SELKIRK STEELERS & THE DISPERSAL DRAFT
The excitement in the Selkirk war room was palatable. We knew with 3rd and 4th pick, we would not be getting either of the all-stars in their prime Cole Hamels and Ryan Zimmerman, but still had a huge number of choices to choose from. So after looking at the options we reached for the stars and rolled the dice on the best prospect in baseball SS Jurickson Profar. The safer shortstop pick was Ian Desmond and his big 27 year old year, but 2013 wasn’t our year so looking down the road we went with Profar. The next pick was tough but we went with Josh Johnson he was once worth more than Hamels, but like Florida disappointed and his value fell.
When our 9th and 10th pick came, I didn’t expect the first round Baystate to be gone at that point. I had dreams of getting another mega prospect like the young Toronto catcher of the future Baystate lost on the three year role but it was snapped up by New York 7th overall. So instead we picked up Minor who really did well the second half after a brutal start, and a player we had going sixth Mark Trumbo. Trumbo isn’t my kind of player poor strikeout to walk ratio but his power is real and the fact he plays third, outfield and first gave us flexibility.
I won’t bore you the reader with more details but we felt overall in the draft that we picked up quite a bit of value at starting pitching then we thought possible in a 28 team league a rotation of Johnson, Minor, Hammels, McAllister, Floyd, Alvarez and Collmenter. Our bullpen didn’t do well in 2012 but does have nice arms in Reed, Melancon, Walden. Not great pitching but solid enough not to have to worry for the next 3-5 years. We got way more prospects (Beltre, Biddle, Clemens, Gibson, Green, Jacobs, Lamb and Springer) then we figured, to the point where I fell I picked a couple too many. We really like Kyle Gibson and George Springer. Biddle and Lamb are great with regards to talent but the chances they play in the majors next year are very iffy so they may well be lost picks. Green, Beltre and Clemens while not shining stars should be call ups in 2013 and add some roster depth.
We got far fewer good draft picks then we hoped as we were shutout out of rounds 1, 3, 4 and 5 that will hurt come the league draft day. We can field a lineup it’s not great but the fans in Selkirk should be prepared for some fun baseball, a rebuilding team that should win about 70 games with decent pitching and some power.
As a GM I am always interested in trades my plan is to be a quality team in three to five years, so if you have plans to win now we would be willing to move value now (Trumbo, Dunn, Dirks, Cuddyer and Hammel) for increased value then.
A special thanks to Stray and Stacy who did an amazing job of the draft, whack was completed is just two hours without missing a beat!