A brief look at who the Cards might draft at 7

07/04/2024 08:00 AM

I will not pretend I know what I'm talking about in this department

Let's make something clear up front. I don't know anything about the MLB Draft. I don't follow either high school or college players at all, so I learn about who the Cardinals draft when the Cardinals draft them. But you guys appear to be starved for MLB Draft content and I will be the conveyor of information, if not the one shedding any new light on players.

I do have one major issue and that's that I'm not subscribed to either The Athletic, so no Keith Law, or ESPN+, so no Kiley McDaniel. I also do not have Baseball America, but that probably goes without saying at this point. I'm relying on free sources to provide you with this information. I have chosen four. I have Jonathan Mayo of MLB dot com, Prospects Live, Joe Doyle of Future Stars Series, and Perfect Game.

Between those four sources, I have.... weirdly only 10 players to talk about. With the wide spectrum of opinion on MLB players and the unpredictability of the MLB draft, I was expecting more than 10 players. Future Stars Series has a free section that only lists the top 7, so I don't have his next three, and Perfect Game was last updated in April, and their 10th player is nowhere near the other two lists, so I disregarded him. But somehow between two top 10s, a top 7, and a top 9, there is only 10 players.

I am less confident the Cardinals will draft one of the players I talk about than I was when I started, cause I expected 15 names. Then again, the uniformity of opinions also maybe suggests there's not really a reason to expect an out of nowhere surprise.

In the interest of time, I will briefly reference the top 3 who seem to have zero shot of falling to the Cardinals. There's a very clear divide between these three and everyone else, at least as far as these rankings are concerned. These three all averaged a ranking less than #3 in the draft, and the next highest after averaged 6th in the mock draft or rankings. So there seems to be a clear tier happening.

Oddly enough, the "best" prospect averaging these four is Charlie Condon, mostly by virtue of not ranking any lower than 2nd on any list. But he's first on only one list. Condon is a 3B/OF who has immense power upside. Travis Bazanna is first on two lists. "You'd be hard-pressed to find a better combination of pure hit tool, approach, and peak exit velocities" Doyle says of the second baseman. Lastly, Jac Caglione is a potential two-way player, though he's likely another college bat who will land at 1B. So we can probably ignore those three for the purposes of the Cardinals. Anyone, theoretically, seems possible after those three.

Chase Burns, RHP - Wake Forest

Highest: 3rd

Lowest: 10th

A pretty well-received prospect out of high school, Burns started his collegiate career at Tennessee. After an excellent freshman season, he struggled out of the gate his sophomore year and got moved to the bullpen. Burns wanted a guaranteed rotation spot so he transferred to Wake Forest for his junior year. Plus Wake Forest is known for their pitching lab. He made a good decision to say the least.

2024 Stats: 16 GS, 100 IP, 48.8 K%, 7.7 BB%, 2.70 ERA

Not really intending to focus on one start, but advanced stats for college is hard if you aren't subscribed to anything, so you kind of rely on someone on Twitter providing it whenever they do, which happened to be when he had his 15 K performance. Thomas Nestico says those are MLB grades with his Stuff+. I can't imagine this guy falls to the Cardinals.

Hagen Smith, LHP - Arkansas

Highest: 6th

Lowest: 7th

Well, if these mock drafts are anything to believe, this is the favorite to be picked. Three of the four have the Cardinals drafting Hagen Smith. That's... kind of crazy. If I know anything about the MLB Draft, and by now you should know that I don't, the Cardinals are absolutely not drafting Hagen Smith. The MLB draft rarely works this cleanly.

2024 Stats: 16 GS, 84 IP, 48.6 K%, 10.3 BB%, 2.36 ERA

Unbelievably bad camera angle in that start, but how can I not share the 17 strikeout start? Smith seems nearly as dominant as Burns, but you can kind of see why the Cardinals might have more of a shot to draft Smith than Burns, who threw 16 more innings in the same amount of games, has better Stuff+, and has more pitches to utilize. But Smith seems like a very good consolation prize.

JJ Wetherholt, 2B/3B - West Virginia

Highest: 4th

Lowest: 8th

Here's a fun fact. Prospects Live has the Cardinals drafting at 7th with the option to choose Burns, Wetherholt, or Smith, which seems extremely not likely to happen. From my neanderthal brain, I am choosing Burns no question, but I also have about 30 minutes of knowledge about all three of these players as of writing this.

2024 Stats: 164 PAs, .331/.472/.589, 18.4 BB%, 10.4 K%, 8 HRs, .258 ISO

Wetherholt is a bit undersized as 5'10, who Doyle says hits the ball hard more than just about anyone in the country. He can theoretically play SS, but is widely seen as a future 2B or 3B. "The power and bat speed here are real, comfortably plus with barrel awareness few of his peers can match"

It seems like the only reason he might be undervalued is because he's had some injury issues, specifically his hamstring. I will say if Wetherholt falls to the Cardinals, he feels like a very Cardinals pick. For one thing, he's a 2B. For another, nobody expects him to stick at SS and what do you know this non-SS prospect is suddenly a starting SS for the Cardinals. And also, they like to pick players who "fall" from expectations.

Braden Montgomery, OF - Texas A&M

Highest: 4th

Lowest: 8th

Another player who had an injury that may keep him lower in the draft. His season ended prematurely with a broken ankle in the super regionals, so he wasn't able to keep his draft stock rising. Nonetheless, he's a switch hitting outfielder with an elite arm. Which makes sense because he's technically a two-way player who can throw 97 mph, but nobody actually thinks he'll continue pitching as a professional.

2024 Stats: 295 PAs, .322/.454/.733, 18 BB%, 20 K%. 27 HRs, .411 ISO

Cape Cod League: 132 PAs, .292/.379/.487, 12.1 BB%, 25 K%, 5 HR, .195 ISO

I wish I could provide more context on some of these stats, because I just have no frame of reference. If you can believe it, those strikeout numbers suggest he currently projects to have a fringe average hit tool. Those Cape Cod numbers are spread across two seasons, after his freshman and sophomore years and though I don't know if it's as much of a thing anymore, I know in the past, Cardinals love players who do well in the Cape Cod League.

Nick Kurtz, 1B - Wake Forest

Highest: 3rd

Lowest: 9, possibly lower from Doyle

If you were wondering who the fourth guy projected to go to the Cardinals, that would be Jonathan Mayo picking Kurtz. Seeing as I have never particularly agreed with Mayo on MLB prospects, I imagine the Cardinals are definitely not picking Kurtz. Kurtz's ranking is kind of inflated because the Prospect Live guys think the Rockies will draft him at 3, which doesn't seem particularly likely, but hey who knows?

Stats: 260 PAs, .306/.531/.763, 30 BB%, 16.2 K%, 22 HRs, .457 ISO

It's weird, because I am SUCH a walk guy with prospects, but sometimes a prospect may walk just a little too much for me to buy it. If that makes sense. Like a .306 average is really nothing special for a top 10 college prospect, and he's never walking anywhere near 30% as a pro, so that number doesn't actually do anything for me. Again, weird.

That said most of these prospects seem to have a "he started doing this more and then exploded his junior year" and Kurtz... has pretty much the same stats all three years. Like I'm not sure his draft position changes if he can declare after his sophomore year. He walked more his sophomore year after his freshman year, but he was also established and pitchers were understandably scared of him.

If there's a downside to Kurtz, it's that he's already limited to 1B, which really ramps up the pressure for him to hit. He's certainly expected to hit, but to use an example of a recent high draft pick who plays 1B, Nolan Schanuel (11th in 2023) has been an exactly replacement level player because his bat has not quite translated yet. It's just kind of a risk because you're kind of banking on a 120 wRC+ at least, which is a high bar for drafting someone. But if you really, really believe in his bat, he's also hard to ignore at 7.

Konnor Griffin, SS/OF - High School

Highest: 5th

Lowest: 9th or whenever Doyle had him

Well, somehow we've reached the ninth player referenced in this article and it's the first high school player. Very college heavy top 10 here. As you can imagine, he's a bit more high variance than the rest of the selections, something that is hard to see the Cardinals choosing to bank on with a great college player likely available. But you never know.

Stats: 171 PAs, .559/.690/.966, 27.5 BB%, 5.8 K%, 9 HRs, .407 ISO

Obviously, these stats don't tell us anything, but I've already established that I'm sharing stats and it's genuinely funny to see a high school kid who is supposed to be top 10 in the draft and how much better he is than anyone he faces in high school. Sort of feels like asking Mike Trout to go face Low A players.

Griffin is already 6'4, 210 pounds as an 18-year-old so he would fit right in on an MLB field. Someone drafting him is hoping for 30/30 potential, which he has because he's fast and has power. He's also considered a great athlete and might stick at either SS or OF, where both his athleticism and arm will certainly play. Oh yeah he also has a great arm. He's a genuine five-tool threat.

He's also a two-way player. Most sites seem to think he'll stick as a position player, but he's an actual prospect as a pitcher too. Not as good of one, but Kiley McDaniel shared on twitter that he has top 50 pick ability as a pitcher too. So, very, very exciting player, just one with a wide variance of potential outcomes.

He won MaxPrep National High School Player of the Year and is committed to LSU, but hard to see him ignoring top 10 pick money.

Bryce Rainer, SS - Harvard-Westlake

Highest: 9th

Lowest: 14th or whatever Doyle has

The first player who, in theory, is probably not going to the Cardinals, just because none of these three sites thinks he's worth a 7th overall pick. The Cardinals also tend to draft players who fall, not players seen as reaches. But again, we don't have a ton of experience with the Cardinals drafting at 7th, so maybe they like Rainer the most of those available. (The Just Baseball Guys actually project him to go to the Cards though)

Oddly, especially given he went to one of the more famous baseball high schools, I am having trouble finding his stats, and I'm not going to put a ton of energy in finding them because they don't actually matter. So you're going to miss out on this one.

Rainer has a pretty interesting backstory. He was hailed as the next pitching prodigy out of Harvard-Westlake before he even threw a pitch as a freshman. And he lived up to the hype that freshman year. But Rainer and his family decided to protect his arm, he wasn't going to pitch at all in his sophomore year. And the next two years, his innings have been severely limited. Rainer still sees himself as a two-way player, but the bat seems to have passed his pitching and he's widely seen as more of a position player prospect.

And that's about the best I can do for you folks. Hopefully we will have more draft content in the next week or so, but hopefully this is enough for now. Happy 4th. Kind of wish I was posting this on a better day, what with it being a holiday and with the game being at 11:35 am later today. But hopefully this finds the people who want to talk about the draft.