Keith Law: Redrafting MLB’s 2010 class

The 2010 draft wasn’t supposed to be very good — we were already looking ahead to 2011, which looked epic and turned out to be just that — so it wasn’t that surprising to me to look back for this exercise and see that, indeed, the 2010 draft wasn’t very good. Only seven guys in the class have reached 20 WAR in the ten years since it happened, and only 20 players have reached 10 WAR, at least one of whom is probably done as a major leaguer.

This is a “redraft,” in which I try to reselect the top 30 picks based on what we know of the last ten years and what I think these players might do for the remainder of their careers. I don’t include players who didn’t sign, and I don’t think about service time considerations (when you draft a player, you only control the first six-plus years of his career). I’m just going big picture here, and while I cite players’ Wins Above Replacement figures throughout (using Baseball-Reference), I didn’t just rank the players by their WAR totals; a few times I deviated quite a bit from those rankings. There’s an age gap here of five years from the youngest player on the list (Bryce Harper) to the oldest (Kole Calhoun), which matters when we’re projecting forward for what these players might still do.

I’ll follow up Thursday with a column on the first-rounders who didn’t make it — 20 of them, in fact. As I said, the 2010 draft just wasn’t very good.

1. Andrelton Simmons

Team: Washington Nationals Player selected in 2010: Bryce Harper
Simmons’ actual selection: Second round, No. 70 overall (Braves)
Career WAR: 36.3

Simmons isn’t the career WAR leader from the 2010 class, ranking third behind Chris Sale and Manny Machado, but he’s on track to become one of the three most valuable defensive shortstops of all time, and that skill set makes him the most likely player on this list to still be playing at age 40. He’s come into a little power in his late 20s that might last into his early 30s, but it’s his defense that makes him the most valuable player in the class when we consider both what he’s done and what he’s likely to do in the future. He’s probably three seasons from passing the career WAR total of Omar Vizquel — an inferior fielder to Simmons who has vocal adherents for his Hall of Fame case, despite a career WAR of 45.6, plus only three All-Star appearances and a single MVP vote in a 24-year career — which should make for one heck of a debate if Simmons does indeed have the second act I think he will.

2. Manny Machado

Team: Pittsburgh Pirates Player selected in 2010: Jameson Taillon
Machado’s actual selection: first round, No. 3 overall (Orioles)
Career WAR: 36.7

Machado was No. 2 on my draft board in 2010, after Bryce Harper, but went third overall when the Pirates opted for pitcher Jameson Taillon with the second pick. Machado has had an exceptional career to date and is on pace for a Hall of Fame career himself — if MLB plays this year, this is actually his age-27 season — but after looking like he was on the cusp of MVP-caliber performances, he’s been somewhat less than that over the last three seasons. He’s still an above-average regular, with the defensive chops and power to still provide value for another decade, but I can’t look at this skill set without thinking there’s another leap in there.

3. Chris Sale

Team: Baltimore Orioles Player selected in 2010: Manny Machado
Sale’s actual selection: first round, No. 13 overall (White Sox)
Career WAR: 45.3

The majority of scouts I talked to at the time of the draft — and many since — thought Sale was a huge breakdown risk as a starter, between the low arm slot and his rail-thin frame; I know the White Sox had those concerns too, but figured his downside was an elite relief pitcher and took the chance at the No. 13 pick. A small change to how he gripped his slider took it from a below-average pitch to a grade-70 one, and while he did eventually blow out, he made 232 starts and threw over 1,600 career innings before it happened. If he never throws another pitch in the majors, this was a great pick, and right now he’s had the best career of anyone in the class.

4. Bryce Harper

Team: Kansas City Royals Player selected in 2010: Christian Colón
Harper’s actual selection: first round, No. 1 overall (Nationals)
Career WAR: 31.8

Harper’s 2015 season won him the MVP and appeared to mark the arrival of the perennial candidate he was expected to be when he was the easy first-overall selection in 2010; he’d been on the radar since he showed up at the Area Code Games in August 2008 as a 15-year-old rising sophomore and was the best player on the field whenever he played. Injuries, approach problems, and bad luck have all contributed to make him a good player but not a superstar since then … yet even last year, when he struck out more than he had since 2014, he was still about a 4.5 win player. As with Machado, there just looks like there’s more in there, and I wouldn’t be surprised if either guy busted out an 8-win season the next time we play 162.

5. Christian Yelich

Team: Cleveland Indians Player selected in 2010: Drew Pomeranz
Yelich’s actual selection: first round, No. 23 overall (Marlins)
Career WAR: 31.8

A few weeks ago, I wrote a “do-over” column on the 2004 draft, asking how baseball history would have differed had the Padres taken Justin Verlander, the Tigers’ primary target at No. 2, with the first overall pick. Here’s another one for you: The Phillies picked four spots after the Marlins, and thought they were getting Yelich, as did I before the draft. The Marlins took him, and that has altered the fates of three franchises, since the Brewers aren’t the force they’ve been the last two years without the 15 wins they’ve gotten from Yelich. He’s below Harper and Machado here because he’s a year older by seasonal age and plays the least valuable position of the three.

6. Jacob deGrom

Team: Arizona Diamondbacks Player selected in 2010: Barret Loux
deGrom’s actual selection: ninth round, No. 272 overall (Mets)
Career WAR: 35.5

Here we have the first player who was taken after the fifth round, which would mean that this year’s Jacob deGrom, if one exists (and who’s to say that he doesn’t?) would go undrafted and possibly unsigned. It’s not as if deGrom just missed the cut; all 30 teams passed on him in the sixth, seventh and eighth rounds. He only started pitching as a sophomore at Stetson University in 2009, and didn’t become a starter for the Hatters until midway through his junior year, which is probably the biggest reason he wasn’t drafted higher. This was a great job by the Mets’ amateur department, boosted by a strong “follow” report on deGrom by area scout Les Parker going into the spring of 2010.

7. J.T. Realmuto

Team: New York Mets Player selected in 2010: Matt Harvey
Realmuto’s actual selection: third round, No. 104 overall (Marlins)
Career WAR: 18.4

Can we take a minute here to appreciate the job the Marlins’ amateur staff did in 2010? They landed Yelich and Realmuto for 50 WAR between them with two of their first three picks. Seventh-rounder Mark Canha has had a nice little career as a bench piece, generating 6 WAR. Six other players the Marlins drafted and signed that year have reached the majors, and a seventh, Blake Treinen, was going to sign but the Marlins pulled their offer after his post-draft MRI. Realmuto was 19 years and three months on draft day in 2010, a star quarterback whom the Marlins made a full-time catcher after he signed. He finally came into his own as a big-league regular in 2017 at age 26, as both his bat and his glove took steps forward that should make him a star for several more years to come — as long as he can handle the rigors of catching every day.

8. Kevin Kiermaier

Team: Houston Astros Player selected in 2010: Delino DeShields
Kiermaier’s actual selection: 31st round, No. 941 overall (Rays)
Career WAR: 25.7

Kiermaier was taken out of Parkland College, a two-year school in Champaign, Ill., and largely ignored as a prospect coming up through the Rays’ system because his production was rather ordinary. He reached the majors just as the industry’s awareness and measurement of defense was improving to the point where a player like him, an 80 defender in center field at his peak, would be valued appropriately. Unfortunately, he’s slipped from that 2015-16 high to merely above-average defense, now with OBPs below .300, which make him a soft regular or quality extra outfielder, due more than $25 million over the next two years. Barring a return to form on either side of the ball, he’s probably produced nearly all of the value he will in the majors — but that still puts him in the top 10 for the draft class, not too bad for a guy whom every club passed over 30 times.

9. Yasmani Grandal

Team: San Diego Padres Player selected in 2010: Karsten Whitson
Grandal’s actual selection: first round, No. 12 overall (Reds)
Career WAR: 17.2

Grandal was a first-round talent in 2007 as a senior at Miami Springs High School, but fell to the 27th round on signability concerns and went to the University of Miami, and in 2010 the Reds took him with the 12th overall pick. It took two trades, but he established himself as a regular with the Dodgers, who valued his pitch framing and power, as well as his OBP skills from the left side, and were willing to overlook some of his flaws on receiving and blocking. He’s been exceptionally durable for a catcher, setting career highs in games played in the last two seasons, and has at least made himself a solid on-base threat batting right-handed as well, giving reason to think he’ll remain a valuable regular into his mid-30s.

10. Adam Eaton

Team: Oakland Athletics Player selected in 2010: Michael Choice
Eaton’s actual selection: 19th round, No. 571 overall (Diamondbacks)
Career WAR: 19.3

Eaton may always be attached to Lucas Giolito, who was one of three pitchers the Nationals traded to the White Sox to acquire Eaton and his extremely team-friendly contract … but the Nats also won a World Series thanks in no small part to Eaton’s performance against Houston, so they’re probably okay with the trade now. Eaton signed for just $35,000 with Arizona back in 2010, not much at all for a player with a year of eligibility remaining, but as an undersized player at a mid-major school (he’s fourth on Miami of Ohio’s all-time WAR list, after Buddy Bell, Charlie Leibrandt and Bill Doran), he probably realized the alternative was to be a $1,000 senior sign if he went back for his final year.

11. James Paxton

Team: Toronto Blue Jays Player selected in 2010: Deck McGuire
Paxton’s actual selection: fourth round, No. 132 overall (Mariners)
Career WAR: 13.3

Paxton’s odyssey has been a tortuous one — he was the 37th overall pick in 2009, taken by the Blue Jays, but declined their offers, only to have team president Paul Beeston tell a local newspaper that he’d been negotiating with Scott Boras, Paxton’s adviser, which effectively outed Paxton to the NCAA. (While we’ll never know Beeston’s motivations, he had to be aware that saying publicly that he’d negotiated with an agent rather than the player would wreak havoc for the kid.) The NCAA suspended Paxton, who left the University of Kentucky to go play in independent ball for the spring, but he wasn’t sharp and slid to the fourth round, where the Mariners took a shot at him. He showed top-of-the-rotation stuff in the minors and early in his big-league career, but often struggled with command, and has missed significant time with injuries, including back surgery this past winter that would have cost him the first half of 2020. Yet despite all of those obstacles, he’s averaged more than 3 WAR over the last three seasons and can look like an ace when he’s healthy. There are really only a few pitchers in this draft class who still have a chance to post significant value going forward — all of them are hurt right now, as it turns out — and Paxton is the only one who might do so if MLB resumes this year.

12. Whit Merrifield

Team: Cincinnati Reds Player selected in 2010: Yasmani Grandal
Merrifield’s actual selection: ninth round, No. 269 overall (Royals)
Career WAR: 13.3

Merrifield’s mere appearance on this list defies most of what we think we know about how the industry drafts and develops position players. He went to the University of South Carolina, a major baseball program in the best conference in college baseball, so he was scouted extensively and still only went in the ninth round, signing for $100,000 to forego his last year of eligibility. He then embarked on an unremarkable minor-league career that involved parts of three separate years in Triple A, none of them pointing to the player he’d eventually become in the majors. He didn’t debut in the big leagues until his age-27 season, and didn’t really establish himself until his age-29 season, after which he got MVP votes and then became an All-Star last year at age 30 with a 3.7 WAR. He’s 31 already, however, and every year has looked like a peak for him, so perhaps there isn’t as much production in his future as there is for the younger players on this list. Still, he’s already 14th in WAR from the draft class, so this counts as a huge win for the Royals’ amateur scouting staff.

13. Noah Syndergaard

Team: Chicago White Sox Player selected in 2010: Chris Sale
Syndergaard’s actual selection: supplemental round, No. 38 overall (Blue Jays)
Career WAR: 15.7

Thor is on the shelf for now after Tommy John surgery, and there are no guarantees he comes back from it — but given success rates for the surgery, there’s a good chance he does come back and has a few more 2-3 WAR seasons, even if he never does find that peak with which he teased us all in 2016. The Blue Jays’ 2010 draft looked at one point like it would be one for the ages with Syndergaard and Aaron Sanchez, as well as the oft-injured Sam Dyson, but the two high school starters are both out now with injuries, and their first overall pick, Deck McGuire, was a disaster.

14. Kole Calhoun

Team: Milwaukee Brewers Player selected in 2010: Dylan Covey
Calhoun’s actual selection: eighth round, No. 264 overall (Angels)
Career WAR: 15.7

Calhoun was a senior sign made good, exactly the sort of player I fear we’ll lose in a world with shorter drafts. MLB teams drafted and signed eight players out of Arizona State in 2010, but only Calhoun has reached 1 WAR in the majors so far (Merrill Kelly may still get there), and he’s still going, producing 2.4 WAR last year at age 31, thanks in no small part to a career-high home run total of 33. Between his age and the probability of a less lively baseball, he’s probably on the downside of his career, but this is a superb eighth-round pick for just a $36,000 bonus.

15. Joc Pederson

Team: Texas Rangers Player selected in 2010: Jake Skole
Pederson’s actual selection: 11th round, No. 352 overall (Dodgers)
Career WAR: 10.9

WAR might overstate Pederson’s value a bit, as the Dodgers have wisely platooned him for much of his big-league career, with 84 percent of his career PA coming against right-handed batters, but he’s been productive when he’s played and shows both power and on-base skills against righties. He was a top 100 prospect in his draft class but slipped to the 11th round on signability concerns, getting $600,000 from the Dodgers, the second-highest bonus they gave out in 2010.

16. Eddie Rosario

Team: Chicago Cubs Player selected in 2010: Hayden Simpson
Rosario’s actual selection: fourth round,  No. 135 overall (Twins)
Career WAR: 10.7

Rosario’s power surge the last three years came out of nowhere; after a big summer in the Appy League in 2011, he didn’t hit more than 13 homers in any full season until 2015, and was more of a speedy doubles hitter whom the Twins tried to convert to second base. (It didn’t take.) The speed is gone, he’s a bad defender even in an outfield corner, and he barely scrapes past a .300 OBP, but he’s just 28 and has posted 1+ WAR in all five of his major-league seasons, peaking at 4.1 in 2018, which is good enough for top 20 in the class. It wasn’t a great draft year.

17. Nick Castellanos

Team: Tampa Bay Rays Player selected in 2010: Josh Sale
Castellanos’s actual selection: supplemental round, No. 44 overall (Tigers)
Career WAR: 9.7

Castellanos has turned out to be a capable offensive player without a position — or, at least, who can’t play the positions he’s been asked to play, racking up negative defensive WAR at third and in left and right field. He’s a great doubles hitter with some home run power, but has never really had the on-base skills (his career-high in unintentional walks is 44) to profile as more than a regular in a corner, so if he moved to first or DH he’d still come in as fringe-average or below. He’s still just 28, however, and is moving to a friendly ballpark, so he could have many years of 1-2 WAR production coming — especially after the NL adopts the designated hitter and he can throw away his glove.

18. Drew Pomeranz

Team: Los Angeles Angels Player selected in 2010: Kaleb Cowart
Pomeranz’s actual selection: first round, No. 5 overall (Indians)
Career WAR: 10.8

Pomeranz was the first four-year college player taken in 2010, considered a high-floor starter with some upside as a big lefty with two potentially plus pitches. He was traded exactly one year after he signed with Cleveland, going to the Rockies to complete a trade for Ubaldo Jiménez; went to Oakland in a December 2013 trade for Brett Anderson; then was traded to San Diego two years later. Something clicked in San Diego — pitching at that ballpark can’t hurt — and he put up 3.3 WAR in 17 starts for the Padres, who traded him to the Red Sox in July 2016 for then-top pitching prospect Anderson Espinoza, who is now recovering from his second Tommy John surgery since the trade. Pomeranz gave the Red Sox a huge 2017 season as a starter, then started to break down again, moving to a relief role in 2019 that appears to be his future. How much value he has left depends on whether he can get right-handed batters out in relief, something he hasn’t done in the last two seasons, as the new three-batter rule means there’s no longer a place for a lefty specialist.

19. Corey Dickerson

Team: Houston Astros Player selected in 2010: Mike Foltynewicz
Dickerson’s actual selection: eighth round, No. 260 overall (Rockies)
Career WAR: 13.0

The Rockies took Dickerson twice out of junior college, in the 29th round in 2009, then in the eight round in 2010, signing him and getting parts of three years and 4.4 WAR out of him before trading him to the Rays after 2015 for German Márquez and Jake McGee.

20. Matt Harvey

Team: Boston Red Sox Player selected in 2010: Kolbrin Vitek
Harvey’s actual selection: first round, No. 7 overall (Mets)
Career WAR: 10.3

I assume at this point that Harvey’s MLB career is over, after multiple injuries, and that’s a shame given the pitcher he was, briefly. Harvey was a borderline first-rounder out of high school but was unsignable and went to North Carolina, where — as late as the summer after his sophomore year — he was struggling with his delivery and velocity as a relief pitcher in the Cape Cod League. Delivery changes got him back up to 97 and throwing strikes the next spring, making him a first-rounder; the Mets later gave him a power slider in Triple A that, for one shining moment, made him a superstar.

21. Robbie Ray

Team: Minnesota Twins Player selected in 2010: Alex Wimmers
Ray’s actual selection: 12th round, No. 356 overall (Nationals)
Career WAR: 8.8

Ray was an over-slot signing in the 12th round, turning down a scholarship to the University of Arkansas to sign with the Nationals, who traded him to the Tigers, who then traded him to the Diamondbacks. In Arizona he lengthened his stride and Ray saw his stuff improve, which has led to big strikeout rates but enough walks to keep him from being more than a fourth starter. The Nats had six other big leaguers from this draft besides Harper and Ray, although none were worth more than 1.0 WAR (Matt Grace).

22. Jameson Taillon

Team: Texas Rangers Player selected in 2010: Kellin Deglan
Taillon’s actual selection: first round, No. 2 overall (Pirates)
Career WAR: 8.2

Taillon is recovering from his second Tommy John surgery, the latest setback in a career full of injuries, but he’s been fairly effective when healthy, with a nearly 5-WAR season in 2018 before the elbow trouble resumed. Although the Pirates erred by passing on Machado, Taillon was the next-best player on my board and, I think, in the consensus of the industry as well.

23. Mike Foltynewicz

Team: Florida Marlins Player selected in 2010: Christian Yelich
Foltynewicz’s actual selection: first round, No. 19 overall (Astros)
Career WAR: 4.9

Foltynewicz’s WAR total includes -1.6 as a hitter — he’s really not good at it — but as a pitcher he’s at 6.4 and was a legitimate star in 2018, finishing sixth in the NL in ERA that year and ninth among NL pitchers in WAR. He was healthy in the latter half of 2019 and seemed ready to pick up where he left off the year before when the pandemic hit, but when baseball resumes he should be at least a league-average starter again and probably more. The Astros originally took him in the first round, but later traded him to Atlanta in a five-player deal that returned Evan Gattis and James Hoyt to Houston.

24. Drew Smyly

Team: San Francisco Giants Player selected in 2010: Gary Brown
Smyly’s actual selection: second round, No. 68 overall (Tigers)
Career WAR: 9.2

Smyly was a good fourth/fifth starter for the Tigers, who drafted him, and later the Rays, who acquired him in the David Price trade, before injuries robbed him of two full seasons in 2017-18. He came back to be awful for the Rangers last spring but better for the Phillies, enough that he’ll probably kick around for a few more years pitching at the backs of various rotations.

25. Jedd Gyorko

Team: St. Louis Cardinals Player selected in 2010: Zack Cox
Gyorko’s actual selection: second round, No. 59 overall (Padres)
Career WAR: 8.9

It seems hard to believe Gyorko might be done at age 31, especially after two years with the Cardinals where he was a productive supersub, but the Padres’ second-rounder from 2010 will probably face a tough job market going forward given his age and awful stints for two clubs in 2019.

26. Aaron Sanchez

Team: Colorado Rockies Player selected in 2010: Kyle Parker
Sanchez’s actual selection: supplemental round, No. 34 overall (Blue Jays)
Career WAR: 8.9

Sanchez is recovering from shoulder surgery that was going to wipe out his entire 2020 season anyway, and his odds to return to the majors from it is in doubt; Julio Urías is the only pitcher I know who’s had this kind of operation and regained his stuff. The Blue Jays’ second pick in 2010 seemed destined for stardom, with a loose arm and athleticism for days, but a change to shorten his stride length seemed to be followed by one injury after another — some freakish, some arm-related — that kept him from reaching his potential.

27. Taijuan Walker

Team: Philadelphia Phillies Player selected in 2010: Jesse Biddle
Walker’s actual selection: supplemental round, No. 43 overall (Mariners)
Career WAR: 5.8

Walker had an unusual spring in 2010 — he wasn’t committed to any college, so teams were attracted to his presumed signability. He came off basketball right into baseball and wasn’t great early in the spring, then started to pick up velocity, hitting 97 mph near the end of his spring … but had one really bad outing in front of a lot of decision-makers, and probably cost himself a chance to go in the first round. The Mariners had been steady on him all spring and rolled the dice on his arm strength and athleticism, which looked like a genius pick until someone convinced him to shorten his stride, something that took him years to fix … and then, right after he got his delivery working and had his best season (2017), his elbow ligament went. Unlike the other Tommy John surgery patients on this list, he’s back and ready to pitch, so there’s more confidence in his ability to produce value going forward, and he’ll pitch at age 27 this year if we have a season.

28. Vince Velasquez

Team: Los Angeles Dodgers Player selected in 2010: Zach Lee
Velasquez’s actual selection: second round, No. 58 overall (Astros)
Career WAR: 5.2

Velasquez blew out just eight games into his pro career, returned in 2012, and reached the majors three years later, which is probably a pretty typical career path for a high school pitcher taken high in the draft. Velasquez had a good arm and a very good changeup even in high school, but he never did have much of a breaking ball. He can’t seem to handle a starter’s workload, but can be more than a one-inning reliever, so the Astros and now the Phillies seem unsure how to handle him — but teams’ new emphasis on multi-inning relievers might be good for his career prospects.

29. Alex Claudio

Team: Los Angeles Angels Player selected in 2010: Cam Bedrosian
Claudio’s actual selection: 27th round, No. 826 overall (Rangers)
Career WAR: 6.0

This is just a hypothesis, but you know who else might really be hurt by a shorter draft? Puerto Rican players. Already seen as opportunities to save money compared to comparable U.S./Canadian players, Puerto Rican prospects tend to appear later in the draft, past the 10th round, because they’re often presumed to be willing to sign at that point without asking for anything over the maximum bonus teams can give out without affecting their bonus pool for rounds one through ten. This year, there may not be any Puerto Rican players drafted at all, since the draft is just five rounds, which means the prospects who are there this year — like Steven Ondina, a shortstop at the International Baseball Academy — will be offered just $20,000 as undrafted free agents. Anyway, Claudio was a great find in the 27th round.

30. Niko Goodrum

Team: Los Angeles Angels Player selected in 2010: Chevy Clarke
Goodrum’s actual selection: second round, No. 71 overall (Twins)
Career WAR: 2.6

I’m reaching a bit here for the last player, passing over about 16 players ahead of him in career WAR to date (among them Mark Canha, a seventh-round pick by the Marlins who’s now at 6.1 WAR), because Goodrum would only need about two more seasons like his last two to end up passing most of those guys. Goodrum was a very raw athlete taken by the Twins out of a Georgia high school, and took three years to get out of rookie ball, which is extremely rare for anyone who ends up doing something in the big leagues. Scouts often deride unpolished prospects as “two-year rookie ball” guys, so Goodrum was looking uphill when he reached Low A at age 21. To the Twins’ credit, though, when he got to Cedar Rapids, he wasn’t overmatched, and he produced reasonably well until he reached Triple A. The Twins didn’t protect him after 2017, so the Tigers signed him as a minor-league free agent, and he’s had two solid years as a true super-utility guy, playing everywhere except pitcher and catcher for Detroit in 2019. Goodrum is a bit of a cautionary tale both ways — even good high school position players can take a while to produce a return, but you can also give up on players a bit too soon.

(Photo of Simmons in 2012: Jonathan Ernst / Getty Images)