First Rounder: No Guarantees

Posted By on March 4, 2023

How many of these guys do you remember? John Wyatt, Larry Hutton, Don Denbow, Terry McDermott, Jim Haller. Don’t ring a bell? How about Bobby Valentine? Oh, him, you know. Well, all those guys were the Dodgers’ first-round picks – their first six, as a matter of fact. None of them was drafted #1 because the Dodgers were not picking that high. Valentine was the highest pick at #5 in 68. Wyatt and McDermott were #8s. Haller was #9 and Denbow, #20. SO out of their first six first-rounders, they got one MLB player. McDermott had a cup of coffee in the bigs in 1972, playing in 9 games.

Getting drafted in the first round certainly does not guarantee the player a big-league career, let alone a successful one. The Dodgers did far better with their lower-round picks in a couple of those first years, especially the 68 class.

That being said, they have had some significant success with some of their first-rounders. Over their next five picks, they got two pitchers who had lengthy careers, Rick Rhoden and Rick Sutcliffe. Rhoden was on the 77-pennant winning team and was used in the trade for Jerry Ruess. Sutcliffe was a Rookie of the Year and pitched on the 1981 team. He was not on the World Series roster but still got the ring. The other three, are John Harbin, Ted Farr, and Mark Bradley. Of those three, only Bradley saw MLB time. He hit a pinch-hit homer off of Fernando Valenzuela in 1983. He also was part of a trade that would have sent him, Orel Hershiser, who was in the minors at that point, Dave Stewart and Burt Hooton to the Texas Rangers for catcher Jim Sundberg. Sundberg vetoed the trade. And Hershiser rode into history.

For the next five years, they only had four first-round picks, and three of those guys, Scioscia, Howe, and Welch made it to the show. Howe was a rookie of the year and won a ring in 81. Welch won a Cy Young with Oakland. Scioscia was part of two World Series-winning teams and went on to be the Angels’ longest-tenured manager winning a World Series there in 2002.

From 1980 to 1990, they got a couple of players who made it to the majors. Dave Anderson, Franklin Stubbs, Chris Gwynn, and Tom Goodwin. None of whom played significant roles with the Dodgers, although Stubbs got a lot of first-base time after Garvey left. Goodwin had a 14-year career. Most of it with other teams.

The 1990s were not much better. A couple of their picks, Darren Dreifort and Paul Konerko, had lengthy careers, Dreifort 11 years and Konerko 18. Konerko was traded to the Reds before the Dodgers really got to see what he could do. He had his best years with the White Sox. Damien Rolls was drafted by the Dodgers but never played for them. He had a four-year career in the bigs. Jason Repko, another Dodger draftee, spent parts of seven seasons in the majors.

Their first six drafts of the 2000s provided five players who went on to have time in the majors. James Loney and Chad Billingsley had significant time in the majors with LA. Loney was later part of “The Trade”. Scott Ebert and Blake DeWitt had short stints in the majors with the Dodgers. Luke Hochevar did not sign with LA but was later drafted and signed by the Royals.

In 2006, their first-round pick at # 7 was Clayton Kershaw. Kersh has been a key piece for most of his career and is most likely a first-round Hall of Fame selection. The rest of the decade produced little, with only Chris Withrow making any impact in the majors. He, too, was used in a big trade with Atlanta. They also drafted Don Mattingly’s boy, Preston, in 2006, but he never progressed far.

From 2010 to 2020, they drafted eight players who have seen at least some big-league action. Corey Seager, Walker Buehler, and Will Smith have had the most time in the majors. Their last two first-round picks, Michael Busch and Bobby Miller have a very good shot at seeing MLB time this year. With the injury yesterday to Gavin Lux, I believe Busch’s chances just improved exponentially.

The kids they now have in the minors are very talented. It will be fun watching them progress.

This article has 43 Comments

  1. Tom Sizemore’s family made the decision to take him off of life support and he has passed away at age 61. Condolences to his family. RIP.

  2. This is for Eric:

    There are seven different categories for classification by OPS used by Bill James, who has been titled “The 96 families of Hitters”.

    Category A: Great, in the range between .9000 and higher.
    Category B: Very good, in the range between .8334 and .8999.
    Category C: Above average, in the range between .7667 and .8333.
    Category D: Average in the range between .7000 and .7666.
    Category E: Below Average in the range between .6334 and .6999.
    Category F: Poor in the range between .5667 and .6333.
    Category G: Very poor in the range between .5666 and lower.

    Notice there is not a category called “shitty?”

    These guys work hard all their lives, year-round, and to call them shitty totally disrespects what the game is about. It is a team game and SS is a key defensive position. I am working on something called Team OPS which is just an accumulation of the OPS of the position players. But maybe OPS+ or WAR is better.

    1. Considering many people assumed Rojas would be the SS when we acquired him, maybe we should just roll with him. Finding a bench replacement for Rojas may be harder, but we have in-house options too.

    2. Ok he’s below average. I didn’t call him shitty on defense though. I just said shitty bat. From now on if I talk about him I will say below average bat, not shitty. I’m going to take a break from posting here.

  3. Michael, nice writeup. I just read and studied the new list of the Dodgers’ top 30 prospects and I am quite impressed with the quality of our farm system according to the individual ratings on each prospect. My only negative is I wish we had more shortstops on the list that were closer to being prime time ready that could be developed and eventually be a star starter on the major league club. I’m sure this will be a priority in the upcoming July MLB draft as the Dodgers have two additional picks for losing Anderson to the Angels and Turner to the Phillies. I also feel that AF will be looking to acquire a young MLB ready shortstop with some of the prospect capital at the trading deadline or before the season if it makes sense.

    1. I agree on the ss situation.
      Yanks have two young talented ss who are about ready to start in MLB. Maybe the Dodgers could trade from their surplus of young pitching or catching for one of them.

      Go Dodgers!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  4. The dearth of shortstops is a direct product of where the Dodgers draft. The teams at the top get their choice of the top shortstops, and by the time the Dodgers draft, the best ones are off the board. The Dodgers might have to take more chances at the position.

    2. When you say take more chances, do you mean drafting someone out of HS? Any idea how well the Dodgers have done with players taken out of HS in the Friedman era?

      1. Out of high school was Gavin Lux, wasn’t he? How’s that for taking chances?!

        1. This should have been his year to shine.,, and yes, that was outside his norm.

          Somewhere, some Dodger fans are trying to figure out how to blame Lux’s injury on Friedman.

          1. No. It is clearly Roberts’ fault for not taking him out of the game earlier. LOL

          2. Hate to say it, but it was Lux’s fault.
            It’s not so much the extra weight–a minor factor–but his actions were the opposite of a high baseball IQ.
            I saw an interview in which he acknowledged as much, saying he wish he’d just taken throw in his face.
            While that would have been better than a torn ACL, he had better options too. If he acted out of feat, he should have just ducked and covered his head with his arms. This would be the instinctive action, wouldn’t it? Or he could have gone into a slide, as runners sometimes do to avoid throws from second base.
            At any rate, the throw was highly unlikely to hit him. How often has Lux thrown into oncoming runners? Fielders are much, much more likely to alter their throw than hit a baserunner.

  6. McKay Christianson I played against in football and baseball in high school. He was going to go to BYU. Then he git Drafted in first round out if high school didn’t go to college. He even made it to AAA quickly. He was going to be the starting center fielder for the Dodgers. And then they traded him to the Cincinnati Reds. That’s where he got stuck in the minors. Because well the Reds at the time had a center fielder by the name of Ken Griffey Jr. McCay finally got traded to the Indians. That’s where he got called up for ten days. Best days ever the food was so better the locker rooms the hotels. All because the outfielders were hurt. The next year he retired from baseball. Because the wear an tear of traveling in minor league just drags a man down. And when your so close to getting to the Show that’s what they call it. That when you get there. You better make an appearance that sticks. Our you get get stuck in AAA baseball the whole time. He told me. It all depends on where you get drafted. And by what organization. And who is the player in front of you. In his playing time the player was his playing time. Yes was Ken Griffey JR. He was that close to being the Dodgers centerfielder. And being a house hold name. Now nobody knows who he was but he backed up Ken Griffey JR if he ever got hurt.. He also said. That’s the life of a baseball player. There’s always the chance you will get traded. Because someone sees how you can benefit there baseball team. So then they trade for you.

  7. I hope under the next CBA that teams will be able to trade players for draft pick position like I believe is done in all the other sports except baseball. It will bring about another must needed change to the game.

  8. 8:05 PM ET vs Royals

    SP Ryan Pepiot R
    0-0 .00 ERA
    SP Zack Greinke R
    0-0 .00 ERA

    Confirmed Lineup
    CF J. Heyward L
    LF T. Thompson R
    C Will Smith R
    DH James Outman L
    SS Miguel Rojas R
    1B M. Busch L
    3B L. Williams R
    RF S. Duggar L
    2B M. Vargas R

    Partly-cloudy-day
    0% Rain
    66° Wind 5 mph Out

    1. Thx Bluto. Ardaya has a good take on the Dodgers. It was interesting that he had a similar take on Lux at short that Mark had. He stated that even with a healthy Lux he thought the Dodgers might have made a move at SS at the deadline.

      1. I was rooting for Gavin to prove me wrong, but I did not think he could play SS and I still don’t. I doubt that we ever find out. It actually surprised me that Friedman was letting him do it.

  10. There you go Outman with a home run.

    Yes it’s spring training but. And what has Miguel Vargas done so far?

    1. Not fair, Vargas is not allowed to swing the bat yet and won’t be until after the day off next week. Not swinging he has drawn four walks even though they know he is not swinging. Heyward hit his second homer of the spring.

      1. Not that it matters it’s spring training. But he has struck out six times. And I thought putting the ball in play is better than walking according to someone.

        I don’t understand how is he not swinging the bat when he has struck out six times. And I thought he was healthy now

        Anyways who cares.

        1. I could really say something crazy here, but I guess you are not paying attention.

          That’s because you only look at stats.

          Vargas has not swung at a single pitch because he has a fractured pinkie. He takes at-bats with his bat on his shoulder. They are going to allegedly allow him to start swinging on Wednesday.

          But, you tend to strike out a lot when you don’t swing!

  11. Well if Lux can’t then maybe Outman will! There’s just something anout this kid!

  12. I missed the reason Why the pitch clock starts sometimes it’s 20 seconds and sometimes it’s 15 seconds.

      1. I’m not sure about all the pitch clock rules, but my son had an interesting idea.
        Perhaps the clock should alter if the count is full.
        This is usually when we see those duels with a lot of foul balls. The suspense builds, especially in a tight game. Giving the pitcher and hitter a little more time could help.
        Anyway, I think the MLB will continue to tweak the rule.

        1. I have read interviews with numerous players, pitchers, and coaches, and 99% of them absolutely really like the pitch clock. I do not this they are going to mess much with a good thing. It’s the bomb! You have to wonder with the pitch clock what Kirk Gibson would have done in the 1988 series, however.

      1. It was a joke about your reply to Eric. Did you click the
        Read it, or just watch the video with JT

  17. Yamamoto with the save last night. Boy some of those balls the Royals hit were tattooed. 2 triples in one inning? WOW. Boys generally looked good. Nice to see Trayce finally get a hold of one for a double. Never like seeing a player struggle in spring. But I think he will be fine once he gets his timing down.

  18. There was a lot to like in this game, especially the play from Outman and Heyward. Rojas and Pepiot looked pretty good too.
    But because every silver lining has a cloud, it occurs to me that Lux’s injury not only exposes how thin the Dodgers are at SS, but raises questions about the decision to use a full-time DH.
    Don’t get me wrong. I’m fine with JD Martinez, but at age 35 he is clearly on the downslope of his career, with just 16 HRs last year. He was a bargain compared to JT, the guy he essentially replaced. Maybe the reunion with Von Scoyoc and Mookie can help JDM reclaim some of the old magic–but maybe not.
    A designated DH (see what I did there?) limits the versatility of the lineup. How many “rest days” will Will Smith get playing DH while Barnes catches? How many DH “rest days” will Muncy get? The DH is also ideal for a platoon because it won’t hurt the defense. But Roberts says the plan is for JDM to be the full-time DH, with no platoon.
    Well, perhaps that should change–especially since Heyward and Peralta seem to be locks for Opening Day. And especially since JDM ‘s splits in 2022 were pretty wide: a .998 OPS versus southpaws, and .729 against righties. Peralta, meanwhile, had an .823 OPS versus righties while with the Dbacks, before slumping after the trade…. Let’s just hope Heyward’s new swing keeps producing.
    So either Peralta or Heyward could be a lefty complement to JDM’s righty bat. A platoon would also help preserve overall lefty-righty balance in the lineup, since Lux has been replaced by Rojas and Taylor, both hitting from the right side.
    Now, if JDM rakes as he did in his prime, forget the platoon. If JDM does that, I’d love the full-time DH. But I think he’ll be good, not great–and keeping Peralta or Heyward active in a platoon would keep them fresh. When they start, JDM would be a scary pinch-hitter….
    I certainly hope Outman is playing his way to a full-time gig.
    If so, let’s consider alternative lineups…

    Mookie RF
    Freddie 1B
    Will C
    Max 3B
    JDM DH (Heyward/Peralta vs righties)
    Outman CF (looking good, deserves runway)
    Vargas 2B (gets his runway; bat-to-ball skills provide buffer between high strikeout guys)
    Trayce (platoon with Peralta/Heyward)
    Rojas (Taylor) SS

Comments are closed.