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Barring injury, San Diego State right-hander Stephen Strasburg is expected to be the No. 1 pick in next year's amateur draft. He pitched for the United States in the Beijing Olympics. |
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WASHINGTON – San Diego State pitcher Stephen Strasburg will not be glued to the TV tonight when his favorite major league team, the Padres, plays the Nationals – even if the loser of the three-game series will improve its access to Strasburg in the June draft.
“I'm just going to let it ride,” Strasburg said. “I've got a full year left. Right now, that's not my goal, to be picked No. 1 next year. I want to get San Diego State to an NCAA regional and the College World Series. A lot can happen in a year.”
The Strasburg Sweepstakes open today at 4:35 p.m. PDT, when the National League's worst teams, the Padres (58-95) and Nationals (58-95), meet at Nationals Park.
Whoever finishes the season with the worst record in the majors will draft first in June. Also in the mix are the American League's Seattle Mariners (57-95).
Strasburg, who piled up 23 strikeouts in a game last season and won a bronze medal with the U.S. Olympic team in Beijing, has emerged as the best talent available at this early juncture, according to Baseball America.
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Hit and miss
There's no guarantee a No. 1 pick will become a star. Consider:
Matt Bush
No. 1 pick by Padres in 2004 hasn't climbed above Single-A. Shortstop was beset by troubles and injuries, and has switched to pitching.
Adrian Gonzalez
No. 1 pick by Florida in 2000 was traded by Marlins, then Rangers before finding a home and success with hometown Padres.
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“I hear he is very, very good,” said Padres General Manager Kevin Towers, whose scouts have asked SDSU coach Tony Gwynn about Strasburg. “If the draft were tomorrow, he probably would be the No. 1 pick.”
Nationals executive Mike Rizzo described Strasburg as a “great talent” and added, “The early returns are that he's one of the top prospects and probably is one of a small handful of guys at the top of the 2009 draft.”
In the event of a tie for the worst record this season, the team with the worst record in 2007 would get the first pick. Advantage, Nationals. They went 73-89 last year, followed by the Mariners at 88-74 and the Padres at 89-74.
“Let's hope the Nationals end up winning the sweepstakes,” Towers said. “I would rather not get the top pick. There's certainly a sense of pride. I would not want to finish the season with the worst record in baseball. We're trying to win as many games as we can.”
Said Rizzo: “We want to win every game. You hate losing.”
As owner of the San Diego Clippers, Donald Sterling publicly implored his team to lose games so it might draft 7-foot-4 center Ralph Sampson from the University of Virginia. Don't expect any baseball executives to follow suit. Not only would it invite scorn and punishment, it wouldn't make much sense.
Today's prospect can be tomorrow's bust, and nobodies can become somebodies in a hurry.
“Who knows, somebody might come up and be even better than Strasburg,” Towers said. “(Florida State catcher) Buster Posey was a guy who, coming into the past season, wasn't considered a top-five pick, and he was taken fifth by the Giants. A lot of things change.”
Strasburg, who was on the field at Petco Park last week to receive an award from the Hall of Champions, said he visualized himself pitching for the Padres many times while rooting for Gwynn as a boy in Santee, but he said he's thinking only of preparing himself.
“I've got a full year left,” said the right-hander, whose 97 mph fastball and 11 strikeouts in a shutout win over the Netherlands spiced up the Beijing Olympics. “A lot can change.”
Even if the club with the No. 1 pick deems Strasburg the best player available, it still might not draft him if it decides it would be too difficult to sign him. Four years ago, Padres scouts ranked Florida State shortstop Stephen Drew the best player available, but the Padres used the No. 1 overall pick on Mission Bay High shortstop Matt Bush and signed him for $2.35 million less than what Drew's adviser, powerful agent Scott Boras, got from the Diamondbacks, who drafted him 15th overall. Padres scouts also had rated college pitchers Jered Weaver and Jeff Niemann above Bush.
It was Rizzo, then the scouting director for the Diamondbacks, who selected Drew. He got backing from Managing General Partner Jerry Colangelo that reportedly cost Colangelo his job. Drew, meantime, has blossomed in Arizona.
“I think we certainly probably learned our lesson from making that decision years back,” Towers said. “Hindsight's always 20-20. You look back, it'd be nice to have Weaver or Drew, but we don't. We just hope Matt Bush gets healthy and becomes a good pitching prospect.”
Towers noted that since CEO Sandy Alderson joined the Padres in 2005, the club has sharply increased its overall investment in the amateur markets. The club had seven extra draft picks in 2007. This year, the Padres ranked 14th of 30 clubs in spending on players drafted among the top 10 rounds. In addition to that investment of $5.064 million, the Padres spent about $5.2 million on a quintet of foreign amateurs, to rank among the top three in that market. They've signed a Boras player from each of the past two drafts, including first-round pick Allan Dykstra, a first baseman from Wake Forest, this year.
“The last couple of years, we haven't bypassed any individuals or Boras clients because of signability,” Towers said. “We've taken the best player available on our board when we picked, and we will take the best player available on our board in 2009.”
But the stakes will be much higher with a top-three pick. Since Alderson came aboard in April 2005, the Padres have never drafted among the top 15. A higher pick carries a much higher price tag.
Strasburg, who played at West Hills High before heading to San Diego State, has chosen Boras as his adviser. Baseball America's Jim Callis has said he expects the asking price for Strasburg to start at $7 million. It could go much higher if Strasburg has a season comparable to the last one.
It doesn't appear the Padres will have as many compensation picks as they have had in recent years, which, along with a likely reduction in their major league payroll, could make it easier to spend more on their first-round pick. In fact, unless the Padres offer salary arbitration to potential free agents Brian Giles and Trevor Hoffman, they may not have any compensation picks for the first time under Alderson.
Rizzo finds himself in a similar position to September 2004, when he was working for a Diamondbacks club en route to 111 defeats. The draft was still nine months away, but he was intrigued by several amateur players, among them Virginia high school shortstop Justin Upton. He would draft Upton first overall in 2005 and sign him for $6.1 million. Upton joined Drew in the majors last year, and the two helped Arizona win the National League West and a first-round playoff series against the Cubs.
“You are always trying to find a silver lining in the cloud, and the silver lining that September was we really did have a handful of good prospects to draw from,” Rizzo said.
Looking ahead to 2009, Rizzo said, “There is a real good amount of talent in the upper part of that draft. We feel we're going to pick the right guy, and we feel we are going to get an impactful guy wherever we pick with our top pick – whether it's one, two, three or four.”
Tom Krasovic: (619) 293-2207; tom.krasovic@uniontrib.com
