That hip injury is about a 3-4 month rehab from what I've read. Before that injury, he was pitching well enough for consideration at #1 overall.

When his hip recovers, there's no reason why he shouldn't be able to do what he's done the last 3 years.

"Before the season started, his mechanics were a cause for concern. Now you know why. His mechanics are very stressful on his body and the body is showing it. He gets his plant knee extended quickly and make his hip control all of his balance and absorb all of the rotational forces in his delivery. Then the elbow never has much flexion in it and kind of long arms the ball. With his elbow so extended, the moment arm of the forces are farther out and requires his rotator cuff to work harder along with the other internal rotators to work harder to turn his arm over. That is why you are seeing shoulder problems."
http://www.crawfishboxes.com/2013-ml...-indiana-state

Signing him for 2MM or whatever to watch him break down in the minors would be a very Royals thing to do. Damn near every promising starting pitcher prospect we've had recently has hurt themselves.

Our last pick of the night is coming up.

Cody Reed, Juco fireballer currently committed to transfer to ole miss.

Keith Law's take on him, has him as his #37 ranked player:

Reed is a true ?pop-up? guy, appearing on scouts' radars this spring as a possible sandwich-round pick who was undrafted when eligible the last two years.

He checks a lot of boxes scouts look for in amateur pitchers -- size, athleticism, handedness (his would be left), velocity (92-95), a second pitch (a plus curveball), and a good delivery. Reed takes a long stride toward the plate, keeps himself online, and gets his pitching hand turned over nice and early.

He's still something of a project, with below-average command and control and a lack of formal pitching instruction or history facing good competition, but the raw material here is tremendous, with the potential for a mid-rotation starter or more.

He will thrive in our pitcher development system.

Interesting draft and not how I expected that to shake out... I'm really surprised Meadows was available at 8 and would probably have preferred they go that right...

But after seeing this all work out/break out, that Dozier pick makes a lot more sense than it did at 8 pm.

They picked a pair of helium, high ceiling guys with the next two picks, and the money that was saved on Dozier should make it possible to sign at least one of those guys.

Manaea is a high ceiling with some risk that looks much better at No. 34 than No. 8. If he can get healthy and they can clean up the mechanics a bit, he has huge potential. 6-6 lefties who can throw in the mid-90s, working off a good changeup and with a decent breaking pitch (Manaea throws a slurve). Hopefully, they can give him an extreme over-slot deal and sell him on starting his pro career with money similar to what he'd get as a top 5 pick next year.

Reed kind of came out of nowhere, but when lefties with that type of size pick up 5-6 mph on an average fastball in their second year in a college program... that tends to happen.

He's raw, but has received only minimal development and coaching so far. That's a guy that can really take off with professional instruction.

The first round pick of Dozier looks cheap... but when it is backed up by high-upside risks like Manaea and Reed, I think cost concerns go out the window.

Of course, it's now up to the Royals to do SOMETHING with these guys when/if they sign them, and that hasn't exactly been a strong suit in this farm system of late.

A guy like Manaea is someone who could be like Yordano Ventura, though. A guy whose stuff is so good, that if you can smooth out his mechanics a little bit, he might be bulletproof in development.

Speaking of Ventura... not sure if anyone posted info from his AAA debut tonight...

5 IP (87 pitches)
1 hit
4 BB (this is the thing to watch with him)
6 K

He now has 80ks in 62 2/3 IP this year, against just 24 walks.

Judging by Manaea's reaction on twitter, I think its safe to say that we're going to sign him.

Could have had this guy in the second round. Typical Royals pick.

LMAO................wait, that was sarcasm, right?:evil:

Whether or not you agree with the strategy, you have to understand it. This isn't the NFL.

Dozier is one of the few 2nd-round talents willing to sign for way under slot in the 1st round. There are a lot of high schoolers and juniors out there who currently project out as a 3rd rounder, but will not sign for the 3rd or 4th round slot bonus, and will go to school to try to raise their draft stock. If you hypothetically believe that there's no incredible "wow" talent available at #8, and you'd rather draft depth over slightly higher quality, then this is the way to go.

There are a lot of players who most teams will not be able to draft today, but that we can. We are almost guaranteed to sign some guy in the 3rd and/or 4th round way over-slot who was originally planning on going to school next year.

I really don't have a problem with their strategy. I'm just really skeptical that Manaea won't be fighting career long injury problems. Those mechanics scream issues.

I definitely grant you the likelihood that DM will screw this up, its just some people don't really understand the strategy itself. Which is understandable, since last year was the first draft where you might want to do this. Before last year, you just took BPA, unless you were poor and your owner-set draft budget ran out.

The NFL avoids this nonsense with hard-slotting and mostly drafting seniors. Hopefully MLB tosses out the draft pool concept and just goes with hard slotting in a few years, then it'll be easy, you just pick your guy without regard for money with each pick.

You mean Dozier? I wouldn't be so sure.

He possibly is not available even at the Royals comp pick. The A's and Rays were linked to him some, apparently, at Nos. 24 and 29 (at least that's what I was able to find when digging a bit last night... also saw it referenced on another Royals board).

I think if Ball or Frazier were available, that's the pick at No. 8 for KC. There are SOME questions about Meadows' power potential... maybe that scared KC off.

As it is, I think the way to look at Dozier not as the Royals' key pick in terms of his individual talent, but as a draftee that unlocks some flexibility at the comp pick, 2nd round pick, and even the 3rd round pick.

If Manaea had NOT fallen to KC at No. 34, this would have been an epic fail. But since the plan worked, I'll give a smidge of credit to Moore for correctly reading the tea leaves on this one.

As it is, the Royals got a LHP with star upside who was considered the potential No. 1 pick at the start of the college season (and who dominated the Cape League last summer as much as anyone in the past half-dozen years or so), an athletic RH power bat (hardest thing to find is RH power) who likely plays 2B or 3B but can also project to RF, and a second budding, upside-heavy LHP in Cody Reed who also was projected as a late first-round guy (they got him at least 15-20 picks after a lot of projections).

If they had drafted Manaea at No. 8 and Dozier at No. 34, I don't think anyone would be complaining.

Will be interesting to see what they do with their 3rd rounder in about an hour or so.

If Dozier is signing for $2 million, as many have speculated, that gives them about $1-1.2 million extra to sign other guys.

Would be pretty cool if they have half of that slotted for Manaea and are planning to use the other half on a guy who has fallen into Round 3. It's also possible some of that money is earmarked for Reed.