By Jim Owczarski Sports Editor Published Jun 06, 2013 at 1:03 PM Photography: David Bernacchi

It’s not yet the spectacle of the NFL and NBA Drafts, but Major League Baseball is getting there. The 2013 First-Year Player Draft is a three-day affair, beginning with the first two rounds being shown in primetime on the MLB Network and all round streamed live at mlb.com.

I get why Major League Baseball is placing added emphasis on its draft. First, it missed the boat a long time ago when the other sports leagues decided to make it an event. Granted, 40 rounds is a bit tedious and not exactly television-friendly, but hey, you gotta do something, right? Second, you have a network and, well, you need programming.

Thirdly, and most importantly, the teams within baseball seem to be placing more and more emphasis on draft and development. (Really, it’s always been important, but now salary control is more important. Better to have a guy for cheap for six years than dump $200 million into one player past his prime, right?).

Finally, there has been a boom in interest among the fan base. Who are these obscure high school position players? Who are the top college infielders? In 2013, people want to know.

Oh, "prospects" have always been interesting. Reports from the farm have always been popular. And, fans always caught wind of the exciting new players. As long as there have been minor leagues this has been true.

Yet, with all the extra in-the-moment attention the draft receives now, the baseball draft is the biggest crapshoot in the history of gambling. Well, maybe not literally, but it’s really, really close.

This thing is 40 rounds. FORTY. A team may make over 50 picks any given year. The reason you get all excited when a draft pick hits is because it’s so rare.

And what do we mean by "hit" exactly?

Honestly, if a draft pick winds up having an actual major league career – let’s call it four years of playing at least 100 games a season – that’s amazing. Yes, amazing. The odds of even that happening are so exponentially long that finding an impact starter, let alone an All-Star, let alone a Hall of Famer – is literally like winning a Powerball - one in hundreds of millions.

That is why I meet the baseball draft with a shoulder shrug.

I’m not telling you how to feel about, but I am saying take these next three days with a grain of salt. And don’t get all fired up about the Milwaukee Brewers losing a first round pick to the hated St. Louis Cardinals for Kyle Lohse.

Lohse is a proven commodity. Some no-name from the plains of Wyoming or the great state of Texas is a nobody, and will likely play as many major league games as you or I.

Seriously.

Last year, I wrote how the Brewers have done an excellent job drafting impact players, both for the team at Miller Park and as bait for trades.

My feelings haven’t changed in that regard, and in fact I’ve come to respect the job the team has done finding those players even more.

They call baseball a game of failure, and the draft is the ultimate pride check. You miss far more, and far more spectacularly, than you ever hit.

It’s a little ridiculous to expect a player to reach the major leagues within a year after being drafted – even two or three – so let’s look at the 10 Brewers drafts from 2000 to 2009.

According to baseball-reference.com, the Brewers have made 493 selections in the amateur draft.

Now, not all of those picks signed with the team and were perhaps drafted in later years by others (i.e. Hunter Pence in 2002) but site does count that future service time as being part of the draft class that reached the majors.

Even with that qualification, only 54 of those picks have even played one major league game.

Of those 54, you can say only Corey Hart (11th round, 2000), J.J. Hardy (2nd, 2001), Manny Parra (26th, 2001), Prince Fielder (1st, 2002), Pence (40th, 2002), Rickie Weeks (1st, 2003), Tony Gwynn (2nd, 2003), Yovani Gallardo (2nd, 2004), Ryan Braun (1st, 2005) and Jonathan Lucroy (3rd, 2007) have had "careers" in the major leagues (and Lucroy is a stretch – this is just his third full season in the majors).

That’s 10 players.

Of those 10, seven turned into All-Stars – a truly astounding figure, by the way.

One turned into a Most Valuable Player.

Now, in a few years, we could add Lorenzo Cain (17th, 2004) and Brett Lawrie (1st, 2008) to that list of those who have had true careers. Maybe.

What does that say? It’s hard – really hard – to find true, every day major leaguers.

Some organizations are better at getting guys to the majors than others, no doubt. The Cardinals have drafted 497 players in those 10 years, with 74 appearing in at least one major league game (including Chris Narveson in the second round of the 2000 draft).

Yet, the Cardinals have only drafted two All-Stars in that time – Yadier Molina (4th, 2000) and Dan Haren (2nd, 2001), though Shelby Miller (1st, 2009) should join that list this season.

How many regulars have they had? Haren only appeared in 28 games for them before being traded. Skip Schumaker played five full seasons for them. Brendan Ryan had just two with over 100 games played in St. Louis. Colby Rasmus had two and a half years before being traded.

Jon Jay is in his fourth year, Daniel Descalso his third and Allen Craig and Matt Carpenter are on track to play in just their second 100-game seasons.

Jason Motte and Mitchell Boggs have had nice careers as relievers.

You know those names because they play in St. Louis and have helped them win games, terrorize the Brewers and win championships, but that’s a list of just six position players who have appeared in 100 or more games since 2000. And in that list, they’ve reached the 100-game plateau just a handful of times with the Cardinals.

I’m going to repeat myself - it’s hard, really hard, to find every day major leaguers.

We won’t know until what, 2017, 2018 to find out if any of these guys picked over the weekend will turn into anything. Chances are they won’t.

 

Jim Owczarski is an award-winning sports journalist and comes to Milwaukee by way of the Chicago Sun-Times Media Network.

A three-year Wisconsin resident who has considered Milwaukee a second home for the better part of seven years, he brings to the market experience covering nearly all major and college sports.

To this point in his career, he has been awarded six national Associated Press Sports Editors awards for investigative reporting, feature writing, breaking news and projects. He is also a four-time nominee for the prestigious Peter J. Lisagor Awards for Exemplary Journalism, presented by the Chicago Headline Club, and is a two-time winner for Best Sports Story. He has also won numerous other Illinois Press Association, Illinois Associated Press and Northern Illinois Newspaper Association awards.

Jim's career started in earnest as a North Central College (Naperville, Ill.) senior in 2002 when he received a Richter Fellowship to cover the Chicago White Sox in spring training. He was hired by the Naperville Sun in 2003 and moved on to the Aurora Beacon News in 2007 before joining OnMilwaukee.com.

In that time, he has covered the events, news and personalities that make up the PGA Tour, LPGA Tour, Major League Baseball, the National Football League, the National Hockey League, NCAA football, baseball and men's and women's basketball as well as boxing, mixed martial arts and various U.S. Olympic teams.

Golf aficionados who venture into Illinois have also read Jim in GOLF Chicago Magazine as well as the Chicago District Golfer and Illinois Golfer magazines.