Late night draft conversation with BA’s John Manuel
Tuesday, June 8, 2010 at 12:06 am by SJK
At about 11:30 ET on Monday night, we talked to Baseball America's John Manuel about the Culver pick. Here's what he told us:
We were shocked on the Culver pick. I will say, we often are low on the Northeast pop-up guys. Our Northeast guy blankets that area but he also covers college baseball, and sometimes the Northeast kids jump up late and we miss that sometimes.
But he also got a text from a scout up there tonight who said, "Are you kidding me with Culver?"
It wasn't a consensus draft, the Yanks weren't the only team to go off the consensus, but that pick was a surprise.
The good news we took from Manuel is that the Yankees may have snuck in and grabbed a guy who was possibly overlooked by scouts and/or just didn't receive the hype. There's a lot of evidence over the last few years to suggest the Yankees know what they're doing. His ranking of 168 doesn't necessarily mean his skill level is set in stone. This kid's local, so the Yankees have probably seen more of him than anyone else in the country. That has to count for something.
The bad news is that his ceiling could be Ramiro Pena.
Time will tell.
Special thanks to John for some late night conversation, and we looking forward to doing a full post-draft interview with him. In the meantime, go subscribe to Baseball America.
Tags: draft, farm system, manuel
I miss Lane
very cool you can talk to BA’s big dawg at basically midnight.
I bet you all had a boner when i was signed
I remember that the Yankees were really impressed with Bleich’s work just before that draft. Let that be a warning. Don’t be fooled by a hot streak or any other small sample size.
From Replacement Level Yankees:
“– Frankie Piliere
And from his chat:
Don’t kill it. This guy (Culver) got huge scouting bureau grades late in the year.
As always, I’d recommend reading Kevin Levine-Flandrup’s articles for draft news. He talked to Damon Oppenheimer after the draft and it sounds like the Yankees knew Culver well and scouted him extensively. The Yankees didn’t think Culver would last to their next pick, and they were right: another team told Oppenheimer they would have picked him before then.”
I don’t believe Oppenheimer at all. This guy was not on anyone’s radar this high.
I don’t believe Oppenheimer either. He’s spinning if you ask me.
Yes, it’s possible they “snuck” in a guy, but there were blatant high-quality guys still on the board when they picked. Seems to be an example of trying to be too clever when some obvious guys were there for the taking.
When a scout sends Baseball America a text with “Are you kidding me on Culver?”, then I’m not happy about the pick.
More from Oppenheimer:
“We were able to draft a very athletic kid who can play a good shortstop”,said Damon Oppenheimer, Yankees Vice President of Amateur Scouting. “He has a plus arm, is a solid runner and is an excellent hitter. He’s a player we are happy to have. It was an easy decision for us.”
Oppenheimer has been great drafting. Bittle Cole bleuch Henry Kennedy. Talk about living off one pick. Hughes
While I don’t like the pick, he’s also responsible for Romine, A-Jax, and Joba. Plus, while he may not scout International FAs, I’m sure the decisions go through him.
He wasn’t on anyone’s board judging by the reaction from the scouting rags. I can’t see how he wouldn’t have been available later on in the draft.
Here’s what BA said today on Sports Illustrated.com
Baseball America: The Yankees may feel they have found the next Derek Jeter in Culver, a switch-hitting shortstop. Culver is a fluid fielder with fine playmaking ability, and his arm has been clocked at 94 mph off of the mound. Hailing from a tiny town in upstate New York, Culver was committed to Maryland but will in all likelihood forego college. Culver’s bat may take time to develop. While his smooth swing shows promise, Culver is mostly a slap hitter who hopes to produce power as he fills out.
Wasn’t Angellini & Lassiter both supposed to be the “next Derek Jeter”? Maybe if they quit worrying so much about replacing one particular player and just concentrated on always drafting the best possible player the “next Derek Jeter” would simply happen. It sounds as though their philosophy was leaning toward drafting according to a perceived need.
Yeah good point. Maybe their strategy is to draft premium positions like SS and C. Since those positions are so highly valued, maybe they think any excess can be traded.
@Russ:
Does it occur to you that maybe Culver was the best player available on the Yankees board?
“It sounds as though their philosophy was leaning toward drafting according to a perceived need.”
Based on what? The fact that they’ve drafted and signed short stops in the past? Lassiter (27th round) and Angelini (10th) weren’t even high picks. If you’re criticizing the Yankees 27th round pick for being “need” based, I think you don’t have a clue what you’re talking about.
It’s pretty obvious that 99.9% of baseball fans, myself included, have no clue what they are talking about when it comes to the draft.
Absolutely no one knows at all whether this is a good pick or not, they are just parrotting what someone else has said. It happens every single year.
Meanwhile, the Yankees are scooping up players who were rated higher than Culver in later rounds. Are those good picks?? They must be great picks, by the logic presented in this thread, right?
From the yankees’ 1st pick to their second pick, there was a large gap. 50 picks. They felt Culver would be gone so they grabbed him. We’ll come back in 3 years and see who was right.
Gary,
I should apologize, in the effort to be brief I obviously did a poor job of expressing myself.
I was not making a comparison of Culver to any other draft picks, I was trying to point out that, over the past few years, often when the Yankees select a shortstop the media, both mainstream & blog based, jump all over that choice and annoint them as the “next Derek Jeter”.
Instead of saddling the kid with that moniker why not just let him develop into whatever player he is destined to become.
However, onto the bigger point. I’m simply a baseball fan and do not profess to have any great insight, I’m merely expressing my opinion. Now, my understanding of things is that teams draft a given player for one of three reasons. First, and most importantly, he should always be the best player available. I have heard, read or seen absolutely nothing that would convince me he was the 32nd best player drafted this year. Is it possible that he was? Of course it is but the deeper you go into a draft the less likely that is to happen. Anyone can search past drafts and find someone from later rounds who went onto successful careers but the chances of that decreases as the picks are made. It has been said that D Opp has claimed that another unnamed team had interest in Culver and he would not have made it to the 82nd pick but this claim is not verifiable. People will lie in order to justify their actions. Besides, knowing which team had this supposed interest would give the statement some context. Maybe this other team has a history of poor drafting themselves and the interest they had would not bolster D Opp’s claim but would in fact weaken his position. Also, if you’re making your selections out of a fear that a player may not be available later I don’t see how that thought process can result in selecting the best possible player. The second reason for drafting a player is signability, however, given the Yankees resources I cannot accept that they would draft anyone in order to save a few bucks. Finally, there is the idea of drafting for a perceived need in the system. People much more knowledgeable about baseball than either of us have themselves said that this selection was a reach and, quite frankly, I have significantly more confidence in the opinions of people such as Keith Law, Steve Goldman, Jim Callis, etc. than anyone here since the departure of Lane Meyer. You can drink the Kool-aid if you like and blindly accept whatever pablum is being fed to you, it’s your choice, just as it is my choice to question whether or not the Yankees are making the best possible decisions.
“Instead of saddling the kid with that moniker why not just let him develop into whatever player he is destined to become.”
So you think an internet blog calling a player the next whatever adversely affects his development? Even I’m not that vain, but thanks for believing in us!
“First, and most importantly, he should always be the best player available.”
Nobody does this for every single pick. Not even close. That’s a bad way to start, but let’s continue on…
“The second reason for drafting a player is signability, however, given the Yankees resources I cannot accept that they would draft anyone in order to save a few bucks.”
I thought you just said teams should always draft the best player available? And the fact that you don’t believe they have a budget really doesn’t matter. They do. Look no further than last year.
“Maybe this other team has a history of poor drafting themselves and the interest they had would not bolster D Opp’s claim but would in fact weaken his position.”
This figurative other team is pure speculation and conjecture at best. I could just as easily say maybe the other team has a great history of drafting. The fact is we can’t know if anyone would have taken him. I’m not saying Oppenheimer is telling the truth, but I’m saying either way it’s moot. Call it an overdraft, fine, but don’t tell me he would have been there at 82 because you aren’t in possession of such information.
“Also, if you’re making your selections out of a fear that a player may not be available later I don’t see how that thought process can result in selecting the best possible player.”
…unless that guy that drops is the BPA. You seem to think everyone in the league drafts BPA with every pick, except for the Yankees. Austin Wilson, 27th on BAs top 200, dropped to 379. Why didn’t teams draft him? Because it’s NOT always best player available. Your “understanding” of the draft process isn’t necessarily as good as you think it to be and it doesn’t take a lot of looking to realize that.
“Finally, there is the idea of drafting for a perceived need in the system. People much more knowledgeable about baseball than either of us have themselves said that this selection was a reach…”
And you’re making the jump from “reach pick” to “drafting for perceived need,” the experts aren’t. If a team over-drafts someone, it’s automatically to compensate for a lack of prospects in their system at that respective position? I’m not buying.
Despite all this, I still agree with you to some degree. Culver was a reach pick. Do I think they were reaching because they’re looking for the “Next Derek Jeter”? No. I think they had a player they really liked and went aggressively after him, possibly too aggressive.
“…blindly accept whatever pablum is being fed to you, it’s your choice, just as it is my choice to question whether or not the Yankees are making the best possible decisions.”
Show me the way out from my Yankee Front Office induced trance where they can do no wrong, O’ Mighty Russ!
I think you took my criticism of your assessment of the Yankee draft philosophy to mean that I agree with what they did, which I don’t think you’ll find evidence of anywhere.
Seriously though, I have absolutely no problem with criticizing the Yankees. I’ll say again: Cito Culver was an over-draft by pretty much all accounts. Beyond that, however, I don’t agree with you questioning the Yankees for not drafting BPA all the time or you saying the Yankees are drafting for need with no evidence of such. Those ideas are wrong and circumstantial, respectively.
Some of you guys really have no idea what you are talking about. To the guy who said that the Yankees appear to be drafting in regards to a specific need you clearly uninformed about amateur players. Generally, the best and most athletic amateur players are Shortstops. I will bet you that nearly every player in the Major Leagues was a shortstop at some time. Everyone needs to realize that because some scouts say the Yanks blew the pick – how can anyone know that? The Yankees took the guy they wanted or the highest guy on their board…chill out.