Draft Update
by buccoben on Jul 12, 2009 2:48 PM EDT
15 comments
Did some reading on Rivals pay sites this morning. Von Rosenberg turned down the Pirates offer and stated he was offered more when the draft was in progress but told teams no. As I stated during draft week he told the Rockies it would take $2m if taken by them. He did not say what the Pirate offer was but seems it will have to dramatically increase as he really wants to be a Bengal Tiger. The inside writer on the Texas site stated he thinks Cain will sign with the Pirates and did not include him in next year's preview. He did believe Urban will be in Austin. I could not find anything recent on Dodson, Stevenson or Schoenfeld. The Florida writer says Den Dekker is probably going back to school thinking if he has a better year he will go higher but will sign if blown away, but does not indicate what that means.
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I could see the Pirates going close to $2M on Von Rosenberg. They paid Sanchez $2.5M and BA rated him the 32nd best prospect in the draft. They rated VR 41st.
Of course, I’d also keep in mind that the college blogs were saying Grossman was definitely going to Texas.
Yea....
Von Rosenberg is probably the most improtant guy we have to sign for this to be a good draft. if we get him, Cain, and one or two of the other pitchers(I prefer Stevenson and Heller) then we will have a very good draft.
I would go so far as to say...
…that if they don’t sign V-R, then the draft was a failure, regardless of which of the other “tough signs” they manage to ink.
He is, by a significant amount, the best player they drafted. Sanchez included.
Are you saying this based solely on upside or a broader ranking that includes risk elements as part of the evaluation? Obviously Sanchez is a lot closer to the majors and not a pitcher thus less risky, while I’m sure Von Rosenberg’s upside is considerably higher. That said I haven’t seen many draft rankings that had Von Rosenberg higher than Sanchez, much less “significantly” higher. I’m sure you have your reasons, but I’m just not seeing many other people (who know what they’re talking about anyway) who share your incredibly strong distain for Sanchez.
charity standing orders
I don't see Sanchez as particularly low-risk.
At least, not if project him to reach a Yadier Molina-type ceiling. He’s going to have to make some significant adjustments to reach that level of play, and the difficulty involved in making those adjustments increases his risk. I think he’s a fairly safe bet to be a backup catcher, but since that’s a fairly low floor in terms of value, it doesn’t move the needle much.
Part of the problem is that I also optimized my list around the organization’s specific needs, rather than the needs of an average organization. Star-level performance is the toughest commodity for a small-market team to acquire, and as such players with star-level upside (like VR – and unlike Sanchez) have correspondingly more value to us (a value that I reflected accordingly in my pre-draft rankings). We can’t just go out on the FA market and buy a Teixeira or a Sabathia. If we want a guy like that, we need to develop him ourselves.
There's also a high inherent level of risk...
…in projecting the offensive performances of catchers. They’re unusually prone to early peaks and/or late development. It’s entirely possible that Sanchez right now is as good a hitter as he’ll ever be. It’s equally possible that like many catchers, he won’t put things together with the bat until he’s 27 or 28 and getting ready to become someone else’s catcher.
Yeah, the star-level thing makes sense, and as an organization, we have to put a premium on that sort of talent. Still, reading some of your comments, I don’t see the “better plater for the Pirates” caveat, which makes it seem like you’re saying BA and BP and whoever else all missed something an amatuer (I’m assuming) scout picked up on.
I’d also say that you’re using pretty strong language when you say that the draft would be a failure if we don’t sign VR. We picked quite a few HS pitchers, and I’m inclined to believe that we have a greater probability of getting a star pitcher out of the 20 or so other HS pitchers we drafted than we are out of VR by himself. If that is not the case, then a $2M price tag isn’t going to keep us from signing him.
charity standing orders
We picked a lot of h.s. pitchers...
…but none of them are nearly as good as VR. We could sign Dodson and Cain and Inman instead of VR, for example, and I still wouldn’t be mollified, because I don’t particularly believe in any of those guys. They’re interesting lottery tickets, but no more, and VR is in my view clearly a cut above them. Similarly, if we end up with Sanchez at $2.5M, Cain at $1M, and Jordan Cooper at $750k, I would’ve rather had Shelby Miller at $4M plus two senior signs, because I believe in Miller, I don’t believe in Sanchez, and I don’t view two extra moderately-high-ceiling lottery tickets as sufficient compensation for taking the downgrade from Miller to Sanchez.
I’m not a pro scout, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that I’m wrong. None of the other teams reportedly had Sanchez graded anywhere near as high as we did, so if I blew the call, then at least I’m in good company.
A $2M price tag could easily keep us from signing VR if the team misassesses the value of some of their other tough signs, and decides that the money would be better spent on them. Which would be a goddamn shame.
Yeah, I’m not saying Sanchez was anything like the #4 player in the draft. Still, he’s not exactly chicken scratch either, and signing him basically for slot gives us a lot of money ($7.5M??) to sign other guys. I feel like we’re operating with the assumption that VR isn’t going to sign, or that our draft budget is suddenly $6M when their words and actions indicate otherwise. VR is the compensation for the downgrade from Miller to Sanchez. Miller was a top 10 prospect, but he fell to 19th because 14 teams agreed with us that he wasn’t worth an early first rounder AND $4M+. The Pirates were also not alone in thinking that the talent gap from the top 10 to late first round was not particularly large. That’s just an awful lot of money to tie up in one place when there is so much risk involved and no guarantee that he’ll turn into an ace even if he doesn’t get injured in the minors.
So would you rather have Sanchez and VR or Miller and those couple of high school kids? Even if you pick the latter, you have to admit that it’s not that cut and dry. They’re all lottery tickets; some just have a better chance of winning and are thus a lot more expensive. It’s a smart investment to spread the money around a bit and even take a safer bet occassionally.
charity standing orders
I had Sanchez as a late second-round talent.
That’s one hell of a reach.
VR is only compensation for the downgrade if he signs, and he very well may not. Since none of the other signability reaches are on his level, no combination of them plus Sanchez is in my mind equal value for the downgrade from Miller, which is why I said that the draft is in my view a failure if they don’t sign VR.
All of which entirely ignores the issue of there being better $2.5M players than Sanchez on the board as well, but that’s a matter for another post…
Grossman was telling people he was going to Texas, too. Von Rosenberg and his family aren’t uneducated people. I’m sure they know enough to use the leverage of his college commitment to fullest advantage, and I’m sure he’s not going to be bought out of it easily. But players always give teams a number before the draft and that almost never ends up being the number. Only an idiot leads with their bottom line number.
I hope we can change his mind.
I thought we made a good, aggressive move with Grossman, and he’s progressing well so far. Von Rosenberg is very similar as a promising, high-upside guy. He’s 6’5" and under 200 lbs., so he can only get stronger and better once he fills out. They made moves like drafting Sanchez with a $2.5M tag so they can make high-priced decisions like Von Rosenberg later on. I really hope they decide on a number and they bring him into the fold. Let the infusion continue!
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