Nathan Kirby is the highest drafted player with local ties for 2015. Photo via collegebaseballcentral.com
Now that the June 2015 draft signing deadline has passed, here’s a quick review of all DC/MD/VA players who got drafted with their signing bonuses (if known), and if not signed where they’re presumably heading to school.
This post at MinorLeagueBall lists all the top 20 round draft picks who did NOT sign. This list has a ton of 20th round+ guys who we’re depending on MiLB.com assignments.
Chelsea James just did a nice summary of the Nats draft class at NatsJournal. I’ll do a separate post to that end later on.
Important Draft-related links for this post:
- MLB’s Awesome Draft Tracker; you can slice and dice the draft 10 different ways, search by schools and home states, etc.
- Official Draft Bonus Pool totals. Astros have $17M (most). Nats have 3rd least at $4.1M.
- MLB.com’s Draft Signing and Bonus tracker; note this only goes through the first 10 rounds; after that, the bonus figures are treated differently.
College Players with local ties
- Nathan Kirby LHP from UVA: went #40 (Supp 1st round) to Milwaukee. Signed at the deadline for below slot value ($1.2M versus slot of $1.545M).
- Josh Sborz, RHP closer for UVA: went #74 (Supp 2nd round) to the Dodgers. Signed at the deadline for below slot ($722k vs $827k).
- Taylor Clarke, who hails from Ashburn (Broad Run HS) went #76, first pick of the 3rd round to Arizona. Signed for slot value of $801k.
- Mike Matuella, of Great Falls (Georgetown Prep) and Duke: #78, to Texas in the 3rd round. Signed for huge overslot deal of $2M.
- Brandon Lowe: UMD infielder: 3rd round #87 overall to Tampa Bay. Signed for $6k overslot ($697k); why $6,000 over slot? weird figure.
- Alex Robinson: UMD’s ace Lefty went in the 5th round (#140 overall) to Minnesota. Signed for $5k under-slot ($382k)
- Joe McCarthy, OF for UVA: 5th round, #148 overall to Tampa Bay. Signed for slot value of $358k.
- Brandon Waddell UVA Saturday/Sunday starter: 5th round (#157) to Pittsburgh. Signed for slightly underslot bonus of $315k.
- Jack Wynkoop of Virginia Beach (Cape Henry Collegiate HS), LHP starter for South Carolina: went in the 6th round to Colorado. Signed for slot value of $298k.
- Michael Boyle: Radford Ace. 13th rounder to the Dodgers. Signed for unknown figure, currently in Rookie/Pioneer League Ogden.
- Kevin Mooney: UMD closer: 15th rounder by the Nats. Signed for unknown figure, currently in short-A Auburn.
- Kenny Towns; 3B from UVA and the 2011 All-Met player of the year from Lake Braddock, went in the 20th to the Angels. Signed for unknown figure, currently in Rookie/Pioneer League Orem.
- Luke Willis, OF from George Mason and Oakton HS, in the 30th round to Kansas City. Signed for unknown figure, currently in Rookie/Appalachian League Burlington.
- Josh Swirchak, a MIF from Division II Wilmington University via Osbourne Park HS in Manassas, Signed with St. Louis as an undrafted free agent after the 2015 draft. Currently at short-A State College.
There were no significant college draftee non-signings from the area.
There are quite a few other college players from the many baseball-playing colleges in the area drafted past the 10th round; search the MLB draft tracker and select the state of Virginia for many more local college players.
Local Prep players of note:
- Jimmy Barnes, Deep Creek HS in Chesapeake; 11th rounder to the Angels. Signed for unknown figure, currently in the Arizona Rookie League.
- Nic Enright RHP from Steward HS in Richmond: 19th rounder to the Mets. Did Not Sign, as noted on MinorLeagueBall.com. Will presumably honor his committment to Virginia Tech.
- Ljay Newsome of Chopticon (south of Waldorf): 26th rounder by Seattle. Per his summer team’s twitter page, Newsome Signed with Seattle for an undisclosed amount. Currently in the Arizona Rookie League.
- Nathan Trevillian, RHP from small Amherst County HS; 22nd rounder to the Pirates. Signed for unknown figure, currently in GCL.
- Stevie Mangrum, 3B from Western Albemarle HS in Charlottesville, 28th round pick by Boston. Did Not Sign, will presumably honor his commitment to Virginia Tech.
- Cody Morris, of Reservoir got picked up in 32nd round by Baltimore. Did Not Sign, will honor his commitment to South Carolina.
- Hunter Parsons of Parkside HS, picked up in the 40th round by Cleveland. Did not Sign, will presumably honor commitment to Maryland.
At the end of the signing period, here’s what some of these local schools’ recruiting classes seem to look like in terms of local guys:
- UVA: Connor Eason, Nathan Eikhoff, Evan Sperling, Grant Donahue
- U of Maryland: A.J. Lee, Hunter Parsons
- Virginia Tech: Nic Enright, Stevie Mangrum, John DeFazio, Paul Hall
- South Carolina: Cody Morris, Danny Blair
- Wake Forest: Harvey Logan
- Liberty: Jack DeGroat
- VCU: Brody Cook
- UNC-Asheville: Jordan Carr
- Campbell: James Monaghan
- Uncommitted thus far: Kaleb Bowman, Hunter Byrnes. Update post-publishing: Bowman went to Spartansburg Methodist and Byrnes went to UVA … to play football.
This Baseball America link has a list of all the major prep players who didn’t sign, listed by college commitment. It has a couple more big names for some of the local baseball schools. PerfectGame.org also has a way to search by college commitment, but it doesn’t verify the results since its self-reported by the players (it has literally 20 names listed for UVA’s incoming 2016 class).
Nats re-draft/previously drafted Players (i’ve noted our previous draft position for each player)
- Andrew Suarez , (2nd round pick 2014) LHP from Miami went in the 2nd round again, #61 overall this time to San Francisco. Signed for slot of slightly more than $1M.
- Skye Bolt, OF from UNC, went in the 4th round (#128 overall) to Oakland. Signed over-slot deal of $610k.
- Cody Poteet, (27th rounder in 2012) went in the 4th round (#116 overall) to Miami. Signed slot deal of $488k.
- Austin Byler, (9th rounder, 2014) OF from Nevada. Was the first pick on day 3; 11th rounder by Arizona. Signed for unknown amount.
- Daniel Salters (22nd rounder 2014) C from Dallas Baptist: 13th round pick to Cleveland in 2015. Signed for unknown amount.
- Jake Jefferies (34th rounder in 2012): 2B from Cal State-Fullerton; Nats picked him up again, this time in the 39th round. Signed for unknown amount with the Nats and is on the Auburn roster.
Previous local Draft posts:
- At the beginning of the season, we profiled a ton of local prep and college players.
- Then we talked about the higher-profile local players in our Pre-draft coverage
- Just after the rule-4 draft, we went over all the local players who got picked.
I think Kirby went to MIL, no? They had a pretty good draft overall, but their player development group gets some rough reports.
In something of a shocker to me, KLaw ranked the Nats as the 5th best farm system. Has to be because of the Giolito/Turner/Ross helium, combined with all of the other promotions to Cubs/Astros, but still. He didn’t seem to knock Lopez for his scuffling, was very upbeat on Pivetta and seemed to think Fedde’s stuff is bouncing back quickly. It’s all about the arms. M good time to be writing a blog about the Nats pitching prospects 🙂
Wally
23 Jul 15 at 8:12 am
http://insider.espn.go.com/blog/keith-law/insider/post?id=4112
This is the link Wally is referring to. Yeah, the meteoric rise of both Turner and Ross has made Washington go from #9 to #5 in Law’s rankings. We’ve also only really matriculated one top prospect (Taylor) from Law’s top 10 ranking either. So that helps. How much of a fleece does the Turner/Ross for Souza/Ott deal look like right now?
Todd Boss
23 Jul 15 at 8:51 am
Kirby did got to Mil, not Sea. My bad; I had another typo in there too. Corrected in the original post.
Todd Boss
23 Jul 15 at 8:52 am
There’s been a few Mid-season prospect rankings lists come out (BA, Law, MinorLeagueBall and topprospectalert.com all in the last week). All of them are consistently ranking Nats guys 1-2-3 as Giolito-Turner-Ross. Below that there’s then a group that includes in some order Lopez, Robles, and Fedde). Cole, who was usually in the 3-6 area pre-season, is nowhere to be found.
Todd Boss
23 Jul 15 at 9:01 am
I wonder if Funkhouser was comparing his situation to Matuella and wondering why he was being offered the same amount even though he was picked much higher.
For whatever it’s worth, Jake Jefferies is the son of Gregg. I guess we’re into collecting the sons of former Mets (although Cutter wasn’t a Nats draftee).
Yes, the Nats’ system is all arms. If we count Taylor as already having made the show, there are no positional prospects on the near horizon beyond Turner and Difo. Maybe Severino, I guess, but he still hasn’t hit that much. Goodwin got promoted to AA and has struggled. He used to be well ahead of Taylor on the OF pecking order.
I’m not giving up yet on Cole, who is only 23, but he does seem to have lost a lot of luster this season. It was said that the Nats were reluctant to discuss him as a trade chip last offseason, but he may be on the table now, if they could get full value for him.
I don’t know that much about the quality other teams have in their systems, but #5 seems high to me for the Nats with so few hitters of any note.
And yes, the Souza deal is starting to look like the steal of the century.
KW
23 Jul 15 at 12:27 pm
Oops, Goodwin got “demoted” to AA.
KW
23 Jul 15 at 12:29 pm
If Erik Davis is first on my “next 40-man roster guy to get DFA’d” then Goodwin may be next. He just seems to be moving backwards. A shame given his potential out of HS.
Law likes potential over depth; right now Ross looks like he could be a #2 starter and Turner an all-star SS; that’s a lot of potential. Law loves Giolito, as does everyone else. Lopez throws 100+.
Funkhouser likely made the right choice; maybe he gets himself back into the top10 discussion with good senior season.
Todd Boss
23 Jul 15 at 3:46 pm
It was a shock to me because other than Turner and Ross, it didn’t seem like anyone else in the system was really stepping forward. But maybe that was unfair. Voth, Fedde, Pivetta are all showing strides. Robles is already in Auburn and drawing raves. Giolito is holding his own, which is saying quite a bit given his level.
So I will throw out an unconventional thought: is Ross actually overvalued right now? Could they actually sell him higher (#2?) than he ultimately proves to be (3/4?). Worth thinking about.
Wally
23 Jul 15 at 5:07 pm
Goodwin – as we discussed here, I was surprised that the Nats felt like they had to add him to the 40-man before Rule 5, as there was no chance he was going to stick anywhere coming off an injury/bad year. He was the Nats’ consensus #2 prospect just a couple of years ago. Even in that time, I always questioned whether he would hit with enough pop to be a corner OF. Anyway, yes, he would be a good candidate for clearing a 40-man slot. He never should have been added in the first place.
Ross – Wally, I think you’re right that the Nats would be in a great position right now to “sell high” on Ross. However, as I’m sure you know, he’s also probably better than the guys with whom they could replace him as a potential starter next year.
We’re assuming that the Nats will need two new starters in 2016. Ross has proven himself in a small MLB sample as a solid candidate. Meanwhile, Roark has really been struggling, although he was good in some spots starts. But he no longer looks like as much of a sure thing for the rotation in 2016 that we thought he would be. Treinen has struggled so much that he’s been kicked to AAA, and there have always been concerns about whether he has enough quality pitches to be a starter. Jordan and Hill seem to have proven themselves as AAAA guys, and Cole looks dangerously close to joining them in that category. For whatever reasons, the Nats have not been aggressive in promoting Giolito, not really putting him in a position to be a viable MLB option until the middle of next season at the earliest. Of the prospects beyond the AAA guys, I would guess that Voth may be the closest to big-league-ready, but he’s had a few ups and downs in mastering AA.
I remember that Todd did a post a couple of years ago on the potential upsides (#1s, #2s, etc.) of the pitchers in the Nats’ system. It might be fun to revisit/redo that whenever he has the time, either now or in the offseason.
KW
24 Jul 15 at 6:43 am
2016 starters: I think right now you’re looking at Scherzer, Strasburg, Gio, Ross and Roark. Yes I know Roark has struggled, but what’s been asked of him is so patently unfair that its hard to really judge him. When he was a starter, he deliverd in 2014. Plain and simple. Now, of course there will be a competition, and Cole, Hill, Jordan and Treinen are all in it. Maybe Treinen figures it out as a starter and wins the job. Maybe. Treinen seems to be one adjustment away from being a heck of a starter (figuring out a pitch to get lefties out).
Ceiling post request: yeah … i was thinking the same. Lots of work to do that post. I’ll put in on the possible list.
Fedde for Chapman: hate it. Yes Chapman is awesome; don’t we have a closer right now w/ a sub 2.00 ERA? Chapman’s bWAR=1.6 as we speak. Storen=1.5. I just don’t like the idea of jerking around the roles of a successful pitcher (see Roark comment above).
Todd Boss
24 Jul 15 at 8:32 am
No one talks about it very much, but some of the most important “scouting”/talent evaluation goes on in an organization with its own players. You have to be brutally honest with what you’ve got. The Nats know Fedde better than anyone else. Is he closer to Giolito/Ross quality, or Jordan/Cole quality? If we got Chapman for the equivalent of someone of Jordan’s level, it would be a steal. If Fedde has a #2/3 MLB ceiling, though, it’s not worth it at all.
If the Nats really want another closer, I’d be more interested in Kimbrel, who is signed for longer than Chapman. The contracts for both Storen and Chapman will be up after next season. But I agree that this doesn’t seem to be a pressing need for the Nats . . . just was it wasn’t when they signed Soriano . . .
KW
24 Jul 15 at 8:53 am
[…] are now draft eligible. From that time frame, here’s the 2015 pre-season list and then the Post-Draft/post-signing coverage from 2015. Pop-up guys plus non-MD/VA native players playing at MD/VA colleges are added as they […]
Local draft-prospects to keep an eye in for the 2018 draft at Nationals Arm Race
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