Baseball America expanded their top draft prospect rankings out to 500 players yesterday, and Keith Law from The Athletic posted his second mock draft on Tuesday morning connecting the fourth overall pick of the Pittsburgh Pirates to a player we have heard about before.
Starting with BA, there wasn’t much change on their list at the top, but this is now the most comprehensive list you will get for draft picks. On top of the massive expansion to the backside of the list, they also added in scouting grades and risk factors for the players, along with a chart explaining the grades in relation to their potential in pro ball. The first change on the list doesn’t come in until the 14th overall player, which is Cole Young, the local high school shortstop, who we profiled here. Their fourth overall ranked player is still Termarr Johnson.
Law put together his list based on talks with scouts, executives and other sources (his words). He has the Pirates going with Cam Collier, who we profiled here. Collier has been loosely connected to the Pirates before as a bit of a savings pick that would allow them to spread around their bonus pool like they did so well last year by picking up huge upside players after the first pick. Law notes that Collier has picked up a little steam recently due to strong play/reports after his college season ended. That might take away some of the potential savings, but it would also push him closer to being a better pick in the fourth overall spot. BA has him ranked tenth overall, so it’s not a huge reach, especially if he’s impressing this late.
The first three picks in Law’s draft are Druw Jones, Jackson Holliday and Elijah Green, three players who have been rated highly together for the last two months (even longer for Jones and Green).
