What Is a First-Round Pick Worth in Baseball?

The NFL Draft is a much-hyped event attended and watched by millions across the country. Teams across the league fret over the value of a draft pick, much publicized by the Jimmy Johnson “draft chart” that enumerates the exact value of each slot in points. Any draft trade will start from the standpoint of the exchange of points. Never mind that the Johnson chart has been debunked by current analytics experts; the NFL takes a long time to come around to the standard analytical thinking.

However, there is much less fanfare around the MLB Draft. Of the four major sports leagues in the U.S., baseball may have the least interesting draft. One of the primary reasons is that MLB draft picks will often never see the field for at least several years after being drafted. In the NFL and NBA, the top players are Day 1 starters and (hopefully) difference-makers; in the NHL, the true top picks will also contribute immediately or quickly. In baseball, very few players see the minors for anything less than two to three years, and some wait longer.

Furthermore, in baseball, the draft is not necessarily the only place from which talent is pooled. Unlike the NBA and NFL, in which strong drafting is the benchmark of any successful team, baseball teams have years of player trades, minor league development, and international bonus-pool signings to build out their depth. Many of the highly drafted players do not end up playing for the teams that drafted them. It’s just not all that interesting to watch a team draft players that may or may not reach the team’s active roster in three years.

Drafting is still a big part of baseball, though. The Houston Astros built a powerhouse on the back of being one of the worst teams in baseball for several years and parlaying that into top draft picks. Baseball has instituted a draft lottery akin to those of the NHL and NBA to ostensibly stave off the worst of tanking, which means that teams still see value in doing it.

Therefore, it is still important to understand the actual value of a baseball draft pick, specifically a first-round pick. How much of a difference is there in the overall career stats of the players picked at each first-round slot? Is there a legitimate reason to tank, or is it based on a perception that does not represent reality?

First-Round Pick Career Statistics

A universally used statistic that captures aspects of a player’s overall performance is Wins Above Replacement (WAR). If we look at the average WAR for each draft position in MLB history, a trend quickly emerges.

From this one graph, it seems readily apparent that there is tremendous value to having one of the first two picks in the draft. There’s a steep decline after that, and by the time you get to pick No. 5, the median career WAR drops to zero. That’s some stark evidence for tanking to the fullest!

Furthermore, this graph utilizes the median rather than the mean to account for outliers like Alex Rodriguez and Barry Bonds. The trend is even starker with use of a pure average. The overall median career WAR for a first-round pick is 4.6, which is barely above the median career WAR of a typical MLB player who is ‘just a guy’ (4.1).

The trend looks almost identical when you look at percentages of picks at each draft slot with a career WAR above 20, which is approximately the average career WAR for an MLB player who made at least one career All-Star team. The percentage is disproportionately weighted toward the top two picks and then tapers off significantly.

Another metric useful in distinguishing stellar play is All-Star Game appearances. Although not definitive, large differences in appearances by draft slot might indicate similar importance of earlier picks. Indeed, an initial glance at the graph of total All-Star Game selections by draft slot would seem to indicate that having one of the top couple of picks is critical to gain true value from the draft.

However, this is just one of the dangers in utilizing aggregate stats rather than averages. As with WAR, we use the median to calculate the center rather than the mean due to a few outliers at the top of the draft. When looking at unit rates, the All-Star Game discrepancy diminishes to nonexistent.

Overall, while WAR data provides some intriguing evidence that a top-two pick has disproportionately immense value, All-Star Game appearances do not do much for such an argument. Still, WAR in and of itself is compelling.

Prospect Comparisons

I thought it would be interesting to compare first-round pick data with prospect data. Each year, MLB.com, Baseball America, and other outlets release a list of Top 100 prospects for that season. We see prospects in baseball move from team to team far more frequently than draft picks do in football. However, it’s very difficult to predict which prospect will succeed, notwithstanding their supposed “top prospect” billing.

I was curious if this trend of first-round pick WAR would hold as strongly when looking at prospect data. After all, a prospect is usually someone who has developed at least somewhat in the minor leagues, particularly if they were not just drafted. If a player has been in a team’s minor league system for a year or two, it may be easier to project their skills to the majors more easily than a college football player’s production to the NFL, which is a far different environment. On the other hand, we see prospects fail every day of the week.

For my analysis, I used Baseball America’s Top 100 prospect rankings, which began in 1990.

Once again, the No. 1 prospect in baseball has a very high median career WAR, suggesting that top prospects are generally a safe bet. There is also a decline after the No. 1 slot, but it is not nearly as steep as that of top draft picks. In fact, you can still count on getting at least a minimally serviceable player among most of the top 30 or so prospects, on average.

In fact, of over 28,000 MLB players in the Lahman database, the average career WAR is 4.1 (omitting all those whose WAR is listed as NULL). 25 out of the top 30 positions yield a median WAR greater than that, but just 38 out of the top 100 positions have a median career WAR above 4.1. The data is still skewed toward the top of the prospect list, but it’s not nearly as big of a discrepancy as it is on the first-round pick graph.

Conclusions

What does this really mean for baseball? Well, mainly that there was wisdom in instituting a draft lottery if the goal was to prevent tanking. Whether it is fair to prevent tanking as a strategy is a discussion for another day (personally, as a fan and an analyst, I am not opposed to the practice). But within the MLB Draft itself, the top of the draft is usually the place to find generational prospects.

Still, unlike in the NFL and NBA, baseball is unique in having other ways of acquiring talent, namely the international prospect pool. Teams that recruit and manage their bonus money well can retain deep minor-league systems for years to come.

Ultimately, trading a non-Top 30 prospect for a proven commodity appears to be a smart move on the whole. If he's one of the very tops, though, hang on for dear life.