Pirates can’t afford mistake with top draft pick
PITTSBURGH – Baseball’s amateur draft is an inexact science, with far more failures than successes, and millions of dollars thrown at first-rounders – 35 percent of whom will never play a game in the majors. There is one time when a team is not expected to fail in the draft. That’s when it has the No. 1 overall pick, as the Pittsburgh Pirates do Tuesday on the first day of the majors’ two-day, 50-round June draft.
The No. 1 choice is supposed to be a lock, a star of the future, a can’t-miss selection, yet sometimes they do miss. In 1966, the New York Mets took the long-forgotten Steve Chilcott with the No. 1 pick; Oakland, choosing next, got a future Hall of Famer named Reggie Jackson.
The No. 1 pick in a very deep 1985 draft wasn’t Barry Bonds, as might be expected today with the benefit of 17 years of hindsight; instead, the Milwaukee Brewers selected catcher B.J. Surhoff in a draft that also produced Will Clark and Barry Larkin. Bonds didn’t go until the sixth pick, to Pittsburgh.
That’s why the pressure in on general manager Dave Littlefield as he oversees his first Pirates draft. With the prospect of a club-record 10th consecutive losing season this year, the Pirates simply can’t afford to make a mistake when they draft first overall for only the third time.
But with no clear-cut star such as last year’s No. 2 pick, pitcher Mark Prior, who is already in the Chicago Cubs’ rotation, the margin for error is high.
“In a perfect situation, you’d love to take the guy who is closest (to reaching the majors) but also has the best potential with the fewest risks,” he said. “Unfortunately, those kind of guys just aren’t out there this year.”
Strapped for cash a few years ago, several Pirates first-rounders were chosen not because they were the best player available, but because they were the best the Pirates could afford. In 1998, for example, they took left-hander Clint Johnston when many scouts were projecting him as only a second-rounder; he has since left their organization and is still in the low minors.
This time, Littlefield said, the Pirates will get the best player. The problem is that scouts widely disagree on exactly who that player is.
The Pirates trimmed their list to three prospects – Ball State pitcher Bryan Bullington, Virginia high school shortstop B.J. Upton and British Columbia prep pitcher Adam Loewen – but all three have flaws lacking in past No. 1s.
A year ago, for example, Prior was a star at Southern Cal and was widely considered one of the top college pitchers ever. By contrast, the right-handed Bullington has excellent numbers (10-2 record, 2.11 ERA, 126 strikeouts in 93 1-3 regular season innings), but at mid-major Ball State. And he was roughed up in his first tournament start.
The Pirates have scouted Upton and Loewen extensively, but both are high-school players and thus are more of a risk than a college player.
Pirates scouting director Ed Creech rates Bullington as a No. 3 starter in the majors or slightly better – not exactly a ringing endorsement for a No. 1 overall pick who figures to command at least a $4 million signing bonus.
“You can find pimples on everybody,” said Creech, who ran the St. Louis Cardinals’ draft when they chose J.D. Drew in 1998. “We’re trying to find the ones with the least acne. Obviously, you’d like to come into a year like last year with a clear-cut No. 1 guy like a Prior, but that guy isn’t out there.”
And while Prior clearly seemed to be the best player in the 2001 draft, he didn’t go No. 1. The Minnesota Twins felt they couldn’t afford him and instead took Minnesota high school catcher Joe Mauer, who got a $5.15 million signing bonus. Prior, the No. 2 pick, cost the Cubs a $4 million signing bonus, plus a $10.5 million, five-year major league contract and an immediate spot on the 40-man roster.
“I think we have to make the No. 1 a good pick no matter what,” Creech said. “I think we have to make every pick from 1 to 50 a good pick, but there’s a lot more limelight when you’re picking No. 1 – and it’s a little more glaring when make a mistake.”
Just ask former Mets executive Joe McDonald, who helped pick Chilcott rather than Jackson and was never allowed to forget it.
Not that the Mets were alone in failing. According to Baseball America, which extensively covers amateur baseball, only 64.9 percent of the 774 first-rounders from 1965-95 played even one game in the majors.
And while the Pirates’ best pick ever was Bonds in 1985 after five teams passed on him, they’ve had numerous first-round failures; of their 35 first-rounders since 1965 (they didn’t have a pick in 1979), only Richie Hebner, Bonds, Jeff King (No. 1 overall in 1986) and Jason Kendall became solid, successful major leaguers. The jury is still out on the No. 1 pick in 1996, pitcher Kris Benson.
“We’ve got to deal with the cards we’re dealt,” Creech said. “If we only have two pairs, that’s what we’re going to bet on. Hopefully, though, we’re going to have a full house.”