Does that mean he has to clear waivers?

Does that mean he has to clear waivers?

They could trade him instead. But how much value would a team give up to get someone who clearly isn't valued by the A's (top 40, at least) right now?

Whatever the case, he's off the 40-man roster immediately, and they have 10 days to trade him, to pass him through waivers, or to release him - and I'm not sure they can release him if he hasn't cleared waivers.

Yep, Billy sure did take advantage of a market inefficiency: fat catchers with no upside.

Damn, kevin, are you this negative all the time? That draft turned out well enough for the A's. They took a chance on Brown and it didn't work. First round picks OFTEN don't pan out. I hope he still has a career ahead of him as he seems like a good guy. I'm rooting for him, at least, fat or not.

And another thing, can we just ban the phrase "market ineffiency" from baseball talk. All teh jokes have been run run into the ground and I have to listen to enough that kind of jargon crap at work. You knuckleheads are supposed to be my oasis! O-ate more dang it.

I don't know about this. Not that Brown is necessarily worth keeping, but I'm pretty sure he could pitch better than Lewis.

I don't see much reason to prefer Brown to Closser, so not much of a loss.

Yep, Billy sure did take advantage of a market inefficiency: fat catchers with no upside.

Yeah, they would have been much better off drafting this guy and signing him for more than twice as much money.

Jeremy was the 35th overall pick in the 2002 draft. Some other 35th picks:

1989- Speedy Brian Hunter
1990- Stan Spencer
1991- Jeff Ware
1992- Johnny Damon
1993- Todd Dunn
1994- Sean Johnston*
1995- Mark Bellhorn
1996- Jason Marquis
1997- Mark Fischer*
1998- Aaron Rowand
1999- Brian West*
2000- Tyrell Godwin
2001- J.D. Martin*
2003- Luis Atilano*
2004- Matt Fox*
2005- Cesar Ramos*
2006- Kyler Burke*

Asterisk indicates they haven't made the big leagues yet. Some good players in there.

This list is provided purely for fun, not meant as a commentary on the wisdom of Moneyball.

Shooty, all the scouts who were familiar with Brown thought he was a lousy prospect.

As I recall, the A's had 6 first round picks, and not nearly enough money to sign 6 legit first round picks. So thay had to get a little creative at the end of the round. It's hardly an indictment of the organization that they didn't made lemonade out of that lemon. The legit first round picks they did pay for have done alright so far.

Besides Blanton, Swisher, and Brown, who were the other Moneyball picks?

If you need a backup catcher, you could do worse.

#8 He also agreed to not ask for much of a signing bonus since the A's are so monitarily challenged that the can't spend (gamble against the house?) a couple million on draft picks.

Besides Blanton, Swisher, and Brown, who were the other Moneyball picks?

Teahen, Obenchain, McCurdy, and Fritz.

Three legit major-leaguers out of seven picks is a pretty good draft. Of course, the A's didn't get much for Teahen, but as a White Sox fan, I'm still sad that Ken Williams passed up Joe Blanton for Royce Ring.

#9 Mark Teahan

Also they made more out of Brown than anybody thought, which is worth something I guess.

Three legit major-leaguers out of seven picks is a pretty good draft.

Are you trying to say Jeremy Brown, Mark Kiger, Shane Komine, and Jared Burton aren't legit????

"Besides Blanton, Swisher, and Brown, who were the other Moneyball picks?"

Teahen, McCurdy, and a couple of college pitchers. Don't know about the arms, but McCurdy was a legit guy to take at the spot; he just came down with degenerative back problems.

Baseball America seemed to like Brown after his 2002 debut, but he didn't develop from there.

I hope the Angels give Brown a minor league spot. You can do worse for organizational depth, plus this is an organization led by a fat former catcher that's had some success with fat catchers.

The Mets could use a fat catcher about his age. Never happen though.

And Brant "Big Tits" Colomarino.

Was a 7th round pick.

2002 draft

Mike LaValliere Has A Posse (And Possibly A Manzier).

Brown had a decent 2005. I don't know why people are acting like his career is over. He could still become a decent backstop.

Pops, Lewis also quoted Beane as thinking Colamarino was the best righthanded hitter in the entire draft, or something like that.

It was DePo, and he said he might be.

I'm disappointed in the lack of snark in this thread. I suppose the joke's too old now...finally.

I'm not all that high on Closser -- a sub .400 SLG playing for the Rockies doesn't sound too impressive. Of course Cust also had that three weeks ago.

I still think Brown can have a Melhuse-esque career. Or not. It's no big deal either way. I'm more disappointed in McCurdy, and pleasantly surprised by Teahen.

The most disappointing thing to me is wasting the #1 picks because of this "budget problem", when they proceeded to sign Dye to $11 million/year after he broke is leg in half.

Before this season, Brown had a .267/.371/.433 line in ~440 minor league games. That's probably better than a lot of #35 picks, and probably far better than what many other organizations felt he was capable of before the draft. And I agree with AG#1F -- he could still become a decent backup catcher.

Yep, Billy sure did take advantage of a market inefficiency: fat catchers with no upside.

They needed a replacement for Sal Fasano, who has carved himself out a 10 year career "with no upside" but plenty of backside.

Colamarino was the 13th player taken by the A's in that draft. If the A's believed he was the best righthanded hitter in the draft, they certainly didn't show.

Another player taken in that draft by the A's was a certain Jonathon Papelbon. He obviously didn't sign, but overall the A's had a pretty productive draft in 2002.

Lane Bryant will hire Brown if his baseball career doesn't work out.

Fritz was extremely talented as well, except that he burned his arm out at Fresno State pitching and catching and has been fighting injury ever since he started his pro career.

Yep, Billy sure did take advantage of a market inefficiency: fat catchers with no upside.

They paid him 3rd or 4th round money rather than forfeiting the pick by taking someone they knew they couldn't sign. A pretty decent percentage of 3rd and 4th rounders don't even hit AAA.

They paid him 3rd or 4th round money rather than forfeiting the pick by taking someone they knew they couldn't sign. A pretty decent percentage of 3rd and 4th rounders don't even hit AAA.

No wonder Joe Morgan wrote "Moneyball." Beane's a genius!

Colamarino is a left-handed hitter, at least every time I've seen him play.

look i know SOME of you hate lewis and beane.

but in the 2002 draft the As got FOUR guys who are good solid major leaguers. my astros sure as freaking heck can't say that about ANY draft they EVER had and if i got even TWO good solid ballplayers out of 1 draft i would be a very happy grrrrrrl. so one of the guys didn't work out. so what? LOTS of guys who go in the first round don't work out.

Before this season, Brown had a .267/.371/.433 line in ~440 minor league games. That's probably better than a lot of #35 picks

I think this is really a misunderstanding of how baseball people approach the draft, or more broadly than talent evaluation. I believe Brickhaus is making a similar mistake in #31.

I don't believe for a second, teams are targeting players in the supplemental round players to outproduce 267/371/433 in the minors. I believe in the 10th round, if you told a scouting director he needed to draft a player who could hit 270.370/433 in minors he could draft that player 8 out of 10 times.

Teams are looking at projectability, meaning potential for drastic improvement as relative to where they are today. Not players who are mostly to max out as 270/370/430 minor leaguers.

Anyway - most of the moneyball draft was the A's taking consensus top 100 players in their order of preference. Swisher, Blanton, mcgurty and Fritz were all highly thought of comming into the draft. The places where they went drasticly off the board were Teahan who was a great pick. Brown who was a bad one.

The point, bbc, is that it lowers the bar of expectation on Beane. If the point of focusing on Brown in "Moneyball" was to exemplify Beane's genius at finding MLB talent, then Brown's failure counts against Beane. If the defense of Beane resorts to, "Well, guys fail all the time" or "My GM doesn't do any better" you've lowered the bar from genius to v. good or possibly lower.

Heck, I'd take him here in Toronto over Fasano. Maybe assign him to AA for now as a backup (AAA has prospect Thigpen 314/378/455 and 27 year old backup Eric Kratz 265/333/388) although he'd probably be as good as Fasano right now (125/192/292 for the Jays).

I don't believe for a second, teams are targeting players in the supplemental round players to outproduce 267/371/433 in the minors. I believe in the 10th round, if you told a scouting director he needed to draft a player who could hit 270.370/433 in minors he could draft that player 8 out of 10 times.

Teams are looking at projectability, meaning potential for drastic improvement as relative to where they are today. Not players who are mostly to max out as 270/370/430 minor leaguers.

You're missing my point. I doubt the A's choose him because they thought he'd max out at that level of production. They thought he was a terrific hitter and had the potential -- potential being the key word -- for drastic improvement. Obviously he hasn't turned into an above average ML hitter, but my point is simply that the notion that the A's way overshot with that pick isn't accurate. IOW, Beane's take on Brown -- that he was a late first round or second round pick -- was probably a lot more accurate than most other teams, who, IIRC, had him pegged as a 40th rounder or something.

Heck, I'd take him here in Toronto over Fasano. Maybe assign him to AA for now as a backup (AAA has prospect Thigpen 314/378/455 and 27 year old backup Eric Kratz 265/333/388) although he'd probably be as good as Fasano right now (125/192/292 for the Jays).

I'd take him in Balt. over Paul fraking Bako.

The point, bbc, is that it lowers the bar of expectation on Beane. If the point of focusing on Brown in "Moneyball" was to exemplify Beane's genius at finding MLB talent, then Brown's failure counts against Beane.

But Beane never claimed to be a genius. Showing Beane not to be a genius is a mark against Lewis, not Beane.

Whatever the case, he's off the 40-man roster immediately, and they have 10 days to trade him, to pass him through waivers, or to release him - and I'm not sure they can release him if he hasn't cleared waivers.

It's his first time being DFAd, so he can also be outrighted to Sacramento if/when he clears waivers.

JC in DC Posted: May 23, 2007 at 02:19 PM (#2376061)

The point, bbc, is that it lowers the bar of expectation on Beane. If the point of focusing on Brown in "Moneyball" was to exemplify Beane's genius at finding MLB talent, then Brown's failure counts against Beane. If the defense of Beane resorts to, "Well, guys fail all the time" or "My GM doesn't do any better" you've lowered the bar from genius to v. good or possibly lower.

- i don't know what a "bar of expectation" supposed to be - that every single pick is a top ML ballplayer? i mean, it don't work like that, we ALL know that. in a average draft how many will be good solid major leaguers? 1, maybe 2? (not counting the sept only to sit on the bench mostly callups or the play one inning than disappear guys)

i don't know about defense, but i would say that a GM who can draft 4 guys in the same year who are good solid ML ballplayers is doing better then just about every other guy.

i don't know what "genius" exactly means, but if you doing better than the 29 other guys who got the same group to pick from then either you are smarter or (ahem) luckier
hehhehheh

i mean i finally finish reading that book - lewis he jump all over the place so it is hard to keep reading - (yeh i am already ahead of joe morgan whaddaya know) and when he talking about billybeane lewis he sounds like a grrrrl talking about some guy she got a mad thing for - oooooooh he soooooo hot - well you got all them grrrrls at home you know what i'm talkin about. and yeh i know some of the beanebaggers they talk like grrrrls

uck

I don't believe for a second, teams are targeting players in the supplemental round players to outproduce 267/371/433 in the minors. I believe in the 10th round, if you told a scouting director he needed to draft a player who could hit 270.370/433 in minors he could draft that player 8 out of 10 times.

I agree with your overall point that teams are searching for high-ceiling possible MLB guys rather than low-ceiling productive minor leaguers. But you are crazy if you think a scout can pluck career 270/370/433 minor leaguers 8 out of 10 times. For a catcher, the number would be more like 1 out of 10.

for drastic improvement. Obviously he hasn't turned into an above average ML hitter, but my point is simply that the notion that the A's way overshot with that pick isn't accurate. IOW, Beane's take on Brown -- that he was a late first round or second round pick -- was probably a lot more accurate than most other teams, who, IIRC, had him pegged as a 40th rounder or something

The only way you can measure if the A's overshot the pick is by looking where the other 29 teams had him on their board. By most account none of the other teams had him in the top 10 rounds. In the truest sense of the words, the A's overshot on the pick even if he ended up being Mike Piazza, since no one else was considering him for many many many rounds.

I agree with your overall point that teams are searching for high-ceiling possible MLB guys rather than low-ceiling productive minor leaguers. But you are crazy if you think a scout can pluck career 270/370/433 minor leaguers 8 out of 10 times. For a catcher, the number would be more like 1 out of 10.

8 out of 10 maybe high, 6-10 maybe... we are talking about 800 OPS minor league hitters here, not necasarily AAA or even AA but career minor leagues in a 1000 AB's or something. Most of the time the majority of those at bats will be against much younger players as the pool to be drafted from would be the most polished and advanced college players. Those guys are a dime a dozen, or seem to be at least. 22-23 year olds versus 18-19 year olds is a crazy mismatch.

"but McCurdy was a legit guy to take at the spot; he just came down with degenerative back problems."

The way I hear it was more like degenerative attitude problems

Jeremy Brown's page at bb-ref (ripe for sassy commentary or whatever) can be sponsored for only $10.

For most of his Indians career, Colon wasn't really all that tubby. And for my money, Bob Wickman was WAY fatter than Sabathia the last couple years.

Other big fat Indians of my lifetime: Boog Powell, Cecil Fielder, Randy Milligan, Paul Reuschel. Albie Lopez wasn't exactly skinny.

And Harvey's is right - Greg Swindell was a large guy. But I don't think he was any bigger than Boog or Wick or Fielder or CC.

that is a lot of fat indians.

only fat guy i remember on the astros is charley kerfeld and let me tell you he did NOT look real too good in orange horizontal stripes ya feelin me here

i know lance one year he looked like he just might be eatin a lil too much BBQ but he has not been fat at all for a good 3 or 4 years

IOW, Beane's take on Brown -- that he was a late first round or second round pick -- was probably a lot more accurate than most other teams, who, IIRC, had him pegged as a 40th rounder or something.

He had a .317 OBP last year as a 26 year old in AAA. And he's fat with poor defense.

Way to waste a pick, Billy.

Well, my hands feel better and Dan's comment of "big fat Indians" has triggered a memory which merits sharing. Completely non-baseball related.

Once upon a time in a far away land known as La Crosse, WI two fellers are drinking and playing pool. One of said twosome was a fine pool player (not me) from years of being in the Navy and killing time. And unlike the rest of the universe drinking did not adversely affect his game so he was deadly after 11 p.m.

So we're playing, drinking, and being stupid when a a few fellows want to play the table. Well, as most here likely know you have to win the table so we pair off. Me, resident pool shark on one side opposed by standard Wisconsin redneck teamed up with the biggest d*mn Native American you ever did see.

Getting ready to break and my compadre declares to me sotto voce, "Gonna hustle'em". I mutter back in the negative thinking I'm not interested in being scalped so far from home but the swabbie is adamant so I grimace and prepare for the worst.

He strings them along for multiple games helped by my intermittent bout of competence. And let me add that at some point money was indeed added to the equation and as closing time approaches there were several hundred dollars sitting on a nearby table. Around 1:30 a.m. or so I confess to getting a bit tired. My friend nods and says, "Time to finish them off." And before you know it lickety-split the table was clean in the next game. Whoosh, whoosh and the game was over.

He grabs his jacket and declares the night finished. Up to this point our Native American opponent had been fairly silent, except for the occasional belch, but at this moment he put his big paws on the side of the pool table and glaring ominously at us declared, "You hustled us. We ain't gonna pay." I am thinking that a gesture of goodwill might be in order but before I can interject my seafaring companion responds, and I kid you not,

"What, you gonna be an Indian giver?"

Pregnant pause by all.

Before our counterparts can come out of their stunned reaction I grab my foolish friend who grabs the money (he was always one for the dollar signs) and headed for the nearest exit. Several pool sticks across our backs and hurled pool balls later we were in his truck hurtling down the highway with an angry mob on the warpath in close pursuit. Thanks to years of being a field foreman of a canning company I have sufficient knowledge of the country roads to find a safe haven and escape our pursuers.

That's my best "bar story". And true as the day is long.

Hey, fat guy was 3 for 10 with 2 doubles last year in the majors. 300/364/500 for a 125 OPS+ which is solid for a DH let alone a catcher. Yeah, yeah extremely small sample size.

For a draft pick your #1 goal is to develop a guy who can play in the majors. Brown did so last year (briefly) and did well. Would he flop if given a shot? Probably given his AAA stats in '06 and '07 (235/291/392 over 51 AB's) but who knows for certain? 7 games as a DH, 6 as a CA and 1 at third this year. Oaklands other AAA 1B/DH/CA all have had bad years too (all under 750 for OPS).

Bottom line, getting your first round picks to play in the majors and not embarass themselves, no matter how brief their time, is a good thing. Brown should've been drafted later, but in truth the A's should've been given more $ to spend on first round picks instead (spend more now, save later).

harvey

i luuuvvvv your stories i surely do

and happy birthday to you and mrs (yeh i know a little late)

bbc:

Thank you. 74 this year. A tad creaky but otherwise operational.

Please let me know if I am re-telling tales. I will confess to having lost track of what I have shared here over the years and what I have not. And I don't want to bore anyone's ears so to speak.

In 1968 the Dodgers drafted and signed Steve Garvey, Davey Lopes, Ron Cey, Buckner, Joe Ferguson and Tom Paciorek- all legit MLBers (I may be missing a player or two)

Their first pick in the regular phase was Bobby Valentine- before he got hurt he hit .340/.390/.522 as a 20 year old in the PCL (Spokane).

Brown had a decent 2005. I don't know why people are acting like his career is over. He could still become a decent backstop.

Does that mean that he will not, in fact, have to get a job selling jeans?

as a White Sox fan, I'm still sad that Ken Williams passed up Joe Blanton for Royce Ring.

Without Ring, we may have missed out on one of the Roberto Alomar eras.

Thanks Dan, I'd totally forgotten about Fielder's 35 ABs for the tribe in '98. Good effing riddance.

I kind of felt bad for Brown at first, but then I realized that if he didn't want to be made fun of, he shouldn't have written that book about himself.

Please let me know if I am re-telling tales. I will confess to having lost track of what I have shared here over the years and what I have not. And I don't want to bore anyone's ears so to speak.

Your stories are great - one of the main reasons I keep reading this site!

Harveys Wallbangers Posted: May 23, 2007 at 03:51 PM (#2376160)

bbc:

Thank you. 74 this year. A tad creaky but otherwise operational.

Please let me know if I am re-telling tales. I will confess to having lost track of what I have shared here over the years and what I have not. And I don't want to bore anyone's ears so to speak.

- i don't think you have told the same story twice. but me i don't care because i LIKE your stories. i ESPECIALLY like the one about you in the restaraunt getting some kind of vegetable put in your beer or something.

vortex:

I am flattered. Thank you.

bbc:

Oh, that was a little while back concerning a new garnish for gin. Repulsive. For the record I don't drink beer.

beer, gin

i knew it was SOME kind of drink

it's STILL funny

Way to waste a pick, Billy.

This is so annoying. So a supplemental draft pick doesn't turn out to be a useful big leaguer. Beane's fanboys usually give us the "he was signed underslot" excuse, but that's not even remotely necesssary. The proper response is to tell the poster to buy Baseball America's draft almanac, and see how many wasted first round picks every single GM who's lasted more than a few years has made.

Well, everyone except Gord Ash with the 90's Blue Jays. Dude was money.

Two fat threads in a day?

"The way I hear it was more like degenerative attitude problems"

Yeah, the attitude may not have been great, but there are a lot more guys in the bigs with bad attitudes than with surgically-fused vertebrae.

2004- Matt Fox*

There's an Evan Longoria joke in here somewhere.

I'd still rather have him over Kendall.

Gord Ash was a damn good drafter.

But Brown sucks, get over it. Beane's drafting is overrated, and moneyball is a fun book but has a lot of ######## in it.

Loved Moneyball and I thought Beane/Depo were right about the whole jeans thing. Scouts DID care too much about the package, not the product. So Eckstein, a first teamm all american, gets picked not 15th,but in the 15th round.

But Beane and Depo DID overestimate their computer/stats evals and Lewis smugly wrote about it before the results were in. Other than passing on Hochevar, the A's did not draft based on signability--they drafted the guys they wanted. Their evaluation system *was* different,but so far it wasn't any better.

Now, I have long thought that DivIII studs are the real market inefficiency. Right now there are several in MLB and most were drafted in the very late rounds or undrafted: Desalvo, Bayliss, Sharpless, Denorfia.

Hirsh and Washburn are also Div-III pitchers,but they went earlier in the draft.

Are we seriously debating whether that was a good draft? How anyone can call it anything but a great draft is beyond me. Thanks to Philly's draft study work, we have a pretty good idea what each draft slot normally fetches in terms of talent:




Basically, an average draft with those slots would be expected to render 63.9 WARP3. What's more, a normal draft would have about a 63 percent chance to get a 20 WARP3 guy, a 39 percent chance to get a 40 WARP3 guy, and a 20 percent chance to get a 60 WARP3 guy.

What have the A's gotten so far? Swisher's projected to be at 19.1 by year's end, Teahan at 17.6, and Blanton at 15.7 for a total of 52.4 They are all in their mid-20s and look to go well beyond the average, perhaps even double it.

More importantly, they are bunching it all 3 players who stand to be 40 WARP3 guys, again far outstripping the expected return. This is all before we see if fringe guys like Komine, Stivisky, Morris, Brown, etc. turn into useful players.

It may be fun to point at one pick from this draft and say that Beane was stupid, but to do so is to completely misunderstand how the draft works.

Their evaluation system *was* different,but so far it wasn't any better.

It really wasn't really any worse than average either- and that's what had some of those in the scouting community verging on panic...

What I thought was funny was Lewis' repeated references to drafting HS players- especially pitchers as being a complete crapshoot etc etc.

All the studies which showed that drafting college players was better than drafting HS players were outdated-
1: many teams- not just the A's had shifted more towards college picks by the time Moneyball came out
2: the dramatic increase in bonuses (Van Poppel etc) made it more likely that stud HS players would be signed out of HS- rather than going to College as many did in the past- strengthening the HS pool and weakening the college pool

The result of just those two factors- in full swing by the time Moneyball came out- meant that focusing solely on college players (as the A's seemed to be doing) was in fact inefficient at that time. Beane/Depo were trying in 2002 to exploit a market inefficiency which really existed- up until about 10 years earlier.

From Rany's draft study:

I don't get all the hubbub back and forth about Beane. He quite clearly isn't a genius of any sort, but he has some good moves (Hello, Jack Cust) and he just as equally has some disastrous ones (Here's to you, Msrs. Loaiza and Kendall). He has some good drafts (2002) and some hideous ones (whichever one had Brad Sullivan and Brian Snyder in the first round. I think 03. But that one. That one's awful.)

As an A's fan, it's nice to have him around, because we keep winning.

I don't know of anyone who still defends the ridiculous lauding present in Moneyball by Lewis, so it's strange to still see the vigor people denounce it with, or the people who still take smug satisfaction (hi kevin) with the fact that parts of it are so obviously off base now.


What it boils down to is Michael Lewis wrote an enjoyable, but unfortunately over the top book. Beane, while being a good to great GM, has a big ego. Nothing too complicated.

He left it to Lewis, who called him "smarter than the average bear".

I believe that's a Ricciardi quote from the book, not Lewis's own words.

Please let me know if I am re-telling tales. I will confess to having lost track of what I have shared here over the years and what I have not. And I don't want to bore anyone's ears so to speak.

As a rookie poster, I'm just getting used to yr stories. Even if people were bored hearing them for the second time (which I doubt), others are hearing them for the first.

Well, everyone except Gord Ash with the 90's Blue Jays. Dude was money.

The wheels fell of in a huge way in 2000 though.

The wheels fell of in a huge way in 2000 though.

Given up on Dustin McGowan already?

I hadn't seen that Harveys story before and I've been here for four years.

that is a lot of fat indians.

They should have had more Tony Curry in their diet.

Timely interview with A's analyst Farhan Zaidi:

I really think that the biggest development in amateur scouting over the past 10 or 15 years is the fact that you know so much more about high school players leading up to the draft and you get a chance to see them in person in showcases and against higher caliber competition. You also have enough money and bigger scouting staffs so that you have multiple people going in there to see the player, from the area scout to the cross-checker to the coordinators and even the scouting directors. This allows you to get multiple looks at the guy and chances to see him against advanced competition, so you just feel better about your evaluation of the player.

The one thing I always say when it comes to the draft is that the only real inefficiency you can create for yourself is if you automatically eliminate one entire group of players from consideration. If you say, ‘we are never going to take a high schooler’ or even if you say ‘we are never going to take a high schooler in the first round,’ I think you are already doing yourself a disservice. I think the last couple of years, we have tried to take a step back and reassess.

I think there might have been a time five or 10 years ago where maybe teams weren’t as aggressive as they should have been about going after more pro-ready college players, but I think you might even make the case that in the last two or three years, the pendulum has swung strongly the other way. There are teams that have been quite dogmatic about taking college players for the first 10 or 15 rounds. It’s interesting, when you watch what happens with those teams. You really get instant dividends when you draft college guys. When they are going through short-season ball and A-ball, those guys tend to just be too good for those levels. You kind of feel pretty good about yourself at that point, but then it is a question of what happens two or three years down the road.

Thse last few sentences could be directed right at J.P. Ricciardi.

How did other teams do in the 2002 draft?

I'm looking at the Angels ... Joe Saunders in the first round, Howie Kendrick in the tenth. Otherwise, a lot of nothin'.

Across town, at Chavez Ravine ... James Loney in the first (also Gregory Miller, who doesn't seem to have done too much), Jonathan Broxton in the second, Delwyn Young in the fourth, Russell Martin in the 17th. Some potential there, but not much production yet aside from Martin.

Tampa Bay ... Bossman Junior in the first, Elijah Dukes in the third, Jonny Gomes in the eighth ... no one else jumping out at me, but I don't know that organization intimately.

Anyway, the A's getting Swisher, Blanton, and drafting Teahen doesn't seem particularly awful. Maybe they should have done better with all the high picks, but, as pointed out, they didn't really have the money to sign the legit high-rated guys, so they got creative.

Including the supplementals, there were 41 1st-round picks in 2002. Brown was 35. No one below him has made the majors except for Teahen, at 39 (round 1). The first four picks of the 2nd round haven't made the majors yet.

Time can change all that, but at this point I don't know that Brown is really an embarrassing pick.