What should the Diamondbacks do with the 16th pick?
June 8, 2012; Los Angeles, CA, USA; TCU Horned Frogs pitcher Brandon Finnegan (29) against the UCLA Bruins during the Los Angeles super regional at Jackie Robinson Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jayne Kamin-Oncea-USA TODAY Sports
The MLB draft is fast approaching and while it doesn’t garner as much attention as the NFL or NBA draft, its starting to. Prospects now more than ever are apart of the everyday landscape, and more and more casual fans know the names of their team’s top prospects and how their doing at the various minor league levels. The 2014 First Year Player Draft will take place June 5th through June 7th with the first round being televised on MLB Network and the rest of it on MLB.com. Lets be real here, the Arizona Diamondbacks have not had a whole lot of success over the years in the draft. Guys like Brandon Webb, and Paul Goldschmidt were some of the best picks, but the Dbacks also missed out on a lot of players that are stars now. Hopefully the Dbacks 2014 draft is one of the team’s better ones.
Probably the most interesting part of the draft is the Competitive Balance rounds and the draft lottery which is a relatively new thing. The Competitive Balance Lottery is designed to give smaller market and smaller revenue teams a chance to grab extra picks in the drafts. I guess this might be a way to create a little more parity between the high revenue teams and the low revenue teams. This is how the lottery works: every small market or small revenue team is eligible to win an extra pick in the 2014 draft, the lottery basically determines the order in Pool A and Pool B. The Diamondbacks have the second pick in Round B. The only part of the draft that I dont like is the fact that its so long. The draft is 40 rounds which to me is ridiculous.
Most expert mock drafts have the Diamondbacks taking LHP Brandon Finnegan out of Texas Christian University.Here is a scouting report from Through the Fence Baseball on Finnegan who is number 14 on their top 50 prospects board:
“He has reportedly hit triple-digits with his fastball. That alone will get you first-round attention. At 5-’11”, however, his size draws question marks for a frontline starter. He also features an upper-70s slurve and a decent change-up that has come a long way. He could end up a dominant closer in the mold of Billy Wagner. Had 86 K/35 BB over 79.1 innings as a sophomore.”
Many have suggested that the Diamondbacks could also go in the direction of a catcher which they could use more of in their system, or a corner outfielder, but you can never go wrong with more pitching in the system. I understand that the Dbacks have plenty of pitching for their future led by Brandon Shipley, and Archie Bradley, but after trading Jarrod Parker, Trevor Bauer, and Tyler Skaggs over the past two years, it wouldn’t be the worst idea to draft a pitcher. Tell me what you think about the draft and what the Snakes should do with the 16th pick in the comments section below.