a "tough sign" high school player late. For a few years, post-summer league signings became a modified draft-and-follow as teams would gather up what they hadn't spent and direct it all on one or two high school players before they enrolled in college. The tighter signing deadline and the penalties for going too high on a player past the tenth round really discourage that. I think what you see know is teams that are interested in a guy try to sway him from a 4-year school to a JUCO.

50PoundHead said:

The new draft pool limits also make it a lot more difficult to take a "tough sign" high school player late. For a few years, post-summer league signings became a modified draft-and-follow as teams would gather up what they hadn't spent and direct it all on one or two high school players before they enrolled in college. The tighter signing deadline and the penalties for going too high on a player past the tenth round really discourage that. I think what you see know is teams that are interested in a guy try to sway him from a 4-year school to a JUCO.

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We had one HS kid drafted last year that we asked to play summer ball for a few weeks before deciding whether to make an offer or not. But yeah the window for being able to evaluate a player like that is much less than it used to be.

The Braves followed the textbook on Day 1. High upside high school players early. 2 HS pitchers with great ceilings in the first round. 2 HS hitters in the second round, including one at a premium defensive position. And a college pitcher with well above average stuff, who would have gone much earlier if not for recent TJ surgery.

Our round 3 pick I would like to see us get another HS hitter. Preferably one who can play a premium defensive position. Preferably a center fielder.

Rounds 4-10 a mix, but at least 2 college pitchers and no more than 1 HS hitter. Add a little salt and some cilantro and you'll have a pretty good soup.