Can the A’s reverse their draft woes?

Oakland has had notably little success under David Forst in the draft, but their recent moves may indicate improvement

In my last look at the Oakland Athletics farm system I went over the recent signing classes in international free agency, and this time around I am going to dig into the draft history under the watch of David Forst. Initially I had planned this to be a single article, however as I did more research I decided to split the draft piece into two sections. The first will be a rundown of the past eight drafts and the Athletics selections, and generally will be the more negative look of the two. Oakland has general had bad luck or made bad decisions through the draft especially at the top, but my look next week generally makes me feel they are inputting the right strategy and through misidentification of talent or sheer luck have failed to capitalize as much as I feel they should have.

The first draft of Forst’s tenure was by far the most successful, and the only one of those that can be said to have a true hit. That hit was third round pick Sean Murphy, who went from mid-round small-school status to a top prospect in three years in the system. Murphy was a fantastic find as Oakland took a chance on the potent bat which was hampered by a hamate injury, and targeting his athleticism and raw power turned into the only clear franchise cornerstone drafted under Forst. Murphy was of course traded to Atlanta last offseason, but in his career his 14.8 fWAR leads A’s draftees since 2016 by a wide margin. Oakland had, in addition to Murphy, four picks who received high bonuses with those four each netting seven figures. I will admit to comparatively not being a huge fan of 6th overall pick AJ Puk at the time of the draft, but the smarter minds at Baseball America named him their top prospect from the draft and he wound up a top 20 overall prospect for them. This was despite him undergoing Tommy John surgery, bringing to fruition concerns that his high octane arm and somewhat awkward arm path could lead to injury issues. The A’s gave up on Puk surprisingly quickly as a starter, with his command never developing to the point he could stick in a rotation, and while he has been a solid reliever he is a bust at the top of the draft. It was an unfortunate outcome for Oaklands $4,125,000 investment, but grabbing arguably the draft’s top player at six is hard to frame as a poor decision without hindsight’s aid.

Pitching injuries were the unfortunate undoing of the entire class, as after drafting Daulton Jefferies 37th overall with an already existing shoulder injury he never pitched a full season for Oakland. He twice had Tommy John surgery and only pitched 14 major league games despite blitzing through the minor leagues when healthy. Even more tragic was Skylar Szynski, who never got a chance to prove himself after being given $1,000,000 in the fourth round. Syznski pitched seven games after being drafted, but then was shut down with a myriad of arm troubles for the next five seasons before an unsuccessful return as a reliever left him with a career ERA of 11.61 in the minor leagues. Oakland selected Puk’s rotation mate at Florida in Logan Shore with their second round pick, and Shore himself never pitched more than 91 innings in a season under the development of the Athletics. No players from this draft remain in the organization, though it has thus far been the best at producing major league players. In addition to Puk, Jefferies, and Murphy, sixth round pick Brandon Bailey, 11th round pick Eli White, 13th round pick Nate Mondou, and 17th round pick Seth Martinez have all reached the major leagues. Generally this draft is the encapsulation of the main argument on building with pitchers. Oakland sank $8,125,000 into four pitchers in the draft, only to see them often-injured and unable to contribute to their success long term. Still, while this draft hurt Oakland’s ability to maintain the success of the late 2010’s, it is perfectly reasonable that they made the picks they did and it’s just misfortune that they turned out so many disastrous injuries.

The 2017 draft on the other hand was terrible for Oakland, but it can be excused because it’s been terrible for everyone. The 80.8 bWAR produced across all MLB draft so far trails even the production of 2019 with two fewer years of development time there. Oakland’s Austin Beck is among the six first round picks who failed to reach the major leagues, and the only one out of the top 21 picks, but while there are a handful of picks who are still seen as potential solid contributors no one in the first round has been an impactful big league player. Beck’s inability to adjust to professional pitching made the more than $5 million invested a waste, but it was not seen as a reach at the time and was a gamble made with immense upside given his physical toolset. 33rd overall pick Kevin Merrill ($1.8m) also was one of those six to miss making the major leagues, with the best player being third round pick Nick Allen who has settled in as a fantastic defensive shortstop who is ultimately a backup due to his lack of offensive ability. The best player the A’s drafted was Garrett Mitchell in the 14th round, but they failed to sign him and ultimately will see no long-term success from this draft. Nick Allen is likely to be the backup this season at the major league level and is the only player from this draft on the 40 man roster for Oakland. It is not entirely wise to make excuses for past failures for an organization, but generally I think Oakland can get somewhat of a pass given the overall lackluster draft in 2017.

2018 is a different story. If anyone can tell me what the hell they were thinking here it would really be enlightening. I can’t name a single person I talked to who didn’t think the Kyler Murray pick was a joke, and it’s only proven more disastrous over time. I haven’t followed the Athletics front office enough to know this but I truly hope someone was fired. We can talk talent and one season at Oklahoma all we want, but a player who was not clearly committed to the sport with relatively little experience was an awful pick at 9th even at the time and has only proven worse with each passing year. It’s all nice and cozy to let the guy play out his football dreams, but if I spent $4.6 million on a guy I would be parking him in my organization with no exceptions. None of Oakland’s three seven figure bonuses made the major leagues, and only fourth round pick Alfonso Rivas, who never played in Oakland, has a positive career bWAR. The shining light from this draft and the hope left in the organization falls on sixth round pick Lawrence Butler, who despite early struggles in his major league career is by far the best player on this list. Oakland has currently the second-worst bWAR from this particular draft, but with Butler around I don’t think that holds up long. Butler’s agent letting him go pro out of high school for just $285k may need to answer some questions now, but Oakland managing to get their hands on a premium athlete at that age for that price is a bargain even if he had never made it out of Double-A. This draft will live or die by Butler’s bat, but given how well-liked he still is around the organization that doesn’t feel like a bad thing. All it takes is one player to change an entire draft class so while this is a clear F at the moment it’s more of a mid term grade. However, making one good pick in the middle of day two after absolutely smoking the ninth overall pick is not really going to make up for anything.

The 2019 draft for Oakland is even worse than 2018 because there really doesn’t seem to be much hope for improvement, but they were handcuffed by having the fourth-lowest pool in an exceedingly top-heavy draft. There were late-round finds to be had (Anthony Volpe went a pick later), but generally the A’s found themselves in a bad crop of players where they picked. Logan Davidson wasn’t a terrible pick out of Clemson as a college bat that showcased power potential and the ability to stick at shortstop, but neither of those panned out in the professional ranks and only two other players received $500k or more. Seventh rounder Drew Millas is the only major league player from this draft thus far, and he has only played in 11 games. Ultimately Oakland had little to work with and did little with it, reaching significantly (imo) with Tyler Baum in the second round who had just one season of decent command before immediately plummeting to depths he had previously never mined with the help of injuries, and then spending $400k on a slap-hitting center fielder in the third.

Oakland only had five picks to work with in 2020, and given their recent history it seemed likely they would bungle a first round pick and all three of their pitchers would be injured. Well second round pick Jeff Criswell was injured in 2021, fourth rounder Dane Acker has never been fully healthy, and Stevie Emanuels has settled in as a relief pitcher. Check marks there, but they finally did it. I know Tyler Soderstrom didn’t look great last year but this was an absolute steal for Oakland at 26th overall and it is the continuation of something I will discuss in the next article. Oakland, prior to Forst, spent relatively little on high school position players but managed to strike it big and produced a WAR/$ about 25% more efficient than college hitters. Yet, Forst spent ²⁄₃ of his money on position players on college hitters. Finally the money went towards a high school hitter and Soderstrom, while probably not yet ready for big league action, seems like he could be the next impact bat for the Oakland lineup.

Much to my joy, one year later and Forst did it again. I loved Max Muncy as an amateur prospect, was EXTREMELY disappointed as a Braves fan to see them pass on him and take Ryan Cusick in the first round in 2021, and while Muncy has had his ups and downs he has already far exceeded the performance of the three college first rounders in Forst’s tenure. So far 2021 has been led for Oakland by second round pick Zack Gelof, who I will begrudgingly admit is a college hitter who has already had success at the major league level. The top three in this draft were just a tremendous trio, as Oakland chased power in each early spot, spent willingly on high school talent, and managed four bonuses of $600k or more despite only holding a late first round pick. Gelof is a major league contributor, and the A’s also roll in Muncy, Mason Miller, and Denzel Clarke as guys who are universally seen in the top eight or so prospects in the system. It’s early to say, but their approach in this draft and 2020 shifted towards riskier picks and they seem to have had success with them. 7th round pick Brett Harris has also had success in the minor leagues and is one of the team’s top prospects.

Again with personal opinions, I didn’t love Daniel Susac in 2022 as a prospect, but it’s hard to argue against the value he provided at 19th. Susac hasn’t panned out so far in a short minor league career, but as college hitters go a player with elite raw power who plays a premium position is typical a mold that is more likely to have success. Susac needs changes, but it’s too early to call him a bust and seems more in line with the trend of taking higher ceiling players early and being willing to let a handful of them flame out for the benefit of those that won’t. I’m not a huge fan of Henry Bolte, but it’s again easy to see where he provides value with an elite physical toolset and the ability to develop from a young age. Fourth rounder Colby Thomas is likewise a large investment in physical tools despite a lack of a hit tool, and while $750k may be a bit of a steep price tag for his services he has been a prolific power bat in his one year career. They continued spending on hitters with third rounder Clark Elliot. Oakland has always spent heavily on hitters, sitting at 65.5% of their top-10 money in the pre-Forst era of drafting. This largely continued through Forst’s first four years, where he spent 67.6% of his money on hitting and in return receiving 88.2% of the fWAR production from his drafts from hitters (mostly Murphy). Forst seems to take it to another level during this three year period, however, spending 81.9% of his top-10 round bonuses on position players.

Forst’s love of hitting continued into first round pick Jacob Wilson in this past draft, but frankly I really don’t see what he’s doing investing his first premium pick in five years and $5.5 million on a...decent-at-best hitter. I don’t want to disparage Wilson horribly here, and I think he’s a fine enough prospect, but I also think this was a terrible pick. In fact, top-to-bottom this draft flies in the face of everything Forst had done with the prior three drafts. He spent big on a low-ceiling, high floor bat and then spent big on high school pitching which Oakland has never done and for good reason given their history of production from that demographic. I do like Steven Echavarria quite a bit, but $3,000,000 is first round pick capital on a demographic the A’s have little success developing. I don’t mind this pickup here as the system needs more risk to pave the way for potential impact talent down the road, but it’s a bit fascinating to see them really go all out here while selecting a glove-first, 30-power shortstop at sixth overall. Beyond that first round pick, which was a bit of a theme from some early drafts, I really like what Oakland did here. Five seven figure bonuses thanks to picking top six, and from Myles Naylor at 39th overall through Cole Miller in the 4th round I’m impressed with what Forst and crew did. I think Ryan Lasko was a brilliant pick at 41st overall, with untapped physical potential and a history of college hitting success. The system needs potential at every level, and Wilson lacks that in a way that sells the rest of this class short in my opinion. It was a questionable use of a lot of money in the draft, but the rebound in the next few rounds sets the system up with a number of potential high-end outcomes. It’s interesting for me to see how Forst’s strategy has developed here, and I generally think there is going to continue to be an emphasis on athleticism, power, and high-end outcomes. Generally, I would argue this is the route to go, as unless you’re picking from the handful of elite guys every season the risk differences between draft prospects are significantly overstated.

By the numbers Oakland has been horrible at drafting. Even with Murphy in there they rank in the bottom third by production, and since then they rank sixth-worst. It’s clear that the first round woes in the early years were key contributors to this, though calling up players such as Butler and Soderstrom early just for them to produce negative WAR doesn’t help. Still, while it’s true most of that production comes from Murphy, the A’s have produced 15.8 bWAR from picks past the first round. This is slightly above the MLB-average of 15.1 bWAR. This production can come from a handful of solid players though it is typical a couple of big hits like Murphy and Gelof to produce most of that. However Oakland ranks third-worst since 2016 in first round pick production, getting 0.4 bWAR between Soderstrom, Daulton Jefferies, and AJ Puk. The MLB average during this span is 7.1 bWAR. The Rockies are the only team to have gotten fewer than Oakland’s three first round picks to the major leagues since 2016, and both tie since 2017 with just one major leaguer. It’s possible the first round strategy needs some adjustment, though it’s also likely going to need a shift in luck. Forst has had eleven first round picks, but it’s more fair to look at the seven between 2016 and 2020 who have had a more reasonable amount of time to reach the major leagues. Three of the four who have were college bats (Murray, Merrell, Davidson), a notable fact considering prior to Forst taking over general manager duties top ten round college hitters taken by Oakland produced an average of 1.76 fWAR, while top ten prep hitters produced an average of 3.05. High school hitters on a per-capita basis vastly outperformed other demographics, with college pitching coming in third and prep pitching coming in a distant fourth. Thus all of the first round picks since Puk/Jefferies being hitters makes complete sense, and spending 29.7% of top ten money on prep hitters versus 23.2% prior to 2020 and 21.6% prior to Forst taking over as GM seem to be signs of progression. I still argue the money spent on Wilson was nonsensical, but Baseball America’s three best available players at the time Oakland picked were all pitchers, so while Wilson is a mold and demographic I am not particularly on there were no other prep bats available until Baseball America’s 15th-ranked prospect Blake Mitchell. There is a lot of climbing to do for Oakland to reclaim a spot as a contender in the American League West, but the progression of the draft strategy over the past handful of years seems poised to reverse the misfortune of David Forst’s early drafts.