Time will tell, but I'm inclined to believe that the minors Rule 5 draft is primarily used by front offices just to fill up the next seasons rosters with org guys. A little short in pitching? No worries, the Rule 5 will fix that.
What makes a player eligible for the Minor League portion of the rule 5 draft? Is it the same 4 or 5 years since signing, and not being on the AAA roster?
Of course, we know that the Pirates will be protecting a few players who are eligible for the Rule 5 Draft in the coming weeks.
Remaining will be a pool of players who are left unprotected and eligible to be selected in the MAJOR LEAGUE portion of the Rule 5 Draft.
Of that group, up to 38 can be protected on a Triple-A Reserve List. This throws some fans, because the players don't have to come from that level--any player can be protected, no matter the level.
Players who are not protected on that list are eligible for the MINOR LEAGUE portion of the Rule 5 Draft. Of which, if selected, the rights permanently transfer to the selecting team, with no roster qualifications that come with a Major League selection.
These picks cost $24,000, at least based on the last available set of rules that we have.
Thanks Ethan -- that helps. So then the question is what should the pirates have done differently to avoid this 11-man loss? Were there 11 pieces of driftwood on the 38-man AAA roster that should have been trimmed so that these could've been protected? Or is the issue that the pirates had 11 semi-talented guys bouncing around for 4-5 years and didn't develop them?
Okay, this is a pretty detailed answer steeped in minutiae, so hopefully it's easy enough to follow.
First of all, they protected 32 players of a possible 38, so they left six open slots, meaning if they go in with a full list they are still liable to lose 5 of the players selected.
However, no team wants to go in with that amount of inflexibility, so they're going to leave a few spots open to select players.
Also, you set this list in the middle of November, a few weeks before the selection event. Players can be added after the fact, but only externally, not internally.
The team placed a few players on waivers that they anticipated clearing (Ali Sanchez, Miguel Yajure, Hoy Park, etc.), and if they had they would have needed space on the list to add them to it. Beau Sulser also was originally protected, but ended up signing overseas, accounting for an additional spot that had been filled. Also, the team was negotiating with MiFAs at the time and need spots for those potential signings.
Basically, the team was keeping space for moves that never ended up happening. Is that bad management? Potentially, but teams don't have a crystal ball either. You can probably quibble over a few of the names and feeling like they absolutely shouldn't have lost them (Del Rosario, Ramos, maybe one or two more), but again, then they may just end up losing Park and Yajure in the MiR5 instead, kind of like Washington lost Palacios. Is one better or worse? With the value level of players we're talking about, it's pretty hard to say, given they are fairly replaceable.
The biggest gaffe, to me, was the selection of a unselectable player. Publicly, 2021 is the last available set of rules available, and I know teams don't have anything newer either. They do have memos, agreements, and emails though, and the team acknowledged it was a mistake, no matter whether it was a reasonable one or not. Sure, maybe he was the last player on their list that they really wanted, and they had no need for the other 5 spots remaining. From the outside though, it looked like they made a mistake, got caught of guard, panicked, punted their pick and left with 5 spots that they couldn't do anything with after the fact.
Do two or three more organizational players coming in change the mind of fans that were indignant over losing 11 players? Wei-Chieh Huang probably didn't inspire anyone, but Palacios did end up playing a role, so who knows. I think casual fans were just shocked by the headline "Pirates lose 11" and those in the media peddling that as a bad thing without the actual context surrounding it.
Sorry for the dissertation, if you made it this far.
BC may have expressed his surprise in losing 11 players in the Minor League portion of the draft, but what else was he supposed to say? Some of those guys may have had promise, for AA or AAA, but when they are left exposed, it is the result of decisions made by a combination of Managers, Coaches, Scouts, and Senior Mgmt. Most of the 11 were relievers, but were they missed?
The Pirates Relievers went from 25th in 2022 to 11th of 30 teams in 2023. In AAA we had A-Z - Bido, Bolton, Crowe, DeJong, YDLS, Flowers, MacGregor, Mlodzinski, O'Reilly, Perdomo, Selby, and Stratton. At AA we had 4 LHRP - Cruz, Dombkowski, Samaniego, and Ogle; and 7 RHRP - Garcia, Junker, MacGregor, Milliano, Minaya, Thomas, and Toribio. Oh, at AA, of the 11 only Minaya was older than 25, so 10 young and talented relievers - 7 pitched more than 40 innings in 2023.
From AA thru to the Pirates at the MLB level, the Bullpen folks are very strong and under control for many, many years. I did like Joelvis - watched him pitch well against an Orioles Farm level team at Pirate City during ST a few years ago.
They had 6 or 7 empty slots on the AAA reserve roster that Cherington was saving to sign minor league free agents. He was caught completely off-guard, by his own admission, by the league-wide raid on the Pirates system. Part of the problem stems from the covid years, when guys, especially international amateur free agents, signed at the ages of 16 or 17, didn't get much work in organized baseball. So their development was delayed and they became rule 5 eligible earlier in their development than normal. Most of these guys came from A-ball, whereas in normal times they would have been in AA by this point and better sorted out between wheat and chaff.
This loss of talent for no good reason is going to come back to haunt the Pirates: most likely Del Rosario, Ramos, and/or Charle. People keep saying that the rule 5 draft is overhyped and inconsequential, but this is the 2nd time in 20 years that Pirates management has allowed the system to be raided in this draft. Also, the Pirates' best player (if we exclude Bonds) in the past 60 years was acquired via rule 5 (Clemente, of course).
Not wrong, but I think we can agree if your club is riding the razor's edge of Rule 5 management there's a whooollllleeee lot of bigger stuff needed to get them where you want.
Well... apparently someone was interested in these 11 players and they had some value. It is possible, even in Pirate-world, to trade prospects for established players, rather than give them away for free. I would say that one of the bigger things was that Cherington was completely unaware that he had left numerous players with value to other teams unprotected: an indication that he had not explored the market to see what value his prospects had. With huge, gaping holes on his MLB roster, he had no idea whether or not he had personnel that he deemed expendable but that had value to other teams that could have been offered in trade to fill gaping holes on the roster.
That’s actually a good point though. In addition to exposing a lot of suspects BC threaded off several better prospects, mostly to good outcomes. I don’t think brass thought as highly of their crop as we do.
Time will tell, but I'm inclined to believe that the minors Rule 5 draft is primarily used by front offices just to fill up the next seasons rosters with org guys. A little short in pitching? No worries, the Rule 5 will fix that.
What makes a player eligible for the Minor League portion of the rule 5 draft? Is it the same 4 or 5 years since signing, and not being on the AAA roster?
Of course, we know that the Pirates will be protecting a few players who are eligible for the Rule 5 Draft in the coming weeks.
Remaining will be a pool of players who are left unprotected and eligible to be selected in the MAJOR LEAGUE portion of the Rule 5 Draft.
Of that group, up to 38 can be protected on a Triple-A Reserve List. This throws some fans, because the players don't have to come from that level--any player can be protected, no matter the level.
Players who are not protected on that list are eligible for the MINOR LEAGUE portion of the Rule 5 Draft. Of which, if selected, the rights permanently transfer to the selecting team, with no roster qualifications that come with a Major League selection.
These picks cost $24,000, at least based on the last available set of rules that we have.
Thanks Ethan -- that helps. So then the question is what should the pirates have done differently to avoid this 11-man loss? Were there 11 pieces of driftwood on the 38-man AAA roster that should have been trimmed so that these could've been protected? Or is the issue that the pirates had 11 semi-talented guys bouncing around for 4-5 years and didn't develop them?
Okay, this is a pretty detailed answer steeped in minutiae, so hopefully it's easy enough to follow.
First of all, they protected 32 players of a possible 38, so they left six open slots, meaning if they go in with a full list they are still liable to lose 5 of the players selected.
However, no team wants to go in with that amount of inflexibility, so they're going to leave a few spots open to select players.
Also, you set this list in the middle of November, a few weeks before the selection event. Players can be added after the fact, but only externally, not internally.
The team placed a few players on waivers that they anticipated clearing (Ali Sanchez, Miguel Yajure, Hoy Park, etc.), and if they had they would have needed space on the list to add them to it. Beau Sulser also was originally protected, but ended up signing overseas, accounting for an additional spot that had been filled. Also, the team was negotiating with MiFAs at the time and need spots for those potential signings.
Basically, the team was keeping space for moves that never ended up happening. Is that bad management? Potentially, but teams don't have a crystal ball either. You can probably quibble over a few of the names and feeling like they absolutely shouldn't have lost them (Del Rosario, Ramos, maybe one or two more), but again, then they may just end up losing Park and Yajure in the MiR5 instead, kind of like Washington lost Palacios. Is one better or worse? With the value level of players we're talking about, it's pretty hard to say, given they are fairly replaceable.
The biggest gaffe, to me, was the selection of a unselectable player. Publicly, 2021 is the last available set of rules available, and I know teams don't have anything newer either. They do have memos, agreements, and emails though, and the team acknowledged it was a mistake, no matter whether it was a reasonable one or not. Sure, maybe he was the last player on their list that they really wanted, and they had no need for the other 5 spots remaining. From the outside though, it looked like they made a mistake, got caught of guard, panicked, punted their pick and left with 5 spots that they couldn't do anything with after the fact.
Do two or three more organizational players coming in change the mind of fans that were indignant over losing 11 players? Wei-Chieh Huang probably didn't inspire anyone, but Palacios did end up playing a role, so who knows. I think casual fans were just shocked by the headline "Pirates lose 11" and those in the media peddling that as a bad thing without the actual context surrounding it.
Sorry for the dissertation, if you made it this far.
BC may have expressed his surprise in losing 11 players in the Minor League portion of the draft, but what else was he supposed to say? Some of those guys may have had promise, for AA or AAA, but when they are left exposed, it is the result of decisions made by a combination of Managers, Coaches, Scouts, and Senior Mgmt. Most of the 11 were relievers, but were they missed?
The Pirates Relievers went from 25th in 2022 to 11th of 30 teams in 2023. In AAA we had A-Z - Bido, Bolton, Crowe, DeJong, YDLS, Flowers, MacGregor, Mlodzinski, O'Reilly, Perdomo, Selby, and Stratton. At AA we had 4 LHRP - Cruz, Dombkowski, Samaniego, and Ogle; and 7 RHRP - Garcia, Junker, MacGregor, Milliano, Minaya, Thomas, and Toribio. Oh, at AA, of the 11 only Minaya was older than 25, so 10 young and talented relievers - 7 pitched more than 40 innings in 2023.
From AA thru to the Pirates at the MLB level, the Bullpen folks are very strong and under control for many, many years. I did like Joelvis - watched him pitch well against an Orioles Farm level team at Pirate City during ST a few years ago.
They had 6 or 7 empty slots on the AAA reserve roster that Cherington was saving to sign minor league free agents. He was caught completely off-guard, by his own admission, by the league-wide raid on the Pirates system. Part of the problem stems from the covid years, when guys, especially international amateur free agents, signed at the ages of 16 or 17, didn't get much work in organized baseball. So their development was delayed and they became rule 5 eligible earlier in their development than normal. Most of these guys came from A-ball, whereas in normal times they would have been in AA by this point and better sorted out between wheat and chaff.
Josh palacios is who they gained in the minor league Rule 5. I prefer palacios to these 11
Pretty sure Palacios didn’t require 11 AAA roster spots.
This loss of talent for no good reason is going to come back to haunt the Pirates: most likely Del Rosario, Ramos, and/or Charle. People keep saying that the rule 5 draft is overhyped and inconsequential, but this is the 2nd time in 20 years that Pirates management has allowed the system to be raided in this draft. Also, the Pirates' best player (if we exclude Bonds) in the past 60 years was acquired via rule 5 (Clemente, of course).
I’ll be sure to bookmark this comment when Del Rosario wins the Cy Young in 2028.
Not wrong, but I think we can agree if your club is riding the razor's edge of Rule 5 management there's a whooollllleeee lot of bigger stuff needed to get them where you want.
Well... apparently someone was interested in these 11 players and they had some value. It is possible, even in Pirate-world, to trade prospects for established players, rather than give them away for free. I would say that one of the bigger things was that Cherington was completely unaware that he had left numerous players with value to other teams unprotected: an indication that he had not explored the market to see what value his prospects had. With huge, gaping holes on his MLB roster, he had no idea whether or not he had personnel that he deemed expendable but that had value to other teams that could have been offered in trade to fill gaping holes on the roster.
None of the 11 players lost in the minor league rule 5 would bring anything to help the MLB club via trade.
What exactly are we talking about here? Nothing. Meaningless chatter.
Sam Hartman.
Jack Hartman. He brought back a below replacement level player. Not exactly helping the huge gaping holes on the MLB roster.
That’s actually a good point though. In addition to exposing a lot of suspects BC threaded off several better prospects, mostly to good outcomes. I don’t think brass thought as highly of their crop as we do.