Wednesday, January 6, 2010

Season 7 Draft Review -- Ottawa Renegades

Ottawa has struggled at the big league level for a while, but that has brought an opportunity to draft some very fine players. Ottawa has a solid farm system, and the Season 7 draft presented an opportunity to add to that pool of talent. Let's review their draft and see how they did.

1st rounder (4th overall) Walt Sikorski has to be one of the more puzzling draft choices ever. He's got very, very good velocity and can induce groundballs with his repertoire of an above average fastball and solid slider. While he is a lefty that is still somewhat deceptive against righties too (he does a solid job against lefties), Sikorski can't really command his pitches and has a hard time throwing strikes. If I get Sikorski in the 3rd round, I'm happy about it, but to make him the 4th overall pick is a real stretch.

2nd rounder Mario Rogers was drafted as a SS but profiles more as a 3B defensively. Problem is, he doesn't have the offensive skillset needed to play 3B. Not a bad prospect, but a bit of a tweener. Will be interesting to see how Ottawa decides to use him.

3rd rounder Earl Cooke is another starting pitching prospect with control questions. Cooke sports a good slider and screwball,but with mediocre velocity and a lack of deception against RH hitters, Cooke isn't a great prospect at this point. Though, truth be told, I like Cooke more than Sikorski.

Ottawa took lots of pitching depth in the middle rounds, but overall this has to be a disappointing draft for the Renegades. They have a solid farm system with some really high ceiling prospects, but unfortunately they weren't able to take advantage of their high draft position and add much to that pool. Overall, I give their draft a C-.