Is Bruce Seid's job on the line? (UPDATE: RIP Bruce, you will be missed -- who will be new SD?)

[TooLiveBrew]

I'm not implying that he will be shown the door on Monday, but if the guys he has picked the last few years, combined with whoever he picks in this draft, don't start to show something by this time next year, the Brewers may need to consider some changes in the scouting department.

 

Go back and compare our 2009 draft to the Cardinals 2009 draft and you will be alarmed about the future of our team in the NL Central.

Or you can point to Coulter, Taylor, Nelson, Lopez, and even the resurgent Bradley & Jungmann... and others. I don't think Seid's job is in any danger at this point.

[danzig6767]

I am distraught enough as a fan, but do you think Seid lies awake at night cursing Mark Teixeira and the fact that we missed Mike Trout by one pick?

 

Yea, if it is true that Seid had Trout highest on his draft board, only to see him go one pick before and then end up taking Arnett, how do you ever get that out of your head?

 

I remember reading a book by Ron Wolf. I forget the exact year, but he said that he had Ray Lewis already written on their draft card with the 27th pick and even were on the phone with him as Baltimore's time was running down to pick, only to hear Lewis say at the last second that he had another call.

 

Baltimore stings Wolf by take Lewis and he said something to the effect that this was the first and only time as Packers GM that he seriously got rattled. He ends up picking John Michaels who was a bust and Lewis had a HOF career.

[DoubleSwitch]

TC07 what do you think of tonights picks? It certainly looks like they've gone after upside and didn't shy away from some risk.

[TheCrew07]

Easily my favorite first day of his tenure.

 

Many of us were hoping that the 2012 draft signaled a shift in philosophy but without a first round pick last year (and the pool money) it was hard to tell if it was an outlier or something more.

 

I think we clearly have our answer now, I'm thrilled. There are still some very intriguing/under the radar HS pitchers out there for round 3 as well. As we discussed in the draft thread there is going to be a run on college seniors to get the bonus pool money needed for the top 3 picks but that's just a necessary evil with the bonus pool system.

[LouisEly]

I think it should be. the brewers front office should raid the cardinals or braves for some top assistants or scouts. they consistently draft in the middle to end of the round and do great with their picks. they also are much better with international talent.

 

The Brewers have had a bad few years, but I think we overestimate other teams' success too. For example, the Braves got Heyward at #12 in 2007 and Mike Minor at #7 in 2009, but before that their only decent first round picks since 2001 have been Saltalamacchia (#36, 2003) and Jeff Francoeur (#23, 2002). And obviously the latter two are not a high bar.

This. Prior to 2009 the Cardinals had not had much success in the draft in the first round. Brett Wallace at #13? Pete Kozma at #18? And they whiffed on all three of their first round picks in 2010 (Jenkins was showing some promise but has had two shoulder injuries and had shoulder surgery late last season; has yet to pitch in 2014).

 

Yes, the Cardinals had a great draft in 2009. And they would also trade 2010 drafts with the Brewers in a heartbeat.

[princeofpop]

I think it is safe to say that Mr. Seid has afforded himself a little job security with the tremendous draft that he has pulled off so far.

 

As long as we can get the first three picks all signed, I think this will be one of those once-in-a-decade type drafts for the Brew Crew!

[LouisEly]

I am distraught enough as a fan, but do you think Seid lies awake at night cursing Mark Teixeira and the fact that we missed Mike Trout by one pick?

 

Yea, if it is true that Seid had Trout highest on his draft board, only to see him go one pick before and then end up taking Arnett, how do you ever get that out of your head?

 

I remember reading a book by Ron Wolf. I forget the exact year, but he said that he had Ray Lewis already written on their draft card with the 27th pick and even were on the phone with him as Baltimore's time was running down to pick, only to hear Lewis say at the last second that he had another call.

 

Baltimore stings Wolf by take Lewis and he said something to the effect that this was the first and only time as Packers GM that he seriously got rattled. He ends up picking John Michaels who was a bust and Lewis had a HOF career.

There is a big difference between the baseball draft and the football draft, and it is that the baseball draft only allows one minute between picks whereas the football draft allows at least five minutes. Now that the draft is televised they give five minutes between picks in the first round, but IIRC that wasn't the case in 2009 - I'm pretty sure it was still one minute then.

 

Think about that; if the player that is #1 on your board goes right before you, or if the top guys on your board go in the 3-4 picks before you, you only have one minute to decide who to take. I wonder how much this contributes to the randomness of the baseball draft; teams have one minute to decide who to pick based on talent, signability, and BPA of the thousands of HS, college, and juco players available.

[Bombers]

I am distraught enough as a fan, but do you think Seid lies awake at night cursing Mark Teixeira and the fact that we missed Mike Trout by one pick?

 

Yea, if it is true that Seid had Trout highest on his draft board, only to see him go one pick before and then end up taking Arnett, how do you ever get that out of your head?

 

I remember reading a book by Ron Wolf. I forget the exact year, but he said that he had Ray Lewis already written on their draft card with the 27th pick and even were on the phone with him as Baltimore's time was running down to pick, only to hear Lewis say at the last second that he had another call.

 

Baltimore stings Wolf by take Lewis and he said something to the effect that this was the first and only time as Packers GM that he seriously got rattled. He ends up picking John Michaels who was a bust and Lewis had a HOF career.

There is a big difference between the baseball draft and the football draft, and it is that the baseball draft only allows one minute between picks whereas the football draft allows at least five minutes. Now that the draft is televised they give five minutes between picks in the first round, but IIRC that wasn't the case in 2009 - I'm pretty sure it was still one minute then.

 

Think about that; if the player that is #1 on your board goes right before you, or if the top guys on your board go in the 3-4 picks before you, you only have one minute to decide who to take. I wonder how much this contributes to the randomness of the baseball draft; teams have one minute to decide who to pick based on talent, signability, and BPA of the thousands of HS, college, and juco players available.

 

That is why the Ted Thompson model of "trust the board" is the only approach I am interested in. You make a list. You cross guys off that list as they get picked. When your turn comes up, you are making a decision on the top 3 on your board. (And I say top 3 because, unless your top 3 all play the same position, you may want to draft a position, so instead of taking the top guy on your list, say a 3B, you take a P, because you drafted a SS with your first pick.)

 

I understand the once in a lifetime rattle (i.e. Ron Wolf & Ray Lewis - I have heard about that too, or even Trout with Seid) ... but that should really only happen once to a GM. Because like anything, the best way to learn is by first hand experience. In the end, trust the board, and ultimately your scouts. Your decisions are mostly made weeks before the draft. IMO

[3and2Fastball]

I think it is safe to say that Mr. Seid has afforded himself a little job security with the tremendous draft that he has pulled off so far.

 

As long as we can get the first three picks all signed, I think this will be one of those once-in-a-decade type drafts for the Brew Crew!

 

Agreed and especially if we sign Lara on July 2nd

[brewcrewdue80]

There's no doubt Medeiros will get signed. But if they don't sign Gatewood and Harrison both then I think Seid's job is over. Now just a wait and see how this all plays out. I can't fathom getting all 3 signed if they all seek 2mil. Gatewood at 2mil and Medeiros/Harrison at 1.7mil maybe. would be a sorta guess by me at this point. Remember if they don't sign one they can't take that money and use it to sign the other. Missing on Gatewood would be 1.4mil? I think in signing money. Missing on Harrison would be 1.1mil? I think. And think, the strategy here on out has to be drafting players to sign under slot to get them all signed. Failing on both Gatewood/Harrison and then having a draft class filled with underslot picks ie nobodys you're left with your #12 pick of Medeiros and nothing else to show for it. (I can safely assume somewhere they'll draft 1 more upside guy to fall back on with the underslot money but that won't happen til some time after the 10th rd.

This is the slot money by Brewers picks left through the 10th rd:

85:641,800-can't go upside

116:449,300-can't go upside

146:336,400-can't go upside

176:251,900-can't go upside

206:188,800-maybe can go upside

236:159,100-can probably consider upside

266:148,700-can probably consider upside

296:138,700-can probably consider upside

The next 4 rounds have about 1.68mil in slot money to find savings w/o losing that money to sign your collective.

7-10 it's 635,300 in slot money to get savings. All told you take the first 6rds of money you have around 6.95mil total to get the three signed with a 6mil target(guess) that 950k doesn't include what money you use to sign those 4 rounds of picks.

[LouisEly]

If you watched the draft special on FSN last year you know that the Brewers don't draft guys in the early rounds they don't think they can sign. They specifically said, "We have to sign our guys."

[Never Outhustled]

There's no reason to think Gatewood is an over slot player. He has no interest in college so he lacks leverage. He was drafted where his talent dictated.

 

Harrison will get the extra money the team saved with senior selection Demuth in round 2. These guys aren't Boras clients, it will get done.

 

As for Seid, he definately needed this. I don't understand how some blame the farm system lack of talent on the Covey issue. We didn't lose a pick, it was just delayed a year. The problem was Sied flushed it by selecting a pedestrian college pitcher in Bradley. Sied finally seems to be drafting like his mentor, that was long overdo.

[paul253]

I'll admit that I was very, very doubtful of Seid's ability to draft. As much as I was looking forward to this draft I was worried he'd find a way to screw it up again. After the Medeiros pick I was less than satisfied. But to see him get Gatewood and Harrison was quite the pleasant surprise. I honestly think he just drafted three top ten organizational prospects. I like the third basemen from Indiana too. It was a position we desperately needed a prospect at and even if Demuth only profiles as a Taylor Green type player it's still better than what we have now. He drafted more HS guys, especially pitchers, than last year and that was nice to see too. Hopefully he can keep it up in future drafts.

[liveforoctober]

Signed and signed. Now get them into the system and let's get to work.

 

http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20140607&content_id=78718586&notebook_id=78718892&vkey=notebook_mil&c_id=mil

[SoupTown]

I like the great discussion gents. The most important sentence perhaps was (TheCrew07): "We can be "in it" with a rotation full of 3s but I don't think we can win anything meaningful in the post season with that kind of roster construction, at some point we need pitchers we can match-up to the best in baseball"

 

I don't follow the A's much. But I think that must be their problem. And it is why we should do any and everything to find such a Number 1 starter. I mean you can throw the guy in games 1,4,7 of a World Series. It is certainly a place I would hope the Brewers would overspend at some stage. But, as you wise chatters note, the draft is where they should be hunted for.

[HiAndTight]

There's no reason to think Gatewood is an over slot player. He has no interest in college so he lacks leverage. He was drafted where his talent dictated.

 

Harrison will get the extra money the team saved with senior selection Demuth in round 2. These guys aren't Boras clients, it will get done.

 

As for Seid, he definately needed this. I don't understand how some blame the farm system lack of talent on the Covey issue. We didn't lose a pick, it was just delayed a year. The problem was Sied flushed it by selecting a pedestrian college pitcher in Bradley. Sied finally seems to be drafting like his mentor, that was long overdo.

 

 

And that's incredibly easy to say after the fact, but at the time he was ranked among the top 10 by most draft pundits and at one point that year thought to be a potential top 3 pick.

 

He was not a pedestrian talent. We had two picks at 12 and 15 and we got two top 10 talents.

Everyone was thrilled when we signed Arnett.

 

Go back and look at the drafts from the last 15 years. There are going to be a lot of names you haven't heard of/thought of in a long time in the first round because of the nature of pitching.

 

Sied's "mentor," drafted position players which are far less risky(though obviously still very risky). That's who he had success with. I don't recall him developing many pitchers, much less many front line starters.

Nelson and Pena both have 2nd tier FB velocity

 

What exactly is "first tier," FB velocity then for a starting big league pitcher?

 

Certain posters on this forum here and there may think a prospect is much better than he is, we will all champion guys we like to a certain degree, but again we don't really have a pitcher with that true impact profile: 2-3 plus pitches, FB topping out at 95+, control with a BB rate down around 2, a K rate over 9 for their career, and who's going to give you 7+ IP on 110 pitches on a somewhat regular basis.

 

It sounds to me that while some posters may be a bit too high on prospects, your disdain with most things Brewers related comes down to just wildly unrealistic expectations. Those types of pitchers come around once in a generation. A pitcher who checks every box. Reguarly going 7 innings on 110 pitches, throwing 95+, 2-3 plus pitches, great control, great strikeout pitcher...all while developing in the minors.

 

You realize that often times pitchers in the minors sacrifice performance in order to work on developing pitches.

 

Either way, you quantify these things in such a limited way to make your point. Nelson didn't look good in Wisconsin. Without knowledge of what he was trying to work on, it's hard to make a real sound assessment. But he's dominated at every other level and he checks off every single criteria you're looking for.

 

Right now we have Peralta and Nelson who both have 1st tier fastball velocity(Peralta had one of the top FB's in the league last year and Nelson is very similar in terms of velocity). But of course having velocity is only half of it. Both of them throw a very heavy, moving FB. Something Thornburg doesn't do. They get GB's. That means a guy like Peralta can get by with more walks. Nelson has shown the ability to drastically limit his walks as he adjusts at every level.

 

 

In essence you're saying that we don't have a Clayton Kershaw in our system...and you're going back to this year or that year to further your argument that we're lacking in high ceiling players. Well, the thing about high ceiling players is they often struggle early on. More mature pitchers with lower ceilings tend to put up the numbers you're looking for. And I would add that leaving our GB/FO ratio is a huge ere in evaluation.

 

We do need at least 1 or 2 front line starters in order to contend in the post-season, but based on your criteria, how many pitchers are there in the game who fit? How many staffs? LAD...Washington maybe, Detroit and who else?

[WV Brew]

Is it too soon to talk about Bruce's replacement? Joe Ferrone is the national crosschecker for the Brewers. Interestingly, he once played for Perugia in the Italian league. Maybe our friend Calle ran across him at some point? Bruce Seid was an inside promotion but that doesn't mean they will go that way again.