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          2022 MLB draft storylines: Did Mets learn from their mistake? Could Yankees find another Aaron Judge?

          Jamie Schwaberow/NCAA Photos via Getty Images
          • Kiley McDanielJul 7, 2022, 07:00 AM ET
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            • ESPN MLB Insider
            • Kiley McDaniel covers MLB prospects, the MLB Draft and more, including trades and free agency.
            • Has worked for three MLB teams.
              • Co-author of Author of 'Future Value'
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          If you've been following coverage leading up to the 2022 MLB draft, you already know there are many famous names high up in this year's rankings -- and the Baltimore Orioles have a fascinating decision to make with the No. 1 overall pick. But there is plenty more intrigue beyond who goes in the top spot, and some of those storylines have flown under the radar.

          Here are five of the themes I'm most interested in (and haven't yet written about) regarding the 2022 draft.

          The Mets' most important draft in a long time

          Arguably the most notable occurrence from last year's draft was the Mets' failure to sign Kumar Rocker: the promise that saw him drafted 10th overall, the saga around the Mets' decision and the continued reporting of Rocker's health as he prepares for the 2022 MLB draft.

          I've been asking scouts for almost a year and haven't had an answer other than "yes" to the following question: Is this the biggest draft mistake in recent memory?

          I'm not referring to drafting Rocker, to be clear. The bigger issue, and the most overlooked aspect, was the complete strategic mess the Mets made in not protecting themselves against the possibility that the pre-signing physical would reveal something unexpected.

          Rocker came with a number of warning signs. He didn't submit his full medical. That's somewhat common for top arms, but it's enough for most teams to warrant drafting a backup for protection, if not negotiating leverage. In addition, Rocker's velocity slipped 4 mph steadily over a three-start stretch at the beginning of last spring, during which time his arm slot wandered a bit. His command and K/BB ratio regressed in 2021. He was audibly grunting over many starts, when he hadn't in the past. He took the ball every turn in the rotation but had the longest track record of throwing in the mid-90s of anyone in the 2021 draft, which is the single best indicator of future arm problems. It all added up to higher odds than his draft peers that the Mets wouldn't like something in his post-draft physical.

          But here was the Mets' true misstep: That pick came with a slot value -- the starting point for negotiations -- of $4.74 million. Rocker's verbal deal with the club was for $6 million -- well over slot for the Mets' pick -- which meant they were taking money from other picks in their overall draft spending pool of $9.02 million to pay Rocker. What they did not do in any of their next 19 selections was target anyone asking for more than the assigned slot value of each pick. Those selections are commonly referred to by teams as "backup plans" -- players who have been passed over a number of times and whom the team that ultimately drafts them has no intention of signing. Unless something goes wrong at a higher pick.

          I know of a number of instances when clubs have selected backup plans even as insurance for players picked in the third or fourth round, where the deals are in the $500,000 range. The Mets didn't even take insurance on a $6 million deal -- when they had 19 opportunities to do so.

          When Rocker didn't sign, that slot value went away, rolled over to 2022 as a compensation pick (No. 11 overall in this draft) -- but the extra $1.26 million they had reserved from other picks disappeared, as it was only able to be spent in 2021. Owner Steve Cohen callously noted while defending the Rocker decision that draft pool money is worth up to five times the nominal amount -- so this strategic disaster cost the new owner more than $6 million in value that could have been salvaged if the Mets even just took a high school player who wanted roughly $1.4 million in the 20th round.

          As for what this means for this year -- the question is what the Mets have learned from their blunder.

          There are plenty of instances when a team picks the wrong player, but very rarely is the mistake as cut and dry as appearing to not understand the basic rules of the draft. It's unclear who made the final call here -- whether it was Cohen, president Sandy Alderson or vice president of amateur and international scouting Tommy Tanous. But it seems clear that they have fostered a culture in which the club's employees either didn't notice this mistake happening in real time or one in which they didn't feel comfortable speaking up -- and all three are still in the same jobs for this year's draft. The Mets pick twice in the top half of the first round -- No. 11 and No. 14 -- and it will be fascinating to see what New York does with GM Billy Eppler joining as the new face in upper management.

          The Aaron Judge doppelganger on the Yankees' draft board

          The Yankees struck gold in 2013 picking Aaron Judge 32nd overall out of Fresno State. Judge was actually their second pick of the draft, after they took Notre Dame 3B Eric Jagielo 26th overall. It's a question for another day if the Yankees would've taken Judge if they had only one first-round pick that year -- but the Bombers might be faced with a similar situation early in this draft.

          Two years ago, Vanderbilt RF Spencer Jones was a well-regarded two-way prospect out of a southern California high school, with rumors he turned down roughly $2 million in the 2019 draft. His first two seasons at Vandy were marred by injury, but he has had a coming out party this year.

          Jones hit .370 with 12 homers, going 14-for-15 on stolen base attempts, and posting 32 walks to 64 strikeouts while playing in the best amateur conference in the country. Jones is 6-foot-7 and shows average speed despite his size. He hasn't totally tapped into his plus-plus raw power regularly in games but flashes big exit velos to give you an idea of his upside.

          In his draft year, the 6-foot-7 Judge hit .369 with 12 homers, going 12-for-14 on stolen base attempts and posting 35 walks to 53 strikeouts while playing in the Mountain West. He, too, didn't totally tap into his raw power as often as scouts would like to see (this was before the TrackMan era, which now allows exit velocity to be measured in college. Judge also showed his speed with deceptively quick average-to-above-average run times in college.

          The Yankees have the 25th pick and are one of many teams interested in the back half of the first round with interest in Jones, so it is unlikely he would make it to the top of the second round.

          A new method for ranking pitchers

          One of my more bold pre-draft ranking decisions was putting LSU righty Aaron Nola over Texas prep righty Tyler Kolek in 2014, even though I knew at that point that Kolek would be going ahead of Nola. Thinking about these two players helped me come up with a new frame for thinking about draft prospects, particularly pitchers.

          My thought then was that a good outcome for Kolek two years in the future would be putting up good strikeout numbers in A-Ball, but that would still come with some concerns on his third pitch, command and overall feel. A good outcome for Nola would be pitching well in Triple-A. At that point, if both teams were trying to make a trade, all 30 teams would want Nola in return to headline a deal -- a smaller number of teams would be willing to take a chance on Kolek.

          Obviously, the Kolek actual outcome was much worse than that and the Nola one much better, so there's some luck in hindsight that I used these two players for the example -- but the frame is powerful, particularly in today's game.

          The execs making these draft-day decisions are getting new contracts every year or two, maybe three, but a prep pitcher isn't getting close to the big leagues in that time. So, having a trade value edge in the short term is good for the club to maintain flexibility and for the exec to improve his or her standing before the player's ultimate outcome is known. It's self-interested and a bit cynical -- but no one really cares as long as it is also helping the team. Being right two years from now also dramatically improves the chances of being right 10 years from now.

          Only judging the draft on career WAR ignores the many players who had significant trade value along the way, capitalized upon by a shrewd exec. Asking the question "what is he gonna be?" is common in draft rooms, but thinking of a player's peak season that's maybe 10 years in the future isn't always the best way to use one's scouting expertise.

          My favorite example in this draft of a player I've moved up because of this is Illinois prep RHP Owen Murphy. He is also a solid pro prospect as a third baseman, has an excellent delivery that channels his physical tools to the mound and -- arguably most importantly for this point of view -- has a very data-friendly shape to his fastball and curveball. That, along with plus physical ability to throw strikes and a solid raw stuff to impress scouts, means Murphy will have value for years to all 30 clubs. He checks the important boxes no matter which direction a team's evaluation strategy leans.

          There are plenty of other prep pitchers in this class who would lose significant value if they get hurt, don't throw strikes or lose a few ticks of velocity, and all of those things are pretty easy to imagine for these players. Murphy's profile can weather each of those storms better than others. He has a lot of Jack Flaherty vibes for me and provides a high floor, despite coming from the riskiest demographic in the draft.

          The evolution of the draft model

          The book "Moneyball" came out in 2003 and helped make clear what was happening behind the scenes in the wake of the 2002 draft. In broad strokes: forward-thinking, analytically inclined teams started taking seemingly boring college prospects who were undervalued because they didn't have much perceived upside. Largely overrated prep prospects with NFL combine-type bodies and physical tools were taken by old-school traditional teams obsessed with shooting the moon in the draft, but they were too focused on abilities that didn't always translate to the field and longer timelines to the big leagues. It took a few years, but eventually that point of view got folded into the industry consensus and an equilibrium set in.

          In 2017, while working for the Braves and helping sift through all the newly available advanced data on prep prospects, I began noticing another shift that ran the opposite direction of the initial Moneyball point of view. It was most obvious with the Angels drafting Jo Adell 10th overall, but also by the Royals drafting Nick Pratto 14th overall.

          Adell was one of the first prep prospects notable as an amateur for putting up huge exit velos in workouts and in games. He was always the most tooled-up player on any field he was on, going back to his freshman year of high school. Now that the mysterious concept of upside for hitters had a hard number that could be compared to current minor leaguers and better understood by analytical types, the conversation had changed. This type of prospect -- one the Moneyball A's turned their nose up at -- was now embraced by analytically inclined clubs, and not just the Angels. It is common now for cutting-edge, numbers-obsessed teams to tell me about a high school hitter's exit velos to explain why his upside is higher than I think it is.

          Pratto was a solid-across-the-board prep first baseman with no plus-plus tool. He was and is a good player, but the ceiling on that kind of player is low due to his position and lack of one truly impact tool. The Royals were one of the most traditional teams and would be expected as such to take players like Adell, but he wasn't on the board. As another example, in 2020 the Royals took a huge upside arm in Asa Lacy, then followed it up with a well-overslot bonus for a low-upside college bat in Nick Loftin.

          This has continued to morph over the years, and now clubs like the Orioles seem to be targeting college hitters with traits they desire (up-the-middle position, big exit velos among players at that position, some idea of the strike zone, not always the cleanest overall stat line) that also seem a lot like the players the 2002 A's would've largely ignored. Just in the past few drafts, the O's have paid at least $400,000 outside of the first round to these players of that type: Reed Trimble, John Rhodes, Jordan Westburg, Hudson Haskin, Anthony Servideo, Joey Ortiz and Zach Watson, in addition to a failed pursuit of Florida's Jud Fabian last year.

          This year, there's a number of players who fit this Orioles type who could be in play for the second and third picks: Vanderbilt RF Spencer Jones, Tennessee RF Jordan Beck, Oregon State CF Jacob Melton, Oklahoma SS Peyton Graham, Cal RF Dylan Beavers, Louisville C Dalton Rushing, Florida CF Jud Fabian, VCU 3B Tyler Locklear, and Illinois State CF Ryan Cermak.

          There are some other versions of this general idea. The Pirates have tended to take safer college bats with their top picks then largely spend the rest of their pool on upside types, mostly high school players, supported by the somewhat new metrics available to make these players seem safer than they have in the past. It makes sense to chase upside when you are pretty sure you won't whiff on your first pick. Workout warriors used to be the realm of only the gut-feel-type scouts, but now the database jockeys have entered the chat.

          Best vibes in the draft

          Finally, if you're somewhat new to the draft and would like a short primer on players to get excited about, here's a vibe check, pinpointing the most fun players to watch in this class.

          The top prospect in the draft, Druw Jones, is also the most famous high school player in years and also created the most viral high school baseball moment in some time:

          The top of the draft is loaded with good vibes from the Peach State, as my second-ranked player, Termarr Johnson, gave me the most visually pleasing homer I've seen in the past year.

          If smooth isn't necessarily your flavor, let me introduce you to the most violent hands in the draft -- courtesy of Arizona prep CF Gavin Turley.

          Maybe you're a little more laid back and prefer an underdog, but you also like dudes swinging for the fences. Five-foot-8 Texas prep shortstop Jett Williams will give you a Kenny Powers vibe in pregame, and never downshifts during the game.

          Lastly, the most talented team in college baseball was also the most fun team I've ever seen in college baseball: the Tennessee Volunteers. They had a dude throwing 105 mph (Ben Joyce), the best pitching prospect in college baseball (Chase Dollander), and an offense full of home run hitters. The two guys I think embody the team's vibe the best is middle-of-the-order masher Jordan Beck and center fielder Drew GIlbert:

          If you're wondering who Mike Honcho is, I'll let Tennessee coach Tony Vitiello explain:

          And may any of us ever have the confidence Drew Gilbert does in the batter's box: