metafour

Van Eyk was a great value pick (talent relative to signing bonus), especially if you consider that he could have potentially gone much higher had COVID not shut the season down. He seems to be fairly underrated by message-board standards and I'm not sure why - there's some obvious control concerns there, but he flashes 3 plus pitches and plus pitch metrics.

This regime's draft planning and execution is absurdly good. They have signed EVERY Top 10 round draft pick they have made. Every single one.

5th round pick Carter Baumler is a HS pitcher who will get $1+ million as well.

Max Meyer signing for $6.7 million assures that Martin would be the 2nd highest paid player in the draft - so he's still getting paid like the "#2 pick". There is virtually zero upside in him turning down a ~$7 million offer.

If he wants him to sign to an amount like the first overall, he should have gone first overall. He didn't. I'm not "worried" because there isn't any real incentive for him to not sign for what will ultimately be an over-slot offer somewhere in the slot value of 3rd overall. We will not forfeit draft picks to sign him.

Its a joke comment which is meant to parody the overly simplistic reasoning that was brought up as "analysis" for why Asa Lacy supposedly isn't good (a conclusion which isn't even true by any measure of comparison). Thats kinda the entire point: if Nick Gonzales is such an elite hitter, and Asa Lacy supposedly isn't any good...how are you gonna strike out on three straight fastballs? If you want a bigger sample size of performance against recognizable talents...as per Mason McRae:

Its the opposite for me: apart from the control concerns which are legitimate albeit hardly so concerning that it overwrites the entire package (especially considering that he was showing much improved control this year), I don't see how you can NOT see the hype. Its elite stuff and elite performance in the best conference in baseball; and he has absolutely dominated an entire slew of elite hitters that wound up as first round picks. His entire package would look elite if he was a RHP too, but he has the added bonus of also being a LHP. I think its lazy analysis to lump him in with a handful of LHP that failed and then make a blanket statement suggesting that there is some inherent flaw with drafting LHP highly. Yes, there IS a tendency of collegiate LHP being pushed up the board because they are LHP, but if you look at the actual stuff on top of the raw performance, you would be foolish to suggest that this is the case with Lacy. You state that David Price is an exception because he went 1st overall, but fail to consider that Lacy was playing so well prior to the season being cancelled that he actually had a real shot of working into 1st overall discussion (Detroit's 2nd option behind Torkelson was also strongly rumored to be Lacy, not Martin or anyone else). I'm not suggesting that Asa Lacy is David Price, but he's certainly in a completely different stratosphere to Tyler Jay, or frankly all of the other names on that list you named. When you look at the H/9, SO/9, and even HR/9 comparisons of Lacy vs. say Hancock, you immediately see how much more electric Lacy's stuff actually is.

Asa Lacy really bad. Nick Gonzales really good. He struck him out on 3 f***ing fastballs lmao. RHB vs. LHP.

We're in 2020 - "pitching metrics" have nothing to do with K:BB rates lmao. Were you the one in the Pre-Draft podcast who was pulling up K and BB rates as an actual scouting benchmark? The entire Asa Lacy segment of that podcast was horrendous. I think I also learned that "Max Meyer doesn't strike anyone out".

They did use the money later though. They gave Coby Mayo (4th round) $1.75 million and Carter Baumler (5th round) $1.5 million. Both HS players.

Yes, they obviously really like Palmer and he wasn't a "money saving" pick. Analysis on that pick after the fact has suggested that analytics are big on him, which is probably what drove the selection. Hard to really compare that selection with those other guys you named without seeing what they all ultimately sign for. For instance, Cole Wilcox is going to get a hell of a lot more than $850K (think first round money) so he wasn't really an option regardless. I'd imagine that Blaze Jordan gets over $1 million easily as well.

It'll end up being something like $7.2 - $7.5 million. They'll sign all the other picks leaving just that amount for him, and it will be enough because he'll still end up being the second highest player in the draft. The allocation of money has already been determined. CJ Van Eyk is supposedly getting above slot too (probably not by much). The 3rd and 4th pick will be underslot.

I really have no idea what they were thinking of doing. If the plan was to take Bitsko, the idea is that you coordinate that with him and then he goes and tells every other team he wants some absurd amount, which guarantees he'll drop to your pick. It kinda just sounds like they hoped he would fall to them? Bitsko seems like a smart career-oriented kid (see: his reclassification), I wouldn't be surprised if he wouldn't commit to pushing himself to Baltimore of all places. A team like Tampa is waaaaay more equipped to develop him.

Its gonna be pretty awkward after this draft when everyone is gonna have to love Keith Law LMAO.

What the f*** is Baltimore doing LMAO?

He's really not. Poor breaking ball spin from him. Pitching models don't like him at all. Super overrated by MLB.com.

Tanner Witt for me.

This. There isn't a chance in hell Boras is letting this kid sign for anything below $7 million.

His commitment to going to college was strong back when he was ranked in the 100's which would put him in the ~3rd/4th round - he could very easily change that decision AND take underslot at #17. This is astronomically higher than where anyone thought he'd go, it will change his plans entirely. I don't buy that the Red Sox are punting this pick on purpose. With no #2 pick, they could rank this kid much higher than industry consensus and see an opportunity to save money here which will let them spend big elsewhere down the line to make up the loss of the #2 pick.

Jim, no kid is going to be dumb enough to turn down millions of dollars at the #5 slot because "Canada".

Watch out for Boras demands with Martin here.