Rates & Barrels - Recapping Day 1 of the 2024 MLB Draft w/Melissa Lockard

Episode Date: July 15, 2024

Melissa Lockard joins Eno and DVR discuss Day 1 of the MLB Draft including the Guardians' decision to take Travis Bazzana first overall, Charlie Condon's outlook with a future that includes playing half of his games at Coors Field, top pitchers Chase Burns and Hagen Smith going second and fifth to the Reds and White Sox, respectively, Nick Kurtz's fit with the A's, Jac Caglianone's chances of continuing as a two-way player with the Royals, and a few intriguing picks outside of the Top-10, including switch-pitcher Jurrangelo Cijntje, who went 15th overall to the Mariners.  Rundown 1:05 The Guardians Select Travis Bazzana First Overall 4:47 Charlie Condon Heads to Colorado 7:15 The Growing Trend of Fast-Tracking Prospects 12:11 Chase Burns Goes No. 2 Overall to Cincinnati 16:13 A Draft That Went Largely to Script Up Top? 23:13 Nick Kurtz's Fit with the A's 26:00 Jac Caglianone & Two-Way Players In This Class 32:39 Hagen Smith to the White Sox (Smith v. Burns) 35:15 Trey Yesavage Slides to the Blue Jays at No. 20 38:17 Intriguing Players Outside the Top-10 Overall 46:31 Best Draft Class Foundations Through Day 1 Follow Eno on Twitter: @enosarris Follow DVR on Twitter: @DerekVanRiper Follow Melissa on Twitter: @MelissaLockard Join our Discord: https://discord.gg/FyBa9f3wFe Join us at 1p ET/10a PT on Thursday, July 18th for our next livestream! Subscribe to The Athletic: theathletic.com/ratesandbarrels Hosts: Derek VanRiper & Eno Sarris With: Melissa Lockard Executive Producer: Derek VanRiper Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Benefits vary by card, other conditions apply. Welcome to Rates and Barrels. It's Monday, July 15th. Derek Van Riper, Eno Saris and a special guest, Melissa Locker joins us today as we discuss day one of the MLB draft. Melissa, thank you so much for joining us today. Thanks for having me on. Did I read this right? This is the 20th draft you've covered now? Yeah. Yeah. I think 2004 was my first. So if I'm doing my math right, it's either 20 or 21.

Awesome, yeah, a lot of that, of course, focused on the A's over the years too, but a lot to talk about in this class, a college heavy top end of the class, which is exciting, I think, from a fantasy perspective, because those players tend to move to the big leagues a lot faster. So if you're in a keeper or dynasty league,

you can look at these players and maybe see them helping you by this time next year, or since the angels picked eighth, maybe by the end of this season, in the case of Christian Moore, we'll talk about a little bit later. But let's start at the top of the board where Travis Bazana was the first overall pick

of the Guardians. He was certainly in that conversation all spring. The interesting thing for me with Bazana is this, he's a second baseman. We don't normally think of second baseman as early first round picks and maybe that's the result of shift restrictions and being less of a place where you hide someone in the dirt than it was even a few years ago. But of course, Bazzana goes first overall because of his bat. So what type of impact are you expecting from Bazzana as he makes his way through that Guardian

system and eventually becomes a prominent part of that lineup? Yeah, I mean, I think eventually is probably quicker than it would be. I think he's a guy that's going to get there really fast. He's very polished. He's even played some pro ball in the summer leagues and also in Australia before he even came to the United States. So he's used to high level competition. He's got a great swing, great pitch recognition. And, you know, I think we put a lot of value on defensive positioning for the draft because you want to have a lot of options, right? And guys that play shortstop, guys that play center field can default to other things.

But I think when you're looking at players that you kind of know are going to get there fast and they're going to play a certain position, all positions are valuable. And if you can put somebody in there and say he's going to be an all-star at this position, I'm not so sure that you have to worry as much about the fact that he's just limited to the one,

because there's not as much of a need to have a safety net with some of these guys. And so I think that's what you saw. This isn't a class that had a ton of like super tools, the high projection guys. But I think you do see a lot of guys who can fit into big league lineups pretty quickly. And that's what you really saw, especially at the top of this this graph. It's interesting. Is there kind of a mini trend here with the second base thing? I mean, JJ Weatherholt and Christian Moore also second baseman. And traditionally I feel like a second base has been kind of a place that

organizations find a guy rather than draft a guy or try to require a guy. It's more like, um, used to be a shortstop. It used to be a third baseman, didn't have enough range, didn't have enough arm. Um, why is it a little bit of a ding on them athletically that they didn't play short for their teams? I do see that to some extent, they're from powerhouses, like from big colleges, that they have great short stops on their teams that that kind of pushed them to second or do you do you see there is a little bit of a question about that athleticism given that they played second in college? Yeah, I mean I think a lot of time is it has to do with arm, you know arm strength and and and kind of being

Limited to second base if the arm isn't there Weatherholic did actually play a decent amount of shortstop this year and would have played more had he not you know missed all that time With the hamstring and I think there is some thought that he'll go out as a shortstop and we'll sort of see what happens there Um, you know, I think Christian Moore has played a little bit of third base, too I think he might move around he could even be an option in left field But I think the the biggest trend more is that you're looking at the fact that you do have nine spots on the field um, and you want production from those nine spots and I do think that um, Teams are able to kind of coach up defense a little

bit better maybe than they used to be able to in the past. I don't think you necessarily see guys relying on their pure athleticism and even more to be great defenders. I think there's a lot of teaching and coaching involved that gets guys to to coach up. I mean there's a lot of guys playing shortstop in the big leagues now that we're not necessarily even shortstops in the early minors, which is interesting, you know, right?. That's kind of a different trend. I think that's part of it, but I think it's more just a matter of looking for the best hitters that you can find available. That's what you really saw yesterday.

Yeah. I want to skip the second pick for now and talk about the guy that went third because it was the Golden Spikes winner, Charlie Condon out of Georgia going to Colorado. We know hitters going into Colorado get that extra bump from Coors Field. But what do you think of Condon from a hit tool perspective? How difficult do you think it might be for him to make the adjustments of having to hit at altitude,

but then go away from altitude where pitches move differently? We've seen a lot of players struggle with that over the years. And Condon's a guy that had some pretty sharp home road splits during his time at Georgia. Yeah. I mean, he's an interesting guy just in general because he didn't really have much of a profile

coming into Georgia. He walked onto the program. He isn't a guy that was heavily recruited. So he's sort of been like an underdog, kind of late bloomer type. And I think it's a little hard sometimes to look at past trends with someone like that because it came on so quickly. On the other hand, you know, I think if you were looking for like a one-one sort of profile in a traditional draft, he was that guy in the sense that not only is he, you know, a power hitter who's got a good hit tool, very athletic, but he does have a chance

to stay up the middle and play in center field. Maybe more likely to move over to right, but like I think, you know, there's some athleticism there could even get some time at third base. I've seen, you know, kind of comps to, you know, Chris Bryant. Obviously, they're hoping for the Cubs Chris Bryant, not the Rockies Chris Bryant, but I think, you know, there's long levers, the power, you know, the ability to move around the field, just the pure athleticism. If he's able to continue the gains that he made at Georgia and carry those over, I think he's a really exciting player for Colorado. Does he have any similarities?

I mean, I guess he's not as fast as Lankford. Lankford is more of a 65, 70 runner, I guess. Yeah, I mean, I think he's not as fast, but he has a better arm. Like Lankford was always sort of a 65, 70 runner, I guess. Yeah, I mean, I think he's not as fast, but he has a better arm. Like Langford was always sort of a guy that you thought had to be put in left field a little bit because of the arm strength thing. So what you give away in one, you do another.

And again, I think it's sort of similar to shortstop. There's a lot of center fielders playing center field in the big leagues right now who you would not have pegged to be center fielders when they first came into the league. I think, again, teams are maximizing so much what they can get offensively from every position that you're seeing atypical players

at a lot of different positions. So he may be one of those more atypical, maybe Cody Bellinger type center fielder, that's not a guy that you would have imagined to be a center fielder, but he is. field or you know that's not a guy that you would have imagined to be a center fielder but he is you know the it also occurs to me to ask you what you think about um sort of trends in terms of moving guys fast um i feel like we're in a little bit of turbulence right now across baseball because of still because of covid because the loss here in the minors. But I think also

given stuff, you know, like literally like stuff plus or bat path grades or, you know, these, you know, kind of analytical process stats, there has been a little bit of like, Hey, I don't care as much about the results in the minors. He's he has three plus pitches. I think he's ready for the big leagues, right? He's doing he's making those swing decisions and hitting the ball hard. I think we can move them up. Do you have a sense of like which organizations push guys further than other guys, you know, like other organizations, you know, the joke is the angels. I know.

They're an outlier for outliers. I think what we can can necessarily, I think we could put Christian Moore in the lineup next week. But yeah, I mean, I think Miami baseball is in a really weird spot right now where, as you say, I think you can plug in a lot of these pitchers coming out of, say, double A into big league rotations, into big league bullpens, and know

what you're almost going to get based on the fact of you know what you're seeing from all the analytics that you know the pitch shapes and everything else that they're doing. Probably the the mental side of it is the one thing you can't predict as much like who's going to wither under that you know pressure and who isn't but it's a lot easier to translate what you're going to see in the big leagues with those pitchers with the pitchers. With the hitters, though, it's really been hard because in part, those pitchers are moving so fast there's no one good to face in the minor leagues. You're almost at the point where you're

looking at a situation where they're facing org guys, and you're trying to challenge hitters. And you're looking at the situation, too, where hitters are moving so quickly they're not learning to fail at different spots like they used to. So they're getting to the big leagues, they're failing for the first time,

and there's not that sort of learned ability to know where to dig yourself out of it. I think, you know, with Jackson Holliday, you saw that a little bit. You know, you mentioned the Oakland A's, they're gonna have an interesting decision coming up with Jacob Wilson. I think he's likely to get recalled

in the next couple of weeks. And he just hasn't been challenged at any level in the minor leagues at all. But there are questions about it. Which is not to say there aren't questions. Yeah, there are still questions about it. Right, yeah, but there are questions about his pitch decisions and the ones that he tends to swing at,

but he can hit all of them right now. And so do you keep him in a situation where he's continually getting hits off of pitchers he shouldn't swing at, or do you put him in the big leagues and actually have him face pitchers that can get him out with those pitches? And so I think more and more organizations are having to make decisions like that

because there's just such a big difference between the top talent in the minor leagues right now and everybody else. I don't think we've ever had such a huge schism between those two. Not since I've been covering it. Given all that, do you have a pick in this top 10 or in this draft of moving faster?

Yeah, I mean, so a lot of it depends on need too, right? Like I think Cleveland probably doesn't need to bring up somebody to their, well, I mean, they can use help in certain situations, but I don't think Travis Manzano is gonna be a guy they hope to help them win the pennant this year. But I think the angels are always gonna be your pick to move guys, not just Christian Moore,

but you look at Chris Cortez, you could see him in their bullpen pretty quickly. So these types of teams are gonna make these decisions fast, but obviously like Pittsburgh picking the first high school player, and that came at pick nine, Connor Griffin is going to not move quickly. And I think that was an interesting decision

from the perspective of they do have this young core that's now starting to get to the big leagues. And they've added somebody who isn't going to get there as fast, but definitely, I think, had the most talent in this draft class. So that was another decision that they had to make where do you try to time up his timeline with Paul Skeens and the guys that they've got going on in the next weeks right now, or do you look for the best player you can possibly

get? And I think they went with the latter, which I don't think is necessarily the wrong decision, but it's just an interesting decision to have to have made. Yeah, because there's probably a case for the Pirates to have taken Trey Savage, who fell all the way to the Blue Jays at 20 in that spot because they could add him to their rotation within the next calendar year. It wouldn't be that much of a stretch. I think Chase Burns is kind of interesting. He went second overall to the Reds.

I remember seeing some numbers about his fastball, absurd IVB. We talked about that all the time, a lot of ride on the fastball. It is important to point out the college baseball is a little bit different than the major league baseball. So there will be some fluctuations with things like that. You're gonna see some numbers that aren't necessarily replicated in pro ball, but 20 inches of ride on a fastball,

even with a college ball is really impressive. Fantastic numbers from Chase Burns at Wake. Is he going to be unfairly comp to Paul Skeens, who is just delivering an incredible rookie season for the Pirates right now, because Burns had really dominant numbers in college, and it does seem to have a big league arsenal that will help him move very quickly.

I hope not. I mean, I think it's sort of like when you see these draft shows and they start comping guys to Hall of Famers and All Stars, like that's just not fair, right? Like there is only one Paul Skeens and he was a once in a lifetime guy. You know, you might see a draft player like that, you know, every 10 years, every 20 years or whatever, but he's a unicorn. I think Chase Burns can be an outstanding major league starter, but to compare him to Paul Skeen is just, I don't think that would be fair. But

that said, I think he had such great stuff at Tennessee, and then he goes to Wake Forest. They have that pitching lab. He puts a lot of work in. He's coming, and it is an interesting situation to do. Some of these schools, these guys are getting to the big leagues with more data and understanding of what they're doing than some of these guys that have been in pro ball since they were in high school. So he's coming armed with knowing what he needs to do, of what has worked and what hasn't worked. And I have a feeling you get into what the Reds have

or what you built there, and things could even click faster for him. And what changes he'll see with the ride and everything else with the new ball should probably be more apparent to someone like him who's used to the data than maybe somebody who came from a program that didn't have a pitching lab like Wake Forest.

He also has more traditional stuff with like a capital S than Skeens did. I mean, we had people talking about Skeens fastball shape. Burns doesn't have that question, you know. And in terms of, you terms of being major league ready, having an 89, 90 mile an hour breaking ball, he could be in the pen, I feel like today. It's just a question of third pitch, kind of feel, getting through the order multiple times, seeing what the pro schedule is way different than the college schedule. you know, so, you know,

I could see him moving pretty fast with that starter package for sure. Yeah, and I think, you know, that's what's so interesting about the major league draft, right, like you have a situation where like Cleveland looking at one could have said, you know, we'll take this guy, put him in our bullpen. We need, yeah, we need.

And they could have, I mean, realistically, like at the Royals, I think was in 2014, right, where they did that with Greg Holland. I mean, I think there are situations where, maybe for the history of the franchise, if you thought this was your year, you might try to do something like that. That's so not the Guardians, though, right?

No, no, and it's probably not the best thing long-term. Like you only get a number, this is the first time they've picked number one in the history of the Cleveland franchise. That's a long time. So you're not gonna get an opportunity again. Exactly. Exactly.

So I mean, if you get a guy that's gonna be hitting 320 with 15, 20 homers and you know, like what you can see from Bizano year after year. I mean, I think that's probably worth, you know, kind of punting a little bit on the chance of having burns in your bullpen this year. I'm Diana Racini, senior NFL insider at the athletic. And I'm Chase Daniel. Diana used to cover me when I played quarterback in the NFL.

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Wherever you get your podcasts, we can't wait to get started. I was talking to an AGM and was talking about, I forget what pick or something. And I was talking about need, and I was like, y'all don't pick based on need, do you? And he was like, well, it can be like a tiebreaker sometimes, if you're like, well, we have a great this, and we could use a great that instead.

But I also think of Sam Blum's scathing piece this past week about the Angels all-pitcher draft. It was pretty good. I mean, the proof is in the pudding. They took all pitchers. Everyone was like, what is happening? Are they really doing this?

They had a whole draft full of pitchers and the only good ones that they picked are on other teams, it looks like. So it is interesting when you look at this draft and I think it was fairly vanilla in terms of how it turned out. Nobody did anything weird. That was one of the Keith's big takeaways. It was like, you know, of the top 30 I had 25 in my top 30, you know. Of the top 30, I had 25 in my top 30. Of the top of the first one's pick, nobody was not in my top 100. And I think we've seen, I was trying to think of the Red Sox first round pick.

Yeah. Nick York was like, that was way out of left field. Do we have a Nick York this year? I feel like the closest is theosavage dropping a little bit. But yeah, I mean, Braylon Payne went 17 to Milwaukee and I think they didn't necessarily think he was going to be a first round pick, but he was going to be very surly a day one pick. And I think what Milwaukee did the rest of the day one sort of made sense for

like what number they're going to get Payne to sign for is going to allow them to do other things. And they've done that, you know, last year they got Cooper Pratt in the sixth round and he's already in the futures game. And it was, you know, partly because they were able to save some money up top. And so if they knew they wanted him anyway and they weren't sure they were gonna get him

in their next pick, you know, it makes sense to get them at a discount there and then use that money to do some different things later on. But yeah, I don't think there was anything that was like crazy out to left field in terms of players that were there. And there certainly wasn't anyone scrambling at the desk looking for notes last night.

Like you every once in a while see that situation. You know, the Nick York one was interesting too, because like I had done a little piece on like Bay Area, you know, draft prospects for 2020. And he was a guy that had come up from folks here who had seen him right before the pandemic that were very excited about him, but you know, pandemic shut everything down,

he had come off an injury. And so I think that was a matter of like, that year was so strange that like the Red Sox probably saw him in a moment where he was, you know, getting what seeing out here, but the rest of the country hadn't necessarily been in at that particular time. So, that happens a lot with the draft because you're not looking at a college, you know, football schedule where everybody's on TV and you see exactly what you're looking at.

There's so many moments when a scout can see somebody that nobody else knows about that makes the pick make 100% sense in the draft room, but makes no sense to anybody outside of it. That, you know, for me, it's hard to judge, you know, draft picks as being like wrong or bad because we're not in the room with those kinds of conversations at this point. I guess last year, one of the big surprises,

head scratchers, whatever, was Xavier Isaac. And then he went and had a great time in the minors, I think. And then he had a really poor futures game. I mean, he's got a little more inconsistency. I think, you know, I think he's again, a high school first baseman is not if you're looking at prototypical positions, not to take off the board in the first round, high school first baseman are certainly not it. But then, you know, you look at like, you know, for instance, Matt Olson was a very high pick as. High school first baseman are certainly not it. But then you look at like, for instance, Matt Olson was a very high pick

as a high school first baseman. He wasn't first round, but he was in that compensation area. And I don't think anyone would disagree with that as a first round pick later on, right? Like it's just a matter of, it has to click in a very specific way. And if there's no fallback that somebody's gonna become some other position or do something else athletically, because if you're stuck at first base in high

school, there's kind of a sense of that's what's going. Um, I guess, you know, PJ, Orlando, um, going to the Marlins, I think at 16. Um, you know, he was somebody who was very polarizing. Um, I met him at the combine, great kid, um, hit the ball extremely hard. And I think really built back a lot of his value at the combine because he had a really crazy high school year where basically the high school coaches didn't pitch to him so he was intentionally walked like a ridiculous number of times, was hardly challenged at all but and he has an unusual setup he'd made some adjustments to it didn't really get to use them in game because no one was throwing in many pitches Yeah, right

So he you know so but he went to the combine got to show off a little bit of a toe tap Which he hadn't been using before he'd sort of been why ultra wide and no stride and you know that might have helped kind of Bring him back into the Marlins picture in terms of this is a guy who can hit for the kind of power that people Thought he could hit with when he won that home run derby last year at the at the high school all-star you know showcase so are at the all-star game the high school home run derby. So I think again those are the sort of decisions that you don't necessarily understand from the outside but you could see how it maybe it would have come together on the inside and it's I guess you know Peter Bendix would have been involved in the Xavier Isaac decision in Tampa. And now he's leading that decision for

For Moirlanda. He's got a type two. Who knows? He's okay with it. I mean, it makes me think a little bit of like, you know, raw materials versus somebody who's maxed out already. You know, I'm not going to say this about Burns because he went to but like if you had another person in his rotation that was at Wake Forest and you thought he was maxed out and you were comparing him to maybe a high school arm that hadn't had the same instruction.

I remember talking to who's the big slider guy in the Arizona bullpen? They thought he'd be a starter. He's like a slider guy in the Arizona bullpen that thought he'd be a starter? He's like a he's like a middle guy for them. Anyway, I he came out of Duke, I think. And I did. Oh, Bryce Jarvis. Bryce Jarvis. I did an interview with him and he was he he like I even asked him, do you feel maxed out?

Like, do you think you're getting the best of like you've done all the pitch changes you can. If he was talking that language, you know, so I wonder if with more Lando, I was also talking to Matt Walner recently about he was super wide and, uh, and he, and part of what the twins did was kind of shorten him and give him a, give him a kick, give him a step. And now he has like the second fastest bat speed in the big leagues. I'm, I'm not saying that Walner is you know the most amazing outcome but I think maybe with Marlando they saw like some raw materials they could work with. Yeah and you know and I did see him hit one that was like

450 you know and it was BP at the combine but I mean the the raw power there from a guy who you know maybe still needs some additional work on the setup is pretty impressive. So, you know, I think that's I think that was a lot there. And again, like he was a guy who I think if we had been having this conversation at this time last year, was someone who was in the discussion for, you know, top half of they liked him at that point, regardless of whatever noise came up with the weird high school season, then the pick makes more sense. But even then, I think none of those were so shocking that it was like, I can't believe they just made those picks the way that you've seen in some other drafts in past years. I think it's interesting that 20 years covering drafts for the A's, like so many teams feel like they change because the front office has changed, the personnel throughout the front office is different.

The A's, I think, are still somewhat predictable. Like I think there are players I look at and go, that makes sense. Nick Kurtz of the A's makes sense. College first base, not awake, nice floor. I think Keith put the Andrew Vaughn sort of comp on him, which is a more reasonable way to make comps, take players who are reasonably drafted and haven't hit their ceilings yet and say like that might be what you're getting. What do you think of Kurtz? How do you think he fits in with the A's and does he fit into this group of guys that could move pretty quickly through the minor leagues based on what he did in college? Yeah, I mean, I think he's a nice fit. You know, you can go back and forth on whether they should have taken

weather holder Montgomery instead. But I do think he fits a pretty good spot in their system. You know, they they have a lot of power. I mean, I think you saw that even just in Philadelphia this weekend. There's a lot of young players that can hit for a lot of power, but they like can't take a walk to save their lives, which is ironic, I think, given the organization's ethos. And, you know, they could use some guys that are coming in with, you know,

better plate discipline than they've had. They've been trying to build it in the system. And I don't know that they're necessarily having a lot of success building plate discipline within the system. So here's the guy that comes in that already has extremely good pitch recognition. He has a really strong idea of what he wants to do at the plate. His approach is very much like I'm only going to hit the things that I know I can do damage on and I'm not going to let pitchers beat me. He was a pitcher in high school. He says he still uses that

kind of mentality is he's at the plate. Like how would I get myself out? So I think that fits really well. They also frankly don't have any first baseman in their system. I mean I know that you know Tyler Soderstam's been playing first base and I think he's actually looked really athletic there and I think he could be a first baseman long term but if they like what he's doing and they think he could move around even to left field or get back behind the plate for like a third of the games or something, you know there's some flexibility there and beyond him it's like Will Simpson and in high A and there are no other real first baseman in that system. So he there's a lot of room for him to move up pretty quickly. And,

you know, I think he he speaks their language already, they've always drafted well out of that area of the country. Neil Avon's been their area scout there for a long time, has done a really great job. So they know that way program in and out in terms of just, not just what you see on the paper, but who the kids are. So I think it's a fairly safe pick for them. And it is probably one that they could match up with the younger guys that are coming up pretty quickly,

sort of different to what we had talked about with the younger guys that are coming up pretty quickly, you know, sort of different to what we talked about with the pirates. There was a there was a couple, you know, interesting multifaceted players. You got Jack Caglia known for the to the Royals announced as a two way player. Keith said, you know, so much power that he's probably not going to pitch much. And then Sancha, the, Gerangelo Sancha, he was announced as a switch-handed pitcher, which is weird because we don't, you know, we don't announce people as switch-handed hitters. So I guess a switch pitcher was the term that Keith came up with.

So, you know, you have these guys, I think of the guy that the A's had for a while that was the, that pitch was- Vendetti. Yeah, Vendetti. And I think of just most recently, the two guys that the Giants picked, in Bryce Eldridge and Reggie Crawford, who were both two way guys, um, and kind of announced as such and coached as such.

Um, you know, they've all kind of, they're all, they've all become one faceted, you know, the ones that we've done in the past. Um, even, you know, I think Van Dede, like, had a better side, you know, and so, you know, scouting reports on Sanchez say he's a better right-handed reliever. So I wonder if you just have any thoughts about, you know, the possibility that we get another Otani or we get a like a legit switch pitcher, you know, or does or is there's just the way that baseball works as they find the thing you do best and you gravitate towards the things you do best because you're just trying to optimize outputs really. It's all sort of about efficiency and stuff.

So I'm just wondering if you had any thoughts about that kind of trend and that idea. Yeah, I mean, I think in the case of Cagliadone, I'd be curious as to why they announced him as a two-way player. I think that even just listening to the Royals talk In the case of Kev Leonhoun, I'd be curious as to why they announced him as a two-way player. I think that even just listening to the Royals talk about him after the draft, it didn't really sound like they had that.

They just kept talking about his power or whatever, right? Maybe that was something that Jack really wanted. But he's going to be a hitter. I think the arm is very special, but there's so much to do to get him to be a really good pitcher that I think it would be very detrimental to his development as a hitter to have to be doing that much work as a pitcher. Plus, you did already have Tommy John surgery. And do you want a situation where your big middle of the order bat blows out his elbow because he's going to be a late inning, like a middle inning reliever for you.

Like, because I think that's probably his more likely outcome is it, is it. It's even hard. I mean, this is hard structurally as a manager to even make him your closer because of like, he has to be somehow warming up. Yeah. The Mets took Carson bench and they did not announce him as a two way player, but he was, um, you know was as much a two-way player as Jack was for Oklahoma State.

And ironically, he actually joined Nolan McLean in that med system. They were roommates at Oklahoma State, both two-way players. But Nolan's going to be more of a pitcher. And I think almost everyone saw Carson as going to be more of an outfielder. But legitimately, he's got an arm. You could see him being, um, you know, uh, a reliever in the big leagues and,

and somewhat quickly. And what he said, he did, he'd be a closer at Oklahoma. So he would warm up in the outfield. Like his center fielder was his throwing partner. He would warm up in the outfield and then run in from right feet to right field to, to be like as a manager or as like a GM, I'm like, eee. Oh, I know, I know. Is there a way for two people to get hurt in my outfield at the same time?

Like one guy throws 98 and the other guy's, unprotected place. Yeah, no, it's fascinating. But at the same time, the movie cinema of that, riding in, he's hit two home runs and he comes in But at the same time, like the movie cinema of that, you know, riding in, he always hit two home runs and he comes in and he's the closer. Oh man, yeah. I thought Otani would end up, honestly,

that's what I thought Otani would be. baseball was so much for Sunday. Right? Maybe we will get to that point. Maybe that's where, I mean, I'm sure it's biased because of his size and the Florida thing, but like, Kevley and on looks a little like AJ Puck, you know, like the way that he when he's throwing the ball, right? So, you know, you can see that sort of like, hits a bunch of home runs, and then runs out there and does AJ Puck things at the end of the end of the game. I mean,

it probably won't happen, but it'd be sort of fun to imagine it happening. And I think, you know, again, when people can do more than one thing, and that's sort of fun to imagine it happening. And I think, you know, again, when people can do more than one thing, and that's sort of what we talked about with, when you had someone who can play shortstop, is the possibilities are more, you know, you have more options for like where that career can go.

I mean, you look at like dating back to Sean Doolittle. He was this two-way player at Virginia. They took him as an outfielder, first baseman. He was gonna be a big leaguer as an outfielder, first baseman, and if he hadn't gotten hurt, but when he did get hurt, he had pitching to fall back on and 13 years later or whatever, he's got a long big league career.

So having options is always good. I think with Sting, he's so unusual in the fact that we've never had a switch pitcher who can legitimately blow hitters away from both sides, right? Like, he's 92 from the left side even. Like, you know, that's, that's way different than Mendetti as good as he was. And you know, he's, yeah, he was, he was a finesse guy, somebody who, you know, used deception.

I don't think there's a lot of deception that he needs from either side, Tarantulo. So like, I think what he can do, we don't know yet. Like the possibilities are kind of endless. And I think he tends to be more, to favor the right side, even against right-handed, you know, left-handed hitters at times, especially if the platoon splits work that way. But if he can pull left-handed out of the pocket against,

you know, like say he's going along right- hand, right hand or right handed, but there's a there's a hitter that comes up that just kills right handed pitching and he can just switch into that a couple times a game. You know, that that sort of option is pretty like we've never really had anything like that. Right. So I think it's pretty cool. And you know, Seattle has such a good system right now that that was an interesting and good risk to take at that point because they can take their time with him a little bit. With the way things are, their pitching is really good and young. They've got a lot of good young hitters already in there.

So why not kind of see how this looks and then figure it out as they go along. I'm curious looking back at the top of the board just again for a minute, like the White Sox got Hagen Smith at five and Burns at two versus Smith at five. That was a fair toss up. I think looking at those two guys, who do you like better or how do you compare those two guys at least as very productive college pitchers that should be successful as big league starters? Yeah. I think it depends on if you know, it depends on like if you're somebody

who just is always going to favor a left handed pitcher, if you have the opportunity to have a left handed starter that can dominate, right, like, because those are kind of rare. On the other hand, I think Burns is stuffed and, you know, would be the

more of the expert on this and that. But I think his stuff does great out a little bit higher than Smith's just from like the raw, you know, like numbers of it. But, yeah, Smith, I mean, he was good and he was good consistently. I mean, that that game he pitched against Oregon State, you know, back at that Globe Life Classic, I think Keith has said, like,

Scouts have said it's the best college pitch game they've ever seen. You know, like that's that's unusual. And he kind of stepped up to the plate all the time. You know, he's kind of built in a way that's a little slight that you kind of worry, oh, will he be able to hold up over, you know, 180, 200 innings? But other than that, yeah, I mean, I think that's, you know, the White Sox need everything, obviously, but I think I think he's a good fit for them. I think he could get there pretty quickly for them as well.

I think, you know, the whole mustache curly hair thing is going to play great in Chicago. And if you can get a good left-handed starter, that's a great way to start building rotations. So if crochet is not going to be there much longer, he's the guy that could come in there maybe in a year or so and take its place. Yeah, one thing from the stuff angle that's interesting about the two is that Burns has really good ride, but he has it from a more vertical release point. So that's sort of a little bit more expected ride, whereas Hagen has a lower release point on that. And that's kind of what teams are kind of analytically looking for.

I've even had pitchers be like, I wish I was shorter, which is kind of really backwards for what it used to be like. And so I could see Hagen having a little bit more sort of deception on the same amount of ride or whatever. And then again, like, I'm not sure where this is anymore, but you kind of almost want to give a left-hander an extra mile or two when you're in terms of miles per hour when you're judging them. Just because there's fewer of them, they don't have the same VLO generally, and their VLO plays up often. So, you know, I like that. One thing that stood out to me, Jeff Fontes did a piece with Stuff stuff plus in it over at baseball prospectus was that you savage was not I wouldn't say better than either two, but I would say in their class. And, you know, he has, according to Jeff, a 22 inches of vertical, which is just like that.

We don't have that in the big leagues. And he was like, well, it might have been a misread. It might, you know, may not read that as such on Hawkeye, you know, the major league pitch tracking, but he was like really, you know, really liked your Savage's mix. The stuff plus was on, on par with the other three. So I guess that was just a little bit more

of draft dynamics that you Savage fell. We talked, we talked a little bit about this, but. Yeah, I was actually that that was very surprising to me that he fell out of the top 15. I mean, I think I thought sort of 13 or so sounded like it was gonna be his floor and to get to 20. You know, I think Toronto too, like to get somebody like him,

you know, they've added some high school arms and high school hitters in the last few years at that spot that have sort of taken a little time to get going, have had some injuries. You look at Ricky Titanin's having another injury issue now. You know, they need help more immediately. And you know, they're I think probably going to be rebuilding here in a couple of weeks anyway. But like, you know, he is a guy who, you know, the angels were tied to him for a long time, because people thought he could plug into their rotation in like two weeks, right? So it looks like a really like a nice wide arsenal. It's like four good. Yeah. And it's unusual. I mean, it's I think, I think the big question for him is from what

Keith has said is that, you know, the mechanics are such that you do sort of wonder like, is that going to hold up for a starter? Is it is it going to be more reliever ish long term? But you know, he the only injury he had was that dry needling thing that had nothing to do with pitching. And, you know, he was very durable. He came back after that and beat Chase Burns. What thing? He so he had a collapsed lung at the end of the season. He had to miss the AAC final, I think it was. But he came back and pitched in the regional against Wake Forest

and beat Chase Burns after that, having had that happen. But there was some thought that maybe that had allowed like had him slip on a few words. I don't know why that would be because it clearly, you know, he's, he seems fine. But you know, he's, that is one where, you know, the durability has, has been there and from the college perspective, with the exception of that very freak thing that happened. So you know, I thought Toronto got really good value there. And it is somebody that, yeah, if you were gonna see someone move fairly quickly,

I think he could be one of those guys. They may not push him much this year, just given the long college season, but next year, start out and high A and move pretty fast from there. I thought it was interesting that the Orioles took Vance Honeycut just because the strikeout rate in college is pretty high.

And I think when we consider the limited quality of pitching at so many places, that seems riskier right now. But the Orioles have kind of shown this ability with some of the guys they have in the big leagues right now of improving strikeout rates, moving through the minor league system, like they might have an ability to improve plate discipline. So I'm just curious, are there certain picks you saw where the organization's gonna give you more confidence in them ultimately being right about the player

and is Honeycutt one of those picks? Yeah, I mean, I think it's certainly made sense for the Orioles, given what they have been doing. You know, he, like Honeycutt is up there with Griffin in terms of tools, right, for this draft being maybe elite among everybody else. He can do everything but the hit tool, which is so weird thing to say because the hit tool is pretty important. But he's a grade 70 defender, grade 70 runner. He's got big power. So it's just if he can hit it enough. But we have seen a lot of those guys in professional baseball

and that one thing becomes too insurmountable to really come together. The Orioles have done a very good job. I'm hearing Joe Adele a little bit as we're talking about it. Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of them, right? Like Michael Choice, right? Like there's so many of these guys that have everything except that one thing.

And I think with the Orioles, they have had a lot of success with a good number of these guys that have everything except that one thing. And I think with the Orioles, they have had a lot of success with a good number of their guys. They've had some guys, though, that are still showing the same tendencies that they showed in college in the minor leagues right now. So I don't think it's a guarantee of anything. But I do think that if you are a scouting department and you trust your coaching staff

to coach up certain areas, absolutely you should go take the tools that are best if you believe that your coaches can help a guy. If they do, then I think that's the way you should do this. If you're a major league organization, you should be investing on the best coaches that you can because if you can find talent and have coaches that can translate that talent, you're going to be outpacing everybody.

And if the Orioles feel that way right now, and proof seems to be in the pudding at the moment, the Honeykettle will be a good pick. One thing that can happen is you can make a strength into a weakness by saying, oh, we have really good, we developed pitchers really good, let's just take hitters for the first four rounds and not putting good stuff good stuff into you know, the quote-unquote meat grinder or whatever. You know, putting you know, in terms of like, Sancha, I like that. I like that pick because they are a good organization, it seems for developing pitching. And why not take a high pick and put somebody with like a lot of upside into that, you know, because you can argue either

way, you know, you can be like, Oh, we can develop this up. So let's take a guy who can't strike out who strikes out too much and hope our coaches can fix it. We think we think we can do that. Why not take somebody who, you know, does make contact making even better, you know, so I don't know, every team that we give the kind of bulletproof, you know, every team that we're like, this is the team, they know what they're doing, just give them another draft. I also think too, it kills me when people are like, oh, these guys can't develop X kind of prospect,

we should never take that prospect. Then the problem is the coaching, right? Like you can fix that, you're not stuck with the same coaches forever, you know, like you can bring somebody in. Well, the days are. You know, but I mean, like, but it's like that, that shouldn't be the thing that the thing should be you find the best coaches there so that you can take the best talent. You know, if that's what the the Orioles have found that they're doing now, doing now, obviously, I think if you look at their organizational

strength right now, they could use some pitching, but if the best pitching wasn't there at that point in the draft, it's silly to bypass it, a hitter that you can turn something into just because you wanna force it with a pitcher. Is that Ken Kameniddi's kid that went to the Braves? No, no, it's his cousin. Oh, okay. Which, so Kam, he sat on the, Is that is that Ken Caminiti's kid that went to the braes? No, no, it's his cousin. Okay.

Which so Cam, he said on the call, he was not born yet when Ken was playing, if you want to feel, yeah, but you know, he was an interesting one because the giants were connected to him, I mean, for more than a year and it was very interesting to see them go with the more fast track established outfield bat, given the pace at which they've moved a lot of their prospects over the last couple of years. They went with a guy that should probably move fairly quickly over the longer play high school pitcher that they had been sort of remembered to be connected to for a while. So I'm curious, we've got a handful of picks in for a few teams already.

Who's got the best foundation as far as the possible best draft classes so far based on the early portion of the draft this year? Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, it's a little early because I like to, I think the day two picks are really important. And so I would hate to shortchange what's gonna go on today. I like what Colorado did. I think if you're gonna maximize those two picks and picking from where they picked,

they did a really good job there. I think Kansas City, both Star Power and what they've got coming in is pretty good. I'm always intrigued by what Milwaukee does. I think what they put together every year, you know, is just, is really fascinating. And, you know, even though theirs was sort of the surprise, why did you take that guy that early kind of thing?

I think you could start to see the shape of what they were doing with the rest of the picks in day one. So- They took both high schoolers? Yeah, yeah. And where's the penning team? They also took Blake Burke, who, you know, I mean,

you know, he's an East Bay guy out here from De La Salle High School, so I followed him a long time, but you know, he's a big power guy, first base, he could move pretty quickly from Tennessee. So they have a pretty good variety there. But you know, they've got three high school pitchers, But they've got three high school pitchers, Blake Burke, the big first baseman and a high school outfielder. And so it's an interesting mix there. And they have the teams that have money to play with a little bit too.

The Nationals picking up extra room and being able to take Seaver King at the top and then still kind of swing big later on with that extra cap room is good. And, you know, I think Caleb Loma Vida, who was their last pick, the cow catcher, you know, he obviously needs work with pitch recognition, but he's the best athlete at the catching position,

I felt like from this draft, and should be kind of an interesting guy to follow. Pirates follow up a high school shortstop with a high school shortstop. Yeah, yeah, well, again, I think the question is, you know, I mean, Connor Griffin's big. Like he's, when I met him at the combine, like he was the most physically imposing player

of the guys I met. Maybe he sticks with shortstop because now guys can be six, seven, but I, you know. They have a six, seven shortstop. Exactly, but I could very well see him playing a really good center field too, so I don't think that's probably going to run into a big problem for them. As they say in baseball, it's a good problem to have and it'll work itself out. Right, well, I mean you just wonder if it'll work

itself out for that regime. I mean it's like they're probably feeling some pressure to win. Yeah, you would hope so. They didn't panic though. No, but with the talent they have right now, you would hope that something starts to come together pretty soon there because it would be a shame to waste any of the years of some of these guys that they've got on the roster. I was just thinking, it looks like Braden Montgomery

might be one of the first round air quotes values, right? Guys that slipped a little more than expected. The Red Sox getting him at 12 when I think he was fourth or fifth on a lot of boards. That's kind of a good start. And what you do on day two determines whether or not you just got a good value in round one, or if you actually put together a really nice collection

of talent on top of getting a player that may not have been there. J.J. Weatherholt going to the Cardinals at seven, probably sets up the Cardinals for a little more of a boost in this draft than expected, because I don't know if many people thought he'd actually be there for them. Yeah, I mean, you know, the Red Sox,

that's two years in a row. Kyle Teal really kind of slipped down to them too. So, you know, they've been, I wouldn't say fortunate because like, you know, they still could have passed on him, but I think they did a really good job there both years with getting the player that probably had the highest value at that moment. Yeah, and I think what was also interesting

is they took a pitcher in the second round. And Jen McCaffrey noted that that's the first time they've picked a pitcher in the first two rounds since 2017 when they took Tanner Hawk. So the influence of seeing, you know, Breslow and seeing Andrew Bailey and all that kind of pitching infrastructure they're starting to build with the Red Sox

that they really didn't have the last few years. I think you sort of see that influence there and it'll be interesting to see what they do in day two too. The Montgomery's fell maybe because of, I mean, he was wheeling himself around on the whole. It was an interesting look, right? Yeah. Yeah, like here's our first round pick. He's got an ankle that doesn't work. It's so weird because like, obviously, A, I'm not a doctor and B, I have no, you know, look at these medical reports.

Everyone says that it's not going to be a problem. So that it's a non-bearing bone, ankle, whatever that means, and so we should just be totally trusting that it's going to be fine. Ankle injuries always scare me, but at the same time, again, he's a very, very talented hitter, switch hitter, which there's not that many of those, even pro ball at all anymore, let alone at this point in the draft. He was actually a two-way player at Stanford before he went to Texas A&M, huge arm, and a really good athlete, extremely smart kid. So, there's a lot of upside with someone like him. And if the ankle's not gonna deteriorate into termites, like Grant likes to say about Carlos Correa's ankle,

I think that's right. Yeah, right. Correa's ankle's what I was thinking about. I just saw a plantar fasciitis for Carlos Korea going into the all-star break. Fantastic. Yeah, I went on to see. Yeah. I feel like I can't remember the names off the top of my head, but there were a couple other guys that sort of fell due to injury. Yeah. I mean, injuries are such a funny thing because it's like,

again, we don't see the medicals. And what I thought was most interesting when I was at the combine this year is how much of the time those guys spend like literally in MRI tubes. Like that's the all these guys get like fully body scanned and all that. So there was a benefit to going to I saw something there was a benefit to the player if he went to the combine and the benefit to the teams was they get like their own, their own medicals. So you go through a full medical through the combine. Basically, if a player agrees to go through the full medical at the combine and they get selected, they have to be offered at least I think 75% of

slot, um, even if some of the other goals that would scare off a player. So like in the Kumar Rocker situation, had he gone through those medicals there, he would have been guaranteed a certain amount of money that the Mets would have had to pay at that point. But he hadn't gone through the medicals because probably- They couldn't even refuse to sign him

after seeing the medicals? I guess, no, I mean, I think if they, if they, if yeah, if they take him, because they already have the medicals going in. So I guess they have the information ahead of them. If they make the decision to go forward anyway, then they have to do 75%. Yeah, they can't, they've got to do the 75%. I don't know that anyone's ever actually gotten to take advantage of that yet. But there were a lot of guys going through those MRI tubes at the combine.

So I think it's certainly an option that a lot of those guys were taking. Nothing about an MRI looks fun. Like at zero parts. I've done several. They look terrible. Yeah, look at the little classical music on with the headphones while you're in there.

It's not. Cause it's like classical music and then the beeping and the bangs. Yeah, that's really- I didn't get that. I just got the beeping and bangs and the white. You're just looking at white. And yeah, no, it's really.

I you would have to think of all the medical advancements. That's one they've got to figure out about. How to get a TV in there. Yeah, like at the dentist, you know, they give you exactly. That's been wonders for dentistry for kids. I'm sorry. And adults too. I appreciated that last time I had to go to the dentist.

Melissa, is there anyone we haven't talked about either that got drafted already or will be drafted in the next 48 hours that you thought has a particularly interesting story or maybe someone that could be a little bit of a deep sleeper that people aren't necessarily talking enough about. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I think this was a pretty straightforward class. I really like Slay Caldwell. I think that pick at 29 for the Arizona Diamondbacks

was really fun. He's listed at five nine, there's no way, but he's very physically built, really tools out, very 80 grade on his personality. And I think they've shown already, they can do pretty well with diminutive outfielders with good tools. So, you know, he's kind of a fun guy. I'll be interested to see where Michael Massey goes today, the Wake Forest pitcher. He had pitched through back pain like the entire year this year, had back surgery after the season.

But he was really impressive when talking, and it was fine walking around three weeks later after the back surgery, which was kind of remarkable to me. But he was really interesting in terms of talking to you about pitching, and I think he's somebody that maybe an injury has obviously pushed him out of day one, but could be an interesting one to like see a couple of years from now. Cause he may be day one value and day two.

Love that we're getting another Michael Massey in the pool. I know. No, I think it's great. I would say there's gonna be another Jared Jones taken today too. We already have two Max Muncie. So no, we're gonna, I think a whole like all star team of people with the same names on either side would be just amazing. So all my Excel sheets. Oh yeah, those. Will Smith, the Luis Garcia's.

They've been cooked for a while now. Before we let you go, Melissa, one last question. Do you know why this draft is being held at Cowtown Coliseum of all venues? I don't know. I don't know. There's so many things I don't understand. Last night, I think ESPN just turned off their program after the 30th pick.

MLB Network, they were just announcing the picks for the rest of the night at the desk. Melanie did a great job, but they weren't announcing them at the Cowtown place. They were just putting their names up on a board, which is kind of crazy. I mean, these are like first round equivalent talents to not treat it that way. Major League Baseball makes some very interesting decisions when it comes to production value and also promoting the young people in there.

I mean, they're holding their all-star pressers right now in the middle of day three, you know, day two, third round picks. Like, why are we shoving this all into one weekend? Like, you know, give these things some space. Um, you know, I'd really like to let these kids have more, um, time to be known and talked about because we've already moved on to the home run Derby, you know, like it's, it's, it's not really fair to a lot of the work that goes into this to have it kind of blinked away like that. So, but yeah, Cowtown, I mean, if you're really trying to relate

to the kids, we got a gift now of Rob Manfred coming through saloon doors, which we really have a lot of things we can have to do with that. Yeah. I mean, I'm glad we have that now. That's cool. But yeah, it's, it's always great to catch up to Melissa. Great insight. Thanks for taking the time to join us today. Yeah, thanks for having me on. I appreciate it. So we're going to head out.

Quick reminder before we go, you can get all of our draft coverage from The Athletic at theathletic.com slash rates and barrels. Get a subscription. It's $2 a month if you don't have one already. Hopefully you already have that. You can find us all on Twitter. You can find Melissa at Melissa Lockard.

Find Eno at EnoSaris. Find me at Derek VanRyper and find the pod at Rates and Barrels. It's going to do for this episode of Rates and Barrels. We're back with you on Tuesday. Thanks for watching!