It’s been an important week in the MLB calendar as the 2009 First-Year Player Draft was completed over three days. Hundreds of key decisions were made based on years of scouting reports and statistics. It will be several years before we can judge whether a team’s draft was successful or not, but right now they are all hoping that they have just acquired some young players who can make a difference in the future.
And if the draft picks don’t work out, we also saw an example this week of the sort of devious tricks that can be used to win a ball game.Â
Nationals select Strasburg – now they have to sign him
The 2009 First-Year Player Draft took place this week, with potential draftees and baseball fans watching the MLB Network show hoping for good news.Â
The suspense of the first pick was reduced this year by the presence of Stephen Strasburg. Scouts had been stating for the last eighteenth months or so that he was the outstanding talent of the 2009 class, destined to be selected with the first pick by whichever team finished the 2008 season with the worst win-loss record.
The Washington Nationals earned that dubious distinction (the Mariners came second and some of their fans even suggested the team should have thrown a few games at the end of the season so that they could draft Strasburg instead). In the lead up to the decision being made, many had stated that the only way the Nationals wouldn’t select the pitcher out of San Diego State University is if they were completely and utterly stupid. I didn’t rule that out totally (it’s rumoured that they are about to sack manager Manny Acta, for example), but it was no real surprise when Bud Selig read out Strasburg’s name.
One of the underlying principles of the draft is that it gives the slumping teams a chance to re-stock and compete again. The draft certainly allows long-suffering fans to feel that there is hope for the future. The opening of the Nationals’ new ballpark last year provided only a brief moment of joy in Washington before the locals became all too aware that a new home doesn’t count for much when the team playing in it isn’t worth watching. Tuesday was one of the first days in the Nationals’ brief existence that their fans had genuine reason to get excited about their (future) team.
This excitement still depends on the Nationals agreeing a contract with Strasburg via the omnipresent force that is Scott Boras, which is no foregone conclusion. Reports of a $50 million starting point sound like the makings of an overactive imagination. Unfortunately for the Nationals, that overactive imagination belongs to Boras and, as always, he holds all the aces.Â
The Nationals have to sign Strasburg, it is as simple as that. If they have any ambition whatsoever to become a contender, they cannot let one of the most talented pitchers in recent memory slip from their grasp. Consequently, Boras has an unbelievable amount of bargaining power in the upcoming negotiations.Â
The deadline for agreeing a deal is 17 August. Nationals fans should not be expecting to get much sleep the night before.
Watching the Draft
The First-Year Player Draft has undergone a dramatic transformation over the last couple of years. The phone conference affair so memorably depicted in Michael Lewis’ Moneyball is now a televised event with a host of web-based add-ons at MLB.com.  This year they embraced the Twitter phenomenon by encouraging fans to insert a ‘#mlbdraft’ tag into their ‘tweets’, allowing them to integrate comments from prospect experts, players being drafted and fans watching around the world (including myself) into their online coverage.
I was dissuaded from live blogging the first round again as the draft was moved back by four hours compared to last year. A three-hour first round starting at 23.00 British time didn’t offer much hope of  staying awake, particularly due to the way the draft is conducted. It’s a four minute wait every time a team goes ‘on the clock’, before they select a player you know little about who may not reach the Majors for several years. Add in the choice of Bud Selig, the Dean of Dull, as the Master of Ceremonies and it’s not the most enthralling of spectacles.
MLB deserve credit for trying to make the draft more of an event, to rival those in the NFL and NBA, but it’s unlikely to ever appeal much to the majority of baseball fans.
It was the gulls, your Honour
In the fight to win MLB games, every attempt should be made to gain an advantage (within the rules, of course). The Cleveland Indians came up with a plan this week so cunning that Baldrick himself would have been proud of it.
Step One: encourage a flock of gulls to take up residence in your ballpark by making sure your fans leave half-eaten hot dogs lying around (note: take extra care not to encourage Eighties band Flock of Seagulls to your ballpark by mistake).
Step Two: Away from prying eyes, train the gulls to deflect a well-hit ball past an onrushing fielder.
Step Three: Secretly guide the gulls into position during extra innings in a tied game. Instruct your batter to aim for the gulls and let them do the rest.
Step Four: Celebrate your walk-off victory.
Step Five: Initiate your post-game spin campaign, including suitably annoyed quotes from your manager (“It’s been a little too constant,” Eric Wedge said. “I don’t see any plus to it. I’m sure it will be taken care of, sooner or later” etc) and a press release detailing the research being carried out “regarding the excessive amount of gulls that have been present” at your ballpark.
Step Six: Begin a raft of ostentatious measures designed to give the appearance of you addressing the problem (such as letting off fireworks), while retiring the gulls to a life of luxury at a nearby landfill site.
The plan worked brilliantly for Shin-Soo Choo and the Indians on Thursday against the Royals. Coco Crisp was left waving at a deflected ball in centre field, allowing Mark DeRosa to score the game-winning run from second base.
The Indians claimed they were embarrassed by it, but they can’t fool us.
