Nationals Arm Race

Small Sample Sizes, arbitrary endpoints, its only April, yeah yeah.

As of 4/24/22’s game, in reverse order, here’s our rotation’s last week:

• Adon on 4/24/22: 4ip, 6hits, 5 runs
• ASanchez on 4/23/22: 4 1/3ip, 6hits, 4 runs
• Corbin on 4/22/22: 1 1/3ip, 7hits, 3walks, 7runs.
• Rogers on 4/21/22: 4 1/3ip, 6hits, 4 runs.
• Fedde on 4/20/22: 3 1/3ip, 8hits, 7 runs.

Only Grey managed to have a decent week, throwing half the 4/19/22 DH in fine fashion (5 1/3ip, 3hits, 1 run). Still not a QS though; he got yanked after retiring the first guy in the 6th on just 87 pitches.

As for the rest of the rotation? Come on.

In our last 5 starts, our starters have given us a grand total of 17 1/3 innings and given up an astounding 27 runs along the way. That’s just 17 1/3 innings out of a required 45 to be pitched, meaning our bullpen is absolutely, completely shredded right now and its … April 25th. Every game for the last week looks like a spring training game, where every reliever in the pen gets an inning until the game is over.

We’re only 3 weeks into the season and the team has already called up SIX (6!) arms who weren’t on the opening day roster (Rogers, Sanchez, Clay, Perez, Ramirez, and Harvey).

And they’re going to have to scramble for coverage going forward; there are just TWO remaining arms on the 40-man who aren’t on the active roster or the MLB DL: Carrillo (who just went onto the AA D/L with a “sore shoulder,” uh oh), and Evan Lee, who’s made 3 starts but has only gone 9 1/3 total innings, giving up 8 walks along the way. Not exactly the bullpen innings eater we need. So get ready for any one of the slew of MLFA arms we have sitting in AAA to start getting called up to replace ineffective arms who suddenly have soft tissue injuries. I’m talking guys like Verrett, Edwards Jr., Clippard, Garret, Manoah, Weems, Baldonado, and Rodriguez.

After today’s debacle we’re 6-11, in last place in the NL, and have the 2nd worst record in the league. And we’re going to struggle to do better from here.

I feel like we’re in for a long season.

Well, if there was any better indication of just how bad the farm system is … you can go look at the records of our four minor league affiliates through two weeks.

• AAA: 2-10
• AA: 4-8
• High-A: 6-6
• Low-A: 0-12

Your Fredericksburg Nats are Oh and Twelve. 33 runs scored, 121 against. They’re giving up an average of 10 runs a game, with a current run differential of -88 runs. Wow. So far, the owner of the franchise is reeeaaaallly digging the talent level he’s got to open up his $35M stadium. (Ah who am i kidding, he didn’t spend a dime of his own money, the taxpayers did! I digress).

The only team in the system actually trying (High-A Wilmington) is “only” 6-6. But we’ll get to them.

Ok, so who is hot and who is not after two full 6-game series? We’ll go by level. Here’s who’s “Hot” by level:

AAA:

• Raudy Read: 5-15 through first 12 games. But he’s on the IL. And listed as a 1B. I mean, is the guy actually catching anymore? Tres Barrera seems to be getting the bulk of catcher ABs, which makes sense since he’s the only guy on the 40-man.
• Most of the back-end of the bullpen: Bacus, Bonnell, McGowin, Miller and Lobstein all have decent numbers in their few innings of work so far.

AA:

• Cole Freeman has had a nice start to the season
• Teel, Sanchez and Reyes in the rotation all have had two decent starts.
• Sanchez in particular: 15Ks, 1 BB so far in 3 starts.
• Sterling Sharp rebounded from his awful opener to be pretty stellar in his second start.
• Gabe Klobotis: 5IP, 2 hits, 7/0 K/BB. How was this guy a 36th rounder??

High-A:

• Henry and Cavalli: well, they’ve lived up to the hype. Henry has given up 9 base runners in 11 innings and 4 of them scored; his K/BB is actually better than Cavalli’s.
• Zack Brzycky: where did we get this guy? $10k NDFA last season just shows up at high A slinging dots. 9IP, 4 hits, 14/4 K/BB? yes I’ll take that.
• Alex Troop: 5ip, 10 Ks, zero BBs, 1 hit. And that one hit scored.
• Matt Cronin: picks up where he left off in 2019; 5.1 IP, one hit, 11/2 K/BB. Move him up with Henry and Cavalli at the end of the month.

Low-A:

• Well, Michael Cuevas has had a nice start; 4ip, 1 hit.
• Mitchell Parker started decently but got hit hard in his 2nd start. He still has 15 Ks in 7innings … to go along with 7 walks.

---

OK, who is NOT Hot? Well, mostly everyone, but i’ll highlight a few in particular.

AAA:

• Luis Garcia: hitting just .205 albeit with three homers.
• Carter Kieboom: he’s only appeared in 7 games?!? What is going on? Hitting .222. We care about basically two bats in the whole of AAA and these two are it, and the opening to the season has been rough.
• The entire Rotation: the best starter in AAA is Sean Nolin, who the team acquired with like a few days notice to be the AAA opening day starter. Can you feel the excitement?
• Ryne Harper: the guy was good in 2019 for the Twins; now he’s 32 and struggling in AAA. He’s currently occupying the #1 position on the “first guy to get axed from 40-man when we need to make room for someone.

AA:

• The entire offense: the team is hitting a collective .151/.235/.247 for the season. .151 team batting order. Some how they’ve won 4 games hitting .151 as a team.
• Tim Cate: 3 starts and struggling. 1.85 whip, a .315 BAA.

High-A:

• Again, the entire offense. they’re hitting a collective .208
• Yasel Antuna: He’s 2 for 40. Two for Fourty!! This is one of our top hitting prospects, a guy who was a MLB spring training invite. What is going on?
• Israel Pineda: slightly better at 5 for 42. 3 of those 5 hits are homers. This is perhaps the 2nd best prospect on the team.
• Jackson Rutledge: who had him with an 11.32 ERA through three starts?
• Evan Lee: two starts, didn’t make it out of the 2nd in either start.
• Todd Peterson: for a guy who hung around MLB camp as long as he did … he’s not starting well.

Low-A:

• Everyone.
• The offense is .167/.280/.222 as a team
• The pitching staff has a collective 8.12 ERA and a 1.95 whip. As a staff they’re putting on 2 guys an inning.
• The rotation is so bad they don’t have a single qualified hurler.
• They have more guys with double digit ERAs than they have guys who have sub 7.00 ERAs.
• Leif Strom has perhaps the most unimpressive pitching line: 3 appearances/2 starts, a 19.29 ERA. He’s thrown 7 innings, given up 18 hits and 9 walks. 23 runs allowed, but only 15 earned thanks to some stellar defense behind him

---

It can only get better from here right? A team can’t go winless for 140 games can they? 🙂

Next to get promoted: Cavalli, Henry, Cronin

Next to get demoted/released: Strom, maybe Harper getting DFA’d.

Keith Law, over on the Athletic, released his Washington Nationals top 20 analysis yesterday. I like Law’s analysis, and realize that his opinions can be a bit polarizing, but I thought i’d run through his list and provide some analysis in spots where he differed greatly from other pundits in the space.

By this point in the “prospect analysis season” we’ve seen Nats run-throughs from Baseball America, Prospect361, MLBpipeline’s preliminary list, Prospects 1500, Bleacher Report, Baseball Prospectus, and now Keith Law. Still waiting for a couple other big names to drop (Mlbpipeline’s final list, ESPN, and Fangraphs), all of which should be coming in the next week ro so, but we’re starting to see some standardization of the lists.

Law’s ranking is “ceiling over floor” (meaning he likes younger prospects with growth potential versus older prospects who may be limited in terms of future impact). He’s definitely starter over reliever (its kind of surprising to ever see him rank a reliever) and premium defensive position over corner. So, there’s some surprises on this list.

The Athletic is behind a paywall, so here’s the list.

1	Cavalli	Cade
2	Rutledge	Jackson
3	Henry	Cole
4	Lara	Andry
5	Quintana	Roismar
6	Denaburg	Mason
7	Romero	Seth
8	Cate	Tim
9	Cronin	Matt
10	De La Rosa	Jeremy
11	Antuna	Yasel
12	Infante	Samuel
13	Marte	Daniel
14	Pineda	Israel
15	Adon	Joan
16	Irvin	Jake
17	Lee	Evan
18	Fuentes	Steven
19	Viandel	Pena
20	Sanchez	Bryan

Thoughts on his rankings:

• Same top 3 as nearly all other pundits, in the expected order of Cavalli, Rutledge, Henry. I’d like to point out that the best-case projection for these three guys is a heck of a trio of arms to pair with Strasburg and Corbin for a few years at the back-end of their long term contracts. I mean, there’s worse situations to be in. Especially if all three are pitching in the majors on pre-arb contracts.
• Andry Lara at #4: this is about where others are now putting him; the video on him is pretty impressive. Effortless delivery, almost like Livan Hernandez but with velocity, and side-stuff.
• He has Roismar Quintana all the way up to #5, way way higher than anyone else (Baseball America had Quintana at #20 and most others have him in the mid-teens). This exemplifies ceiling over floor approach to prospect grading to a T.
• He’s got our two high-profile 1st round scuffles in Denaburg and Romero back to back, fittingly. Question; at what point does a prospect write-up of Romero NOT mention that he’s got “off-the-field” issues? I daresay i have not read a paragraph about the player since the day we drafted him that did not include that caveat. I wonder if he makes the majors and pitches for us for several years and then when we hear about his first arbitration hearing if the write-ups will go, “… Romero pitched adequately out of the nats bullpen in 2026 … he’s come a long way since getting kicked off his college team!” sigh.
• Law has Antuna all the way down at #11 (by way of comparison, BA has him #4 and Prospects1500 has him at #2, which may be influenced by fantasy value since he’s now on the 40-man and might get big league time in 2021). I think Law dings him because he doesn’t think Antuna can stick at a premium defensive position … which greatly hurts his value unless he can show 25-homer power.
• Despite having TJ surgery, Law has Jake Irvin all the way up to #16, noting that he was showing significantly higher velocity before blowing out his elbow (do you think maybe the two events are related?) Nonetheless, if Irvin comes back with a new elbow and the same velocity, he’s a significantly better prospect.
• Evan Lee at #17 … that’s definitely optimistic on Lee.
• Bryan Sanchez at #20 and now we know why; 3,000 rpm on his curve ball right now to go with mid 90s velocity?? As an 18yr old? Wow.

A couple other notes:

• Cluff and Mendoza were BA’s #10 and #11 … and Law doesn’t even have them in his top 20.
• No mention of Tres Barrera who is mid-teens in most other groups, not even in his honorable mentions.
• Lastly, he drops a name i’ve never heard before: Mirton Blanco. Turns out he’s an 2018 IFA who threw in the DSL in 2019 with pretty solid velocity before blowing out his elbow too. Seems like a trend.

July 6th came and went, and the Nats signed their #1 overall pick without too much fanfare, giving Mason Denaburg a nice bump over his slot value and wrapping up the 2018 Draft Class.

Here’s a table of the 29 players we successfully signed, with known bonus amounts.  The MLBpipeline Draft Tracker is the most up-to-date resource for this data now that Baseball America has taken most of its stuff behind a paywall.

Round+JA7:J38	Overall	Name	Position	Col/HS	College or Cmtm	State	Signed?	Bonus Amt	Slot Value
1	27	Denaburg, Mason	RHP (Str)	HS	Florida	FL	Yes	3000000	2472700
2	65	Cate, Tim	LHP (Str)	Coll Jr	Uconn	CT	Yes	986200	986200
3	101	Schaller, Reid	RHP (Rel)	Coll So	Vanderbilt	TN	Yes	555100	555100
4	131	Irvin, Jake	RHP (Str)	Coll Jr	Oklahoma	OK	Yes	550000	414500
5	161	Canning, Gage	OF	Coll Jr	Arizona State	AZ	Yes	308900	308900
6	191	Karp, Andrew	RHP (Str)	Coll Sr	Florida State	FL	Yes	200000	239600
7	221	Day, Chandler	RHP (Rel)	Coll Jr	Vanderbilt	TN	Yes	188300	188300
8	251	Cropley, Tyler	C	Coll Sr	Iowa	IA	Yes	10000	157200
9	281	Driskill, Tanner	RHP (Str)	Coll Sr	Lamar	TX	Yes	10000	144400
10	311	Shaddy, Carson	2B	Coll Sr	Arkansas	AR	Yes	10000	136900
11	341	Bartow, Frankie	RHP (Rel)	Coll Jr	Miami	FL	Yes	125000
13	401	Wilson, Cody	OF (Corner)	Coll Jr	Florida Atlantic U	FL	Yes	125000
14	431	Fletcher, Aaron	LHP (Str)	Coll Jr	Houston	TX	Yes	125000
15	461	Lee, Evan	LHP (rel)/OF	Coll So	Arkansas	AR	Yes	125000
16	491	Teel, Carson	LHP (Str)	Coll Jr	Oklahoma State	OK	Yes	125000
18	551	Rhinesmith, Jacob	OF (CF)	Coll Jr	Western Kentucky	KY	Yes	125000
20	611	Vega, Onix	C	JC J1	Broward College	FL	Yes	125000
21	641	Tapani, Ryan	RHP (Str)	Coll Sr	Creighton	NB	Yes	10000
22	671	Daily, Cole	SS	Coll Jr	Notre Dame	IN	Yes
24	731	Marinconz, Kyle	SS	Coll Jr	Cal Poly San Luis Obispo	CA	Yes	60000
25	761	Vann, Chris	LHP (Str)	Coll Sr	Mercer	GA	Yes	3000
26	791	Morse, Colin	RHP (Str)	Coll Sr	Shenandoah	VA	Yes	3000
27	821	O'Connor, Pablo	2B	Coll Sr	Azusa Pacific University	CA	Yes
28	851	Chisolm, Blake	1B	Coll Sr	Sam Houston State	TX	Yes
29	881	Pogue, Colton	SS	Coll Sr	Pittsburg State U	KS	Yes
30	911	Vickers, Trey	SS	Coll Sr	Wichita State	KS	Yes
31	941	Quintana, Jonathan	OF	Coll Sr	Barry U	FL	Yes	3000
32	971	Maley, Alec	RHP (Str)	Coll Sr	Kentucky	KY	Yes	3000
38	1151	Milacki, Bobby	RHP	Coll Jr	Arizona Christian U	AZ	Yes	25000

Summary of the 29 drafted players:

• One High Schooler, 13 College Seniors
• 16 Arms (including Evan Lee) and 13 Bats
• Of the 16 arms, 4 were relievers in College and are (presumably) already routed to that role in the pros.
• Thus, 15 College players with eligibility remaining
• As of this writing, two guys have already been double promoted to Hagerstown; 11th rounder Frankie Bartow, UMiami’s closer this past season, and 5th rounder Cage Ganning, OF from UCLA.
• I count $6,800,500 in total bonus money paid out, more than their bonus pool figure of $5,603,800 and a bit more than their 5% cushion figure above the bonus pool figure of $5,883,990
• A few of the lower level bonus figures have yet to be disclosed; i could see Cole Daily getting a $125k bonus or near to it since he got bought out of his senior year, but the rest of the players w/o known bonuses were College Seniors who probably each got the same $3,000 bonus that other College Seniors got in rounds 20 and up.
• As of this writing, 2 have yet to be assigned, 15 went to the GCL, 9 went straight to Auburn, and 3 played a week or so in the GCL before getting to Auburn.

Verdict on this class overall: I like the fact that they threw out a ton of max $125k bonuses in the rounds 11-20; that certainly wasn’t the case last  year and it may have bought them some good players.  I’m ok with Denaburg as their 1st rounder and wasn’t as hung up on picking a more “famous” name at that point in the draft.  Unlike in 2017, I liked who they got in the rounds 3-6 area, and I think they may have a real player in 10th round senior sign Carson Shaddy.    In the rounds 11-20 they got a number of weekend starters from good schools to sign for the $125k figure, one of which has already forced his way to be twice-promoted.  Of course, when nearly half your draft dollars go to one kid, and that kid is a high schooler who probably is playing in our minor leagues for the next 5 years … its going to be quite a while til we really know if this was a winning class or not.

 

---

 

Here’s a table of the 11 guys who did not sign:

Round+JA7:J38	Overall	Name	Position	Col/HS	College or Cmtm	State	Signed?
12	371	Lawson, Graham	RHP (Rel)	Coll Jr	South Carolina	SC	Won't
17	521	Chapman, Ridge	RHP (Str)	Coll Jr	South Carolina	SC	Won't
19	581	Linginfelter, Zach	RHP (rel)	Coll So	Tennessee	TN	Didn't
23	701	Hamilton, Cole	C	JC J1	Linn Benton CC	OR	Won't
33	1001	Haney, Jack	C	HS	Cedartown HS	GA	Didn't
34	1031	Baca, Tyler	OF	HS	The Linfield School (CA)	CA	Didn't
35	1061	Binelas, Alex	1B	HS	Oak Creek HS (WI)	WI	Won't
36	1091	Blessie, Bo	RHP	HS	Robert E Lee HS (TX)	TX	Won't
37	1121	Wilcox, Cole	RHP	HS	Heritage HS (GA)	GA	Won't
39	1181	Nardi, Andrew	LHP	JC J2	Moorpark Col (CA)	CA	Didn't
40	1211	Menhart, Michael	RHP	HS	Richmond Hill HS	GA	Didn't

Quick Summary here:

• The big misses here of course are the 12th and 17th rounders from South Carolina, both of whom announced on twitter within a few minutes of each other of their intent to return to school.
• 19th rounder Zach Linginfelter was a draft-eligible Sophomore from Tennessee who made it into their weekend rotation late in the season and had the easy decision to return to school, where he probably is a weekend starter all next year and could easily find his way into the top 10 rounds.
• 6 of the 11 non-signees were 30th+ round prep players who were never going to sign … either because they were 1st round rumored kids with million dollar price tags or because they were legacy picks
• 2 of the non-signees are Juco guys who were a little hard to find info on: Cole Hamilton and Andrew Nardi.  Nardi seems to have a committment to go to Arizona; can’t blame him for heading to a good program.  Hamilton doesn’t even have a perfectgame.org profile and too common of a name to research on twitter.

No major misses; highest non-signed player was a 12th rounder.

(Just realized I forgot to post this earlier this week!  CWS started yesterday; this is a recap of the super regionals with predictions and key names to watch in the CWS).

Here’s a recap of our CWS coverage so far for 2018:

• Field of 64 announcement with Regional predictions and highlights of top-end draft prospects.
• 2018 Draft Preview with coverage of Local College-age eligible players of note
• 2018 CWS tournament: Regional Results, Super-Regional Pairings

---

CWS Super Regionals were played this past weekend.

Super Regional Recaps:  I’ve got these ordered by they way they’ll be playing into the CWS field (i.e. by bracket, with former Natioanl seeds 1,8,5,4 in the top and 6,3,7,2 in the bottom).  And this is the order they’re listed on d1baseball’s Tourney Central, the quickest way to find results.

• #1 Florida vs Auburn: Brady Singer overcame a leg injury in the first to throw a quality start while his offense spoiled Casey Mize‘s likely final collegiate start to get Game 1.  In game 2, Auburn could do nothing with Jackson Kowar, but got two runs late including a walk-off in the 9th to force a decided against Florida’s closer.   The two teams played a classic 3rd game, with Florida eventually advancing on a walk-off homer in the 11th to advance to Omaha for the fourth year in a row.
• Duke vs #9 Texas Tech:  Texas Tech got the first game 6-4.   Duke pounded them 11-2 to force the decider.  There, Texas Tech won 6-2 to advance.
• #5 Arkansas vs South Carolina: Arkansas showed why they’re a tough out, with their offense lighting up in a game one win 9-3.  Nats 10th rounder Carson Shaddy was a huge factor here, hitting a bases-clearing double in the 7th to break open the game.  In game 2, South Carolina got a solid start from Reservoir HS grad Cody Morris to force the deciding 3rd game (Note: Shaddy again had a solid game for Arkansas, and our 15th rounder Evan Lee got into the game as a match-up lefty for one batter).  In the decider, Arkansas jumped on South Carolina early and cruised 14-4 to earn a trip to Omaha.  Shaddy had another huge game with 3 RBIs.
• Tennessee Tech vs #13 Texas: Tennessee Tech upset Texas 5-4 in the opener.  Texas won game two 4-2 to force a deciding third game.  There, Texas took the series against pesky Tennessee Tech to advance.
• #3 Oregon State vs #14 Minnesota: OSU continued their dominant post-season by beating Minnesota 8-1 in the first game behind nearly a CG from OSU ace and lightening rod Luke Heimlich.  They had to work a bit harder in game 2, but Oregon State still advanced to their 2nd straight CWS 6-3.
• #6 UNC vs #11 Stetson: UNC got to Stetson 1st rounder Logan Gilbert, putting 4 runs on him in 5 innings and holding on for the game 1 victory.  UNC made quick work of Stetson in Game 2 to advance to the CWS.
• Mississippi State vs Vanderbilt: In a game dominated by poor pitching and errors, Mississippi State’s junior undrafted outfielder Elijah Macnamee hit a walk-off 2-run homer to take game one.  Vanderbilt scored 3 runs late, including a walk-off homer in the 9th, to take game 2; our two Vandy picks Reid Schaller and Chandler Day got the hold and the win by pitching the 8th and 9th in this game.  Mississippi State took game 3, getting a couple runs off of Day’s long-relief effort but exploding for four runs in the 11th to advance.
• Cal State Fullerton vs Washington: UWash got to CSF starter Colton Eastman in the 7th, and put enough runs on the board to make the lead stick in game 1.  Fullerton got revenge in game two 5-2 and forced the decider.  There though, Washington won in extra innings to advance to their first ever CWS.

---

My CWS Predictions: Florida, Texas Tech, Arkansas, Texas on one side, Oregon State, Stetson, Vanderbilt, Cal-State Fullerton on the other.

Actuals: Florida, Texas Tech, Arkansas, Texas on the top, Oregon State, UNC, Mississippi State, Washington on the bottom.

I got the whole upper bracket right, whiffed on most of the lower bracket.

 

---

CWS Field and Profiles

Top Bracket:

• #1 Florida: 47-19 overall, 20-10 in the SEC.  1st place SEC-East regular season.
• #9 Texas Tech: 44-18 overall, 15-9 in Big-12.  3rd place Big-12 regular season.
• #5 Arkansas; 43-19 overall, 18-12 in the SEC.  2nd place SEC-West regular season.
• #13 Texas: 42-21 overall, 17-7 in Big-12.  1st place Big-12 regular season.

Bottom Bracket

• #3 Oregon State: 49-10-1, 20-9-1 in the Pac-12.   2nd place, Pac-12 regular season.
• #6 UNC: 43-18 overall, 22-8 in the ACC.  1st Place ACC-Coastal division regular season.
• Mississippi State; 37-27 overall, 15-15 in the SEC.  5th Place, SEC-West division regular season.
• Washington: 35-24 overall, 20-10 in the Pac-12

CWS field review by the numbers

• SEC: 3 teams
• Pac12: 2 team
• ACC: 1 teams
• Big12: 2 teams
• National top 8 Seeds: 3
• Regional Hosts (i.e. top 16 seeds): 6
• First time programs: 1 (Washington)

---

CWS Field thoughts

An interesting field.   The entire bottom half of the tourney was decided before any of the upper half, as six of the eight super-regionals went the full 3 games.  At first glance, its easy to predict the two best teams here (Florida and Oregon State).  But its hard to not see what Mississippi State has done lately.  They finished 15-15 in SEC play … but that included them sweeping both Arkansas and Florida late just to get their league record up to .500.  They’re incredibly hot, just flipped the script on Vanderbilt, and is not a team i’d want to mess with right now.  The upper bracket has more seeds, but the lower bracket might be a tougher road for the favorite Oregon State.

Florida beat Arkansas 2 of 3 in their season series, but it was in Florida.  On a neutral field its hard to say who might win.  In the bottom , Oregon State will open with conference rival Washington, who they took 2 of 3 against (again at home).   Its hard to see a Texas-Texas Tech rematch but if they do meet, Texas took 2/3 on Texas Tech’s field and should be slightly favored on a neutral field.

Quick predictions:

Final: Oregon State over Florida.

Player Star power in this CWS: By team, here’s the top-end draft talents

• Florida features top picks Brady Singer, Jackson Kowar, Jonathan India. 
• Texas Tech’s top pick was a Supplemental 2nd rounder Grant Little.
• Arkansas had three upper round picks: 3rd rounder Blaine Knight, 4th rounder Eric Cole and 5th round C Grant Koch.
• Texas’ highest draft pick is the son of Roger Clemens, Kody Clemens, drafted in the 3rd round.  Also features role player Andy McGuire, from Madison HS in Vienna, drafted in the 28th round.
• Oregon State features Nick Madrigal (#4 overall), plus 1st-day picks Trevor Larnach and Cayden Grenier, as well as the controversial 1st round talent Luke Heimlich.
• UNC had just one top 10 round pick, RHP 6th rounder Rodney Hutchinson.
• Mississippi State’s ace Konner Plikington slipped to the 3rd round.
• Washington had and 8th rounder A.J. Graffiano and a 9th rounder Willie MacIver.

Nats 2018 Draftees in the CWS: thanks to the Nats strategy of drafting only College players, they drafted a ton of guys who are playing in Omaha.  By team:

• #5 Arkansas features 10th rounder Carson Shaddy, the Arkansas starting 2B as well as our 15th rounder Evan Lee, a role-player on the team this year.  Shaddy had a massive super-Regional at the plate and will look to continue in the CWS.

---

College CWS tournament references:

• d1baseball.com’s daily scoreboard is my go-to link
• d1baseball’s Tourney Central
• Baseball America’s College coverage home page
• CollegeBaseballDaily.com has coverage as well.
• CollegeBaseballCentral.com has coverage as well.
• Ncaa.com’s interactive full 64-team bracket
• NCAA Individual player stats
• Warren Nolan.com’s College Baseball RPI
• Warren Nolan’s Conference RPI rankings

Another  year in the books, and another 40 guys now potentially part of the Nats organization.  Ok well really more like 32-33 new guys; that’s about how many i’d expect to sign out of this class.

We reviewed the top 10 more in-depth in the previous post since, historically, the most likely eventual MLB impact players are all top-end draft picks.  Lets zip through the rest of the draft and do some quick commentary.

• Round 11: Frankie Bartow, U Miami’s closer.  I like this as an 11th rounder, which in today’s draft system are the first time you can grab someone of note and have a decent shot at them.  Bartow has some career accolades (freshman all-american, finalist for collegiate closer of the year, etc).  Yes he’s a college closer and that’s all he’ll be, but I like this as an 11th rounder.
• Round 12: Graham Lawson, also an 8th/9th inning guy for South Carolina.  Not as accomplished as Bartow, but similar role.
• Round 13: Cody Wilson, a corner OF from FAU.  Good power this year (14 homers), good speed (nearly 20 SBs).  Not a bad 12th rounder.   College Junior though so he has some leverage but it doesn’t seem like he slipped really.
• Round 14: Aaron Fletcher.  a Senior lefty starter from U Houston.  Um, this was Houston’s Friday starter, who pitched a 4-hit, 0 earned run gem in the CWS regional opener to beat Purdue.   Why wasn’t he picked up already?  College numbers look great for a good team in a decent conference, conference pitcher of the year in 2018.  Perhaps its because he doesn’t have massive K/9 numbers.  Nonetheless, I like this pick.
• Round 15: Evan Lee, a two-way draft eligible sophomore player for Arkansas.  Lefty reliever and a corner OF.  This is a weird one; he doesn’t have great numbers on either side of the ball, but he was an absolute beast coming out of HS (all-american on every service, Gatorade player of the state, etc).  I wonder if this is an over slot candidate.
• Round 16: Carson Teel, College Jr lefty starter from Oklahoma State.  Entered the weekend rotation mid-season, gave them 11 starts, including getting the Win over USF in last weekend’s regional.  Decent numbers on the season skewed by one bad outing against West Virginia.  Another value pick.
• Round 17: Ridge Chapman, coll JR mid-week starter for South Carolina; looks like a guy with some inflation in his stats; his BAA is .189 on the year but his ERA is 4.95.   He’s a Juco transfer into South Carolina and his Juco numbers were pretty impressive; perhaps an area scout remembered him from 2017 (when he was drafted late but chose not to sign).
• Round 18: Jacob Rhinesmith, Coll Jr center fielder from Western Kentucky (which, i’d like to point out, has completely ripped off the Nats Curly-W on their uniforms…).  14  homers, 13 SBs as a center fielder?  Another Juco transfer with very gaudy 2017 numbers.  Listed as 6’1″ 195, lefty.  Maybe he sticks in center?
• Round 19: Zach Linginfelter, RHP coll Sophomore from Tennessee.  Was in relief most of the season, then put into the rotation towards the end of the year.  Pitched well in the SEC tourney.
• Round 20: Onix Vega, a Juco C from Broward College.  Gotta have catchers for your short season teams.

Past Round 20, I’ll just note interesting guys; see the table above for the next 20 picks fully.  From here down honestly most guys are just one-and-done short-season players.

• Round 21: Ryan Tapani, 5th year Sr RHP from Creighton.  Looks like Creighton’s Friday starter with pretty gaudy numbers (10-1, 2.38 ERA on the year).  Just named 3rd team All-American by Collegiate Baseball Newspaper.  Son of former MLB player Kevin Tapani, a former pitcher who had more than 350 major league starts in a 13 year career. Nice 21st rounder senior sign.
• Round 26: Colin Morse, a senior RHP from Shenandoah University by way of … McLean HS.  A local kid.  He seemed like a weekend starter for Shenandoah the last three  years, and he had starts in all four years of his career.
• Round 30 Trey Vickers, senior SS from Wichita State.  Basically a four year starter at SS for a good baseball program.  Not flashy, but I like the career accomplishment for a higher profile program.
• Two late round picks (Rounds 34 and 40 picks Tyler Baca and Michael Menhart both seem to be related to Nationals front-office staff (respectively,  Assistant Director of Amateur Scouting Mark Baca and Pitching Coordinator Paul Menhart).
• Round 37 pick Cole Wilcox is an interesting throw-away pick; he was projected as a 1st rounder prior to the draft and was even tied to the Nats in some mocks, but he had a $3M price tag and so once he fell out of the 1st round he was guaranteed to go to school.  He announced his intent to honor his commitment to University of Georgia even before the Nats picked him, where he’ll be a draft eligible sophomore in two years’ time.

Its notable that every single pick the Nats had between rounds 25 and 32 (8 straight rounds) were College seniors.  And then, they ripped of five straight HS draftees from rounds 33-37, including a guy who was projected to go in the first round (Wilcox) in the 37th.   It is almost as if the team got to round 33 and was like, “eh, we’re good, pick a bunch of prep kids as favors to executives or who we have no chance of signing.”

Summary of the Draft class:

• 23 Arms, 18 Position players, which adds up to 41 since we have a 2-way guy in Evan Lee.
• 16 College Juniors (or draft-eligible Sophomores)
• 14 College Seniors with no leverage
• 3 Juco guys
• 7 High Schoolers, 6 of which are basically throw-away picks in the late rounds.

Of the 30 4-year college guys:

• 8 from SEC teams
• 1 from Pac12 teams
• 2 from ACC teams
• 1 from Big10 teams
• 2 from Big12 teams
• 5 from non-major conference but still big-time Baseball programs (FAU, Houston, Sam Houston State, UConn, Wichita State)
• 11 from smaller/non division 1 programs

Not surprisingly, a huge take from the SEC, which proved this year they’re unrivaled in terms of college baseball power.

Geographic Locations of picks:

• 6 from Florida, 4 from Georgia
• 4 from California, another 2 from Arizona
• 4 From Texas, another 2 from Oklahoma and 2 from Arkansas
• 3 from Tennessee, 2 from South Carolina and 2 from Kentucky
• 5 from the Midwest (Iowa, Indiana, Kansas, Nebraska)
• 4 from random remaining states: one each from Connecticut, Wisconsin, Oregon and Virginia.

that’s 36 of the 40 picks from these 5 general areas.  We know that Florida, Georgia and California are the three heaviest areas for providing baseball talent, but normally we see a big focus in the Texas/Oklahoma area with our drafts.  Not this year; one quarter came from the two southeastern states this year.

---

 

Here’s a table with all 40 picks.

Round	Overall	Name	Position	Col/HS	College or Cmtm	State
1	27	Denaburg, Mason	RHP (Str)	HS	Florida	FL
2	65	Cate, Tim	LHP (Str)	Coll Jr	Uconn	CT
3	101	Schaller, Reid	RHP (Rel)	Coll So	Vanderbilt	TN
4	131	Irvin, Jake	RHP (Str)	Coll Jr	Oklahoma	OK
5	161	Canning, Gage	OF	Coll Jr	Arizona State	AZ
6	191	Karp, Andrew	RHP (Str)	Coll Sr	Florida State	FL
7	221	Day, Chandler	RHP (Rel)	Coll Jr	Vanderbilt	TN
8	251	Cropley, Tyler	C	Coll Sr	Iowa	IA
9	281	Driskill, Tanner	RHP (Str)	Coll Sr	Lamar	TX
10	311	Shaddy, Carson	2B	Coll Sr	Arkansas	AR
11	341	Bartow, Frankie	RHP (Rel)	Coll Jr	Miami	FL
12	371	Lawson, Graham	RHP (Rel)	Coll Jr	South Carolina	SC
13	401	Wilson, Cody	OF (Corner)	Coll Jr	Florida Atlantic U	FL
14	431	Fletcher, Aaron	LHP (Str)	Coll Sr	Houston	TX
15	461	Lee, Evan	LHP (rel)/OF	Coll So	Arkansas	AR
16	491	Teel, Carson	LHP (Str)	Coll Jr	Oklahoma State	OK
17	521	Chapman, Ridge	RHP (Str)	Coll Jr	South Carolina	SC
18	551	Rhinesmith, Jacob	OF (CF)	Coll Jr	Western Kentucky	KY
19	581	Linginfelter, Zach	RHP (rel)	Coll So	Tennessee	TN
20	611	Vega, Onix	C	JC J1	Broward College	FL
21	641	Tapani, Ryan	RHP (Str)	Coll Sr	Creighton	NB
22	671	Daily, Cole	SS	Coll Jr	Notre Dame	IN
23	701	Hamilton, Cole	C	JC J1	Linn Benton CC	OR
24	731	Marinconz, Kyle	SS	Coll Jr	Cal Poly San Luis Obispo	CA
25	761	Vann, Chris	LHP (Str)	Coll Sr	Mercer	GA
26	791	Morse, Colin	RHP (Str)	Coll Sr	Shenandoah	VA
27	821	O'Connor, Pablo	2B	Coll Sr	Azusa Pacific University	CA
28	851	Chisolm, Blake	1B	Coll Sr	Sam Houston State	TX
29	881	Pogue, Colton	SS	Coll Sr	Pittsburg State U	KS
30	911	Vickers, Trey	SS	Coll Sr	Wichita State	KS
31	941	Quintana, Jonathan	OF	Coll Sr	Barry U	FL
32	971	Maley, Alec	RHP (Str)	Coll Sr	Kentucky	KY
33	1001	Haney, Jack	C	HS	Cedartown HS	GA
34	1031	Baca, Tyler	OF	HS	The Linfield School (CA)	CA
35	1061	Binelas, Alex	1B	HS	Oak Creek HS (WI)	WI
36	1091	Blessie, Bo	RHP	HS	Robert E Lee HS (TX)	TX
37	1121	Wilcox, Cole	RHP	HS	Heritage HS (GA)	GA
38	1151	Milacki, Bobby	RHP	Coll Jr	Arizona Christian U	AZ
39	1181	Nardi, Andrew	LHP	JC J2	Moorpark Col (CA)	CA
40	1211	Menhart, Michael	RHP	HS	Richmond Hill HS	GA