Monday, January 5, 2004
The B Leagues Draft!
Last year I said the exclamation point was unwarranted, but we got 2 great pitching prospects, so that cannot be a bad draft. This year is a really bad draft.... I am glad we do not have the 1st pick, because there is no one I would want to take with it. All of the good players are slackers or injury prone.
There are 5 players that I would like to get, but not one of them excites me very much:
1: SS Shawn Smith, Mobile (20-R) Great glove and might hit eventually.
2: 3B Fernando Tello, Savannah (22-L) Great bat but would play RF for us and not all that well
3: SS Buddy Hollinger, Little Rock (19-R) I always like the teenagers. Has great range, but other aspects of his defense are suspect.
4: SS Sam Kowalski, Savannah (20-R) Really a 3rd baseman and outfielder. Will probably hit for some power eventually.
5: P Claude Sipple, El Paso (22-R) Only made 2 starts, but did not allow a run. Scouts love him, but why did he only make 2 starts? He was not injured. And we have no idea about his injury proneness since he only made 2 starts. Only struck out 5, too, in 17 IP. So that tells me he did not start more often because his coaches did not think he was ready. Might be one of those late bloomers our never bloomers....
That's it. There are no other pitchers I like at all. I was hoping I could snatch a reliever or two with an early pick, but there are none worth picking. Just a horrible draft for pitchers. There are 3 other hitters that I like a lot, expect they are injury prone.
I did not get even one of the shortstops I wanted.... They all went in the 1st round. Maybe I should have drafted Buddy Hollinger in the 1st round and hoped that Fernando Tello would last until the 2nd. P Claude Sipple went in the 2nd round to Memphis, 2 picks before we had a chance at him.... Not a good draft for us at all.... We need a 2nd baseman and a center fielder and relief pitchers and we got nothing that will alleviate those needs in this draft.