And now, the final piece of the draft recaps will cover the AL West Teams. The division has been dominated by the Vancouver Blaze in the standings as of late, but let's see who was on fire in the AL West in the draft!
AL WEST
Kansas City Tweakers
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Kansas City had the 2nd pick in the draft, and selected Brutus Henry. Henry is a monster at the plate, wielding a powerful bat and is also a masterful contact hitter. He hits lefties slightly better than righties, and hits both fairly well. His batting eye is also good, and he’s got great speed and baserunning ability. Projecting him as an annual 40/40 candidate isn’t a stretch, he’s a great add to the KC system. 2nd rounder Anthony Crosby is another huge bat, his only weakness being that he struggles against RH pitching a bit. It’s a huge a plus that he’s serviceable defensively as a catcher, and has decent durability. After that, the highlights are that they added a couple of more big power guys who may have a shot at the majors, and a defensive wizard at SS.
Final Synopsis: KC greatly improved the offensive talent in their system this draft.
Grade: A+
Oakland Bruisers
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With the 10th pick, Oakland got Wilfredo Chavez, who projects to be a legit major league shortstop with a very nice bat. If he comes close to his fielding projections, Oakland will have a huge advantage over most teams having his bat at shortstop. Oakland’s 2nd rounder, Chad Brohawn, is another very good hitter, and could definitely start in the majors, probably in right field. He’s got very good splits and power, a good batting eye, and some speed. He’s definitely one of the better 2nd round picks in the draft. After that, they landed a flurry of defensive speedsters, and a fairly decent DH vs. RH in the 8th round.
Final Synopsis: A fairly deep draft for Oakland here, we like what they came away with.
Grade: A
San Francisco Hammer’d Leprechauns
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Picking 24th, the Hammer’d Leps got Goose Hayes, a speedster with great range and contact hitting ability. His RH split and batting eye projections are a bit of a concern in terms of future Major League success at the plate – which given these factors, means that he probably shouldn’t have gone in the first round. We like their 2nd round choice SS Allen Wall for his elite defensive ability; he should be able to at least be decent at the plate too. There’s not much to write home about after that – they didn’t even sign a lot of their late round picks anyway.
Final Synopsis: We’re not high on Hayes as a first round choice, but we like Wall in the 2nd.
Grade: C
Vancouver Blaze
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Vancouver selected RP Clinton Seaton with the 29th overall pick. Seaton’s LH split is outstanding, he keeps the ball down, and sports a wicked slurve in his arsenal. His RH split is also very good. His control is mediocre in terms of major league potential, but with outstanding ratings elsewhere, he should be able to overcome his control issues to be a success in the bigs. Their supp round pick RP Trevor McQuillan we actually like better than Seaton – he projects to have closer-type stuff. A nice grab for the Blaze for sure. They continued to go pitching after their top 2 picks – nothing really great, maybe one of the guys gets a cup of coffee in the majors.
Final Synopsis: They landed 2 nice relief prospects here, given the thin draft class, we’d say they did pretty good.
Grade: B-
That concludes this season’s draft recap. We hope you enjoyed the coverage. Good luck to all teams with their new prospects!