Evaluating the Twins Draft

The Twins had five picks in the first 100 places this year. As I pointed out earlier, after the first 100 picks the draft really is a crapshoot. There will be players who make the big leagues but they will be few and far between. In the 130th spot in the draft, three players have made it to the big leagues from the last 20 years. Two of those had three at bats between them. Only Eric Byrnes contributed anything at the big league level.

After taking Byron Buxton in the first round, the Twins seem to have focused on hard throwing pitchers who will move through the system quickly. Even the high school kid, Jose Berrios, taken with the 32nd pick looks like he is pretty polished for a high school pitcher. The three college kids  taken with the next three picks, Luke Bard, Mason Melotakis, and JT Chargois,  all project as relief pitchers with some closer potential on the upside. Chargois, who mostly played first base in college as well as closing, may not develop as quickly as the others.

Its likely the Twins will give some of these guys a chance to develop the pitches to be starters the same way they did Carlos Gutierrez, a first round pick fin 2008. Guttierez is now a reliever at AAA who has had some injury issues this year, but still projects as a solid bullpen contributor with a great sinking fastball. I would expect the pitchers taken in this draft to end up in that same spot.

The last kid the Twins took with their top 100 picks was Adam Walker, a high school hitter with tremendous power. He lacks a defensive position. He has the speed to play a corner outfield spot, but a below average arm.  And there are doubts that he will make enough contact to make use of all that power. He is the kind of high risk - high reward player that makes sense this late in the draft.

In fact, you could say the same of all these guys except Buxton. This was projected as a weak draft and it appears the Twins have gone after players with plus major league skills, rather than load up on guys with at best average major league potential.

The rest of the draft isn't meaningless, but any evaluation of it is. The simple truth is no one taken beyond the first 100 picks is at all likely to provide much benefit at the major league level. They all have that potential, or they wouldn't be drafted,  but picking out the ones that will defy that rule is a fools game.