I'm not sure we can say he was a horrible draft pick from the start. He was a last third of the first round pick. In that area you either take higher risk to get a higher ceiling or you take a lower ceiling to get lower risk. Sims was a risky prep arm with a high ceiling.
Also, lest we forget, Sims was hurt in that bus crash. I'm not 100% sure that didn't affect his career.
50PoundHead (08-11-2020), JohnAdcox (08-11-2020), jpx7 (08-11-2020), Metaphysicist (08-11-2020)
Correct, but it was a horrible pick because Marcus Stroman was picked right after him. Just like us picking Jason Hurst right before Aaron Judge and just like picking Braxton Davidson right before Michael Kopech and Jack Flaherty.
They were not “reaches” ....but because of who they left on the board (literally the next pick in every case)...they were horrible picks.
"Well, you’ll learn soon enough that this was a massive red wave landslide." - thethe on the 2020 election that trump lost bigly
“I can’t fix my life, but I can fix the world.” - sturg
In hindsight. But any draft pick that doesn't pan out is going to be a bad pick because of major leaguers picked after them. If the pick was a reach at the time and it caused us to miss someone on the board who was clearly better, that's more of an issue. Sims wasn't a reach.
I'll say I wasn't as big a fan of the Hursh pick. I thought he was a reach at the time and the fact he busted hard shows it was a bad pick.
jpx7 (08-11-2020)
I think most scouts had Sims with a higher ceiling provided he could reach it. I like the way Prospectus has always teamed up projected ceiling with an estimate of the percentage chance that ceiling will be reached. And folks can play "only if" with every draft, but especially in baseball. Braves drafted college 3B/1B Joe Leonard in 2010 at #101. J.T. Realmuto was taken three spots later. If anything, Stroman has surprised me for pitching as well as he has. You don't see many under-sized RHPs do as well as he has.
jpx7 (08-11-2020)
I can see that with Stroman. Either way they figured out how to pick the wrong guy in the first round almost three years in a row. This does happen some...absolutely, but when you swing and miss so many times...maybe you are making poor choices. You can’t miss on your first rounder that many times close together. Those poor choices likely led up to us having to rebuild, because of the shape the farm was in.
So, yes...misses happen all the time. If you miss three out of four years, you will likely be looking for another job.
jpx7 (08-11-2020)
Most of those guys ARE looking for another job. There is no debate the Braves had a rough patch of drafting.
jpx7 (08-11-2020)
We keep blaming our GMs but Bobby and John we’re both there through the Wren and Coppy era. I suspect they had much more to do with the crappy drafts and all the pitching. I mean Cox relied on pitching for being a ‘good’ manager.
Coppy
I doubt it. DeMacio--brought in by Wren after Clark left--went much heavier with college guys, which was somewhat of a departure for the Braves. Coppolella went heavy with pitching, but I can distinctly remember that the Braves were desperately hoping that Taylor Trammell would drop to them. The Reds took him at #35 and the Braves then took Wentz at #40. I didn't mind the targeting of some of the top pitchers that year, but they then continued through the middle rounds of the second day to concentrate on more pitching. It was even more pronounced the previous year (2015), when the Braves took only two position players (Riley and Herbert) in the first ten rounds. I remember thinking that even though it's a crap shoot, the concentration of pitching, pitching, pitching got a tad ridiculous after awhile.
Snowman (08-14-2020)
Lots of people, most notably you, were very outspoken that the pitcher drafting strategy was dumb.
That said, even the people that championed it, stated there would be a lot of attrition. Assuming (big if) Soroka comes back as himself, then you can argue that he and Fried represent a strong outcome from the rebuild. Getting two, really good pitchers in a 3 year rebuild is really good. For me the issue is that they can't seem to get anyone else to just be solid. They got two cashed in lottery tickets and nothing. If 1-2 of the other guys could show themselves to be solid 4s that would be huge. But no.
"Well, you’ll learn soon enough that this was a massive red wave landslide." - thethe on the 2020 election that trump lost bigly
“I can’t fix my life, but I can fix the world.” - sturg