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1) OF Ken Griffey Jr.
Drafted in first round (No. 1 overall) in 1987
Griffey might have a case as the best homegrown player of any team in any era when considering how much hype surrounded the top overall pick as the son of a three-time All-Star. It’s wild to imagine that the Mariners nearly passed on the sure-bet center fielder out of Moeller High School in Cincinnati.
Former owner George Argyros had his heart set on a college pitcher, and his top choice was Mike Harkey. Griffey only wound up in Seattle by agreeing to a $160,000 bonus, well below the $225,000 that the previous year’s top pick received. Griffey took pride in being the top pick, and boy, did he deliver. Griffey played in just 129 Minor League games before going on to become the franchise leader with 70.6 wins above replacement, per Baseball-Reference, and 417 homers. He ranks at or near the top of just about every offensive category in team history.
Who could the Royals have drafted in the 80s?
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This is the second installment looking back at who the Royals could have selected in past drafts, by the decade. I’m not sure if there is anything more difficult in life than identifying baseball talent. Brain surgery? Talking to women? The list is pretty short. Staking your career as a scout or General Manager to the analysis of 18–22-year-old ball players is a risky endeavor. Why do some players make it and some do not? That remains the million-dollar question that vexes all teams.
1980
The 1980 draft was the Darryl Strawberry draft. There was little doubt about the straw man going #1. Even the Mets, who held the pick, couldn’t have blown that one. Kansas City held the 16
Ryne Sandberg vs. American League pitchers By JohnW53 on Jan 27, 2021, 6:08am CST +
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According to baseball-reference.com, these were the 8 American League pitchers with the most Wins Above Replacement from 1984 through 1993:
1. Roger Clemens, 65.1
8. Mark Gubicza, 30.0
Ryne Sandberg faced every one of them during those 10 years, as he played in the All-Star Game each season. Those were all the All-Star appearances of his 16-year, Hall of Fame career.
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During the regular season, Sandberg batted .285/.344/.795. He slammed 282 home runs, hitting at least 26 in 5 seasons, with a high of 40. He drove in 1,061 runs, reaching 100 on the nose twice.
In 1997, his final season, he played 13 games against American League teams, in which he went 15 for 48, .313, with 5 doubles, plus 3 walks, and had 9 RBI.
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Earlier this week, MLB Pipeline’s Jim Callis and Jonathan Mayo rolled out their list of the Top 100 prospects for the 2021 Draft, offering fans a comprehensive look at the best amateur players in the country. Beyond those rankings, they also applied their expertise in putting together a mock draft for the Top 10 slots in 2021 and answered fans’ questions during a recent Twitter Q&A.
As part of MLB Pipeline’s ongoing Draft coverage, we thought that it would be interesting to explore past successes in the annual event by highlighting the best pick in each team’s history.
But please note that the purpose of this list is not to identify which players performed the best for the organization that drafted them. Rather, for this exercise, we have identified every team’s best Draft pick based on (Baseball Reference’s) Wins Above Replacement though, in some cases, exceptions were made (and noted) by the MLB Pipeline team.