The Case for Allowing Later Draft Pick Trades

[Bob_Meteors]

I recently proposed allowing picks up to the 10th round to be traded. In response to the argument that these picks are useless, I have compiled a list of all 6th-10th round picks with over 10.0 career WAR. (note for pitchers I only included pitching WAR, and for batters I only included batting WAR.)

This list only goes up until the 2110 draft because after that, very few players have had long enough careers to reach 10 WAR.

Ryan Hernández - 2105 Round 9 - 61.98 WAR
Harsendu Dhurvusala - 2103 Round 10 - 44.39 WAR
Yu-shu Lung - 2104 Round 6 - 42.22 WAR
Blake Waller - 2107 Round 6 - 38.77 WAR
Bao-tian Qian - 2103 Round 7 - 31.38 WAR
Abdeljilill Abedi - 2104 Round 6 - 30.42 WAR
Christovão Neri - 2105 Round 7 - 27.53 WAR
Achaius Mainaky - 2106 Round 7 - 25.61 WAR
Badr bin Hassan - 2102 Round 6 - 22.33 WAR
Botol Ranho - 2102 Round 6 - 21.51 WAR
Endres Bäumer - 2101 Round 6 - 19.38 WAR
Mennad Belqola - 2104 Round 7 - 18.71 WAR
Tilmão Argolo - 2101 Round 6 - 18.56 WAR
Jack Joyce - 2110 Round 10 - 17.82 WAR
Juan Carrasco - 2104 Round 10 - 15.67 WAR
Ta-heng Chan - 2104 Round 7 - 15.53 WAR
Bob Poole - 2104 Round 6 - 15.38 WAR
Abdul-Jabbar Ubaida - 2109 Round 7 - 15.01 WAR
Daud Khorasani - 2104 Round 6 - 13.81 WAR
Jyotibhasin Rai - 2105 Round 6 - 13.58 WAR
Eustachio Clementi - 2102 Round 8 - 13.27 WAR
Éric Sanchez - 2110 Round 6 - 13.07 WAR
Brendan St. John - 2104 Round 10 - 12.57 WAR
Man Chin - 2101 Round 8 - 12.29 WAR
Xiao-yan Song - 2102 Round 6 - 11.65 WAR
Danya Yadrov - 2104 Round 7 - 11.22 WAR
Santos Pina - 2104 Round 6 - 11.10 WAR
Candrabali Malavika - 2105 Round 10 - 13.43 WAR
Aranyakumara Yamura - 2106 Round 7 - 12.33 WAR
Cong Yen - 2105 Round 7 - 10.66 WAR
Robinson Cordero - 2106 Round 9 - 10.27 WAR
Sixto Valdéz - 2101 Round 6 - 10.21 WAR
Wilson Calip - 2101 Round 6 - 10.21 WAR
Xian-yao Nan - 2104 Round 6 - 10.18 WAR
Harmage Partha - 2102 Round 8 - 10.12 WAR

As an interesting side note, here's a list of players in the 11th-20th rounds with over 10.0 career WAR. Potential future amendment??

Ronnie Drew - 2105 Round 13 - 68.21 WAR
Han-wu Han - 2103 Round 17 - 55.50 WAR
Itri Jela - 2104 Round 17 - 50.70 WAR
Thai Ho-Dac - 2103 Round 11 - 36.81 WAR
Samuel Bravo - 2103 Round 12 - 35.23 WAR
Janardan Shreerang - 2103 Round 19 - 31.52 WAR
Dan Harmon - 2107 Round 15 - 31.00 WAR
Zuleide Rainha - 2101 Round 13 - 29.35 WAR
Dhrtadhiti Indrani - 2103 Round 19 - 21.24 WAR
Doan Ba - 2106 Round 17 - 19.17 WAR
Su-shun Chin - 2107 Round 13 - 18.56 WAR
Nasih bin Kamil - 2104 Round 11 - 16.90 WAR
Carlos Granados - 2106 Round 17 - 15.63 WAR
Sami Kisito - 2106 Round 14 - 14.54 WAR
Freddi Uhlirz - 2110 Round 14 - 13.39 WAR
Tsadik Shukrani - 2102 Round 11 - 12.74 WAR
Pedro Gil - 2101 Round 14 - 11.96 WAR
Arvinder Sivasubramanian - 2106 Round 14 - 11.41 WAR
You-liang Ai - 2106 Round 12 - 10.88 WAR


From 2101 to 2110, 35 players drafted in rounds 6-10 reached 10 career WAR. There were a total of 1000 picks in those rounds during that time period (5 rounds * 10 picks per round * 2 league drafts * 10 years), suggesting that these picks have a ~3.5% chance of developing into a highly valuable player. Representing a "lottery card" with value, they should, therefore, be tradeable.

[claphamsa]

your argument is talent variation is too high in the daft and should be decreased....Ill buy that.

[claphamsa]

also you have no control...what about higher rounds? 14 cases (I didn't count) of players getting blessings from the talent fairy...doesn't mean these players arent dog shit when drafted

[Huckleberry]

I will say that I'm also not in favor still, but this was an outstanding job of research.

While it pains me in my core to admit it, I agree with clap. I would lean more toward lowering the talent change randomness setting instead.

[Bob_Meteors]

In response to requests for current distributions of draft location among 4+ star potential players:

SP Alfredo Cavazos was drafted in the 7th round of the 2115 ABL draft and is now 4OV/4.5POT.

SP Wen-zhong Cheng was drafted in the 6th round of the 2114 IBL draft and is now 4OV/4POT.

SP Anupradana Koushika was drafted in the 14th round of the 2118 IBL draft and is now 2.5OV/4POT.

SP Ismael Muñóz was drafted in the 6th round of the 2116 ABL draft and is now 3OV/4POT.

CL Carlos Piña was drafted in the 6th round of the 2116 ABL draft and is now 4OV/4POT.

SS Mitch Reddick was drafted in the 12th round of the 2119 IBL draft and is now 3OV/4POT.

3B Weiner Uhlirz was drafted in the 12th round of the 2116 IBL draft and is now 4OV/4POT.

Overall, of the 113 players with 4+ potential, 7 of them were drafted later than the 5th round. This is not the same percentage as the odds of getting a good player in those later rounds, but furthers the theory that these picks represent lottery tickets with a small but not insignificant chance of developing into valuable players.