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For the casual baseball fan, a rebuild by one’s favorite team can be a very dark, long, and boring time. As the offseason has trenched on, many Royals fans have come to realize that this is likely what they’ll be partaking in over the course of the next few seasons. A dark, long, and boring stretch of seasons, something that they are far too familiar with. This is one of the perks of being a fain of a small-market baseball team, as building consistency in contention with the current state of baseball economics is something that almost never comes.
So yes. Rebuilds can be tough. But with the current state of this Royals organization (lack of talent on the major league team, unlikely contention, and having one of the worst, if not the worst farm system in baseball), there is no question that this is the right direction. You can have your own opinions on whether they should or shouldn’t the talent that is left on the roster (I’m part of the latter), but that’s not what I’m particularly going to focus.
With how the rules of balance and compensation work in baseball, the Royals have positioned themselves fairly well for a nice start to this rebuild. Their position in the 2018 MLB Draft is a terrific one and it was only enhanced with departure of Eric Hosmer. All you have to do is look at some of my tweets that followed the news to get a feel of how excited I am.
The Royals now have four of the top 50 draft picks, five of the top 60, and six of the top 100 in a fairly loaded class compared to recent years. I'm already so ready for the draft.
— Patrick Brennan (@paintingcorner) February 18, 2018
Amount of selections by team in first round of this year's MLB Draft
— Patrick Brennan (@paintingcorner) February 18, 2018
KCR- 4
CLE- 3
TBR- 2
ARI- 2
SDP-2
PIT- 2
BOS- 1
NYY- 1
BAL- 1
TOR- 1
DET- 1
CWS- 1
MIN- 1
LAA- 1
TEX- 1
HOU- 1
SEA- 1
OAK- 1
LAD- 1
COL- 1
SFG- 1
STL- 1
CHC- 1
MIL- 1
CIN- 1
NYM- 1
MIA- 1
ATL- 1
WAS- 1
PHI- 1
So as things stand (and they could change slightly), the Royals currently have picks 18, 31, 33, 39, 58, and 93 in the first 100 draft slots. If Mike Moustakas signs with a team other than the Royals, they will likely find themselves with a seventh pick in the top 100, depending on the figures of the contract.
In my opinion, this makes the draft all the more important for the Royals. This draft presents a great opportunity to get a jump-start to what looks like could be a long rebuild. Getting this draft right could be huge for this organization.
And as it tends to be with me, these things usually strike curiosity in me. Looking at how the Royals amount of draft picks compared to other teams this year, I wanted to see where they stacked up compared to other teams in recent memory with draft supply. The answer is the Royals do have one of the bigger collection of picks in draft history. Since 2000, only eight teams have had four chances to make a pick in the top 40 selections, with the 2018 Royals being the first team since the 2011 Rays, who arbitrarily had six of the top 42 picks. So let’s dive in and take a look at how some of those comparable situations went.
2000 Atlanta Braves
Picks: 29, 30, 38, 40
Players Selected (WAR with team)
- RHP Adam Wainwright (0.0)
- 3B Scott Thorman (-1.0)
- SS Kelly Johnson (7.5)
- SS Aaron Herr (0.0)
2004 Oakland Athletics
Picks: 24, 26, 36, 40
Players Selected (WAR with team)
- C Landon Powell (0.2)
- OF Richie Robnett (0.0)
- OF Danny Putnam (-0.2)
- RHP Huston Street (5.8)
2005 Florida Marlins
Picks: 16, 22, 29, 34
Players Selected (WAR with team)
- RHP Chris Volstad (4.9)
- LHP Aaron Thompson (0.0)
- RHP Jacob Marceaux (0.0)
- RHP Ryan Tucker (-1.0)
2007 San Francisco Giants
Picks: 10, 22, 29, 32
Players Selected (WAR with team)
- LHP Madison Bumgarner (28.2)
- RHP Tim Alderson (0.0)
- OF Wendell Fairley (0.0)
- 2B Nick Noonan (-0.6)
2011 Tampa Bay Rays
Picks: 24, 31, 32, 38
Players Selected (WAR with team)
- RHP Taylor Guerrieri (0.0)
- OF Mikie Mahtook (0.1)
- SS Jake Hager (0.0)
- SS Brandon Martin (0.0)
The results may not look eye-popping, but a lot of these deep drafts that teams had ended up as fairly successful. A lot of these teams found themselves adequate to very high impact players, such as Adam Wainwright (ignore the fact that he was traded), Kelly Johnson, Huston Street, and Madison Bumgarner. With the higher quantity of picks, the Royals will put themselves in a better position to potentially land a player that will stir the future of this organization in a positive way.
Just avoid being the 2011 Rays, as they came out basically almost came out empty-handed with what could have been possibly the most loaded pool of picks in draft history...
I’m not making any predictions with how this will turn out. I’m just pointing out the significance and the possible positive long-term ramifications this draft could have. I have my own questions about the confidence I have in this front office nailing this thing. I can only hope. But for now, I can be pleased with how this has set up.
This draft is going to be super fun.