It’s been five years since that draft, which is approximately the time teams should realistically wait before assessing the MLB amateur draft. That 2011 draft was historically good, as Gerrit Cole was the first pick and Jose Fernandez the 15th and they were—and are—prodigies. The first round included Anthony Rendon, Francisco Lindor, George Springer, Sonny Gray, Joe Ross, Joe Panik, and as, five years on, we watch Trevor Bauer, Archie Bradley, Dylan Bundy, Bubba Starling and Javier Baez to see what they eventually become.
Five years later, the Red Sox and Cubs have the most wins in their leagues, Boston lately starting a team whose eight position player starters all were self-developed. “Their talent is unbelievable,” said Walter Weiss this week, as Indians coaches similarly assessed the previous weekend. Matt Barnes, who is touching 99 settling into a setup role, and Blake Swihart, their semi-permanent athletic left fielder, were the first rounders. Jackie Bradley, Jr. was a sandwich pick. Mookie Betts a sixth rounder. Travis Shaw an eighth rounder.
Amiel Sawdaye, who has been promoted to a personnel VP position, was the scouting director. And while Sawdaye is a likely general manager somewhere, sometime, getting Betts and Shaw in rounds six and seven defines the Theo Epstein system that took hold from the time he took over the baseball operations. They had the 150 pound Betts in as around a 12th rounder. But when they went to their neuro-scouting system to study makeup, he was off the charts, and was selected in the sixth round in front of the San Diego Padres, who were holding his card, because GM Jed Hoyer and Jason McLeod came out of the Epstein school. Before McLeod, it was current Tiger VP David Chadd, who in his time with the Red Sox got Jon Lester and Dustin Pedroia as second round picks based on talent, and more importantly, makeup.
Then came McLeod, with Jacoby Ellsbury in 2005, a decision based not only on athleticism, but interaction visiting Ellsbury at Oregon State, as well as contact with the Falmouth Commodores. In 2007, McLeod took Anthony Rizzo in the sixth round, and a week after the draft said he thought Rizzo “may have the best makeup of any player I’ve ever drafted.” McLeod went to the Padres with Hoyer, and after the 2009 season when ownership wanted “sizzle,” they got Rizzo for Adrian Gonzalez. Then when they went to the Cubs with Epstein and acquired Rizzo for Andrew Cashner, who the big arm scouts liked and whose injuries and makeup have left him 28-46, while Rizzo was the leader of the Cubs by age 25.
The reality is that the Red Sox haven’t developed frontline pitching. Their front three in the rotation—David Price, Rick Porcello, Steven Wright—were acquired as a free agent, by a major trade, and through a minor league deal. Craig Kimbrel cost them prospect inventory. They believe Barnes is turning the curve, but if fellow trade acquisitions Joe Kelly and Eduardo Rodriguez do not hold up and Clay Buchholz continues his inexplicable habit of making the big mistake at the big time, they may have a hard time avoiding an attempt to trade for a starting pitcher in what looks to be a barren trade deadline market.
But next to David Ortiz, Dustin Pedroia and Hanley Ramirez, the six young position players are not only remarkably athletic, but models of makeup. Bogaerts, Bradley and Ortiz are 1-2-3 in batting. Ortiz, Bradley and Bogaerts are 1-2-4 in on base percentage. Ortiz, Bradley, Bogaerts, Betts and Shaw are 1-2-10-11-14 in OPS. They are also built for the ultimate lefthand-hitters park, with a team .308/.377/.506/.883 line at Fenway this season.
They believe Christian Vazquez, the Fourth Molina Brother, is developing into the American League’s Jonathan Lucroy (“The best I’ve ever pitched to”—Price). They developed Swihart as a catcher, but Sawdaye has always believed he is so athletic he could play anywhere and be a big switch-hitting bat; last year he circled the bases in 15 seconds on what he thought was an inside-the-park homer, he was a kick returner in high school, and would have played shortstop as a 17-year old on Team USA had Lindor not been on the team. It’s going to be years before he’s arbitration-eligible, so unless he’s their only way to get a Gray (if he’s healthy) or Zack Wheeler, he’s going to be the left fielder.
Yes, it was noticed that the Betts-Bradley-Swihart troika all have two triple games. And, obviously, all came out of the same draft.
The difficult part is to convince ownership not to listen to the voices squealing for immediate gratification and appreciate the development process in a hot media market. In 2013, there was a media campaign to get Bogaerts off shortstop and bring back Stephen Drew. Since last May 13, Bogaerts has hit .343. “I cannot believe the way he hits every kind of pitch from every type of pitcher to every part of the field,” says Ortiz. David appreciates how little a kid from Aruba plays in his youth, and adds, “what’s he going to be when he’s 26? Superstar.”
What the coaches see is the makeup, the high intelligence, the drive. As a hitter, Torey Lovullo and Chili Davis say his approach is to look out at the mound and essentially say, “my hands are faster than anything you can throw, then adjusts.”
Brian Butterfield says Bogarts is the only other shortstop he’s coached other than John McDonald “who comes out every day and works on plays that are the most difficult for him. He practices the difficult.”
Several days a week, Butterfield also gives Betts an intense infield drill despite the fact that Mookie is now a right fielder. “He wants to practice coming up quickly and throwing,” says Butterfield. “He does his outfield work, but the infield drills are part of cutting balls off, then getting in position to get rid of the ball accurately.” Mookie still loves the infield, but says, “if I take these ground balls in the outfield, it’s slower. The hard, intense intense infield drills are more beneficial to becoming a good outfielder.”
Betts and Bradley every day practice their power shagging in live batting practice.
And, in his fifth full pro season, Bradley has regained his swing.
Understand, when JBJ was a sophomore at South Carolina, he was arguably the best college player in the country. His draft year, he broke his left wrist diving for a fly ball, and now says he did not fully recover his strength in the wrist until 2013. Problem is, a broken hamate bone limited his time in his first professional season. Then the 2011 season was lost. So when he regained the strength in that wrist, he’d had one full, healthy season, his sophomore year. He had fewer than 500 professional at-bats. And, when Ellsbury was hurt in spring training of 2013, he was thrust into the major leagues unprepared for major league pitching.
He went through approaches and stance, then this spring Davis convinced him to go back to who he was in 2010. “I’m just at the plate doing what I did to get the chance to get here,” says Bradley. He trusted his strength instead of worrying about getting jammed, and suddenly was rewarded with fly balls clanking off The Wall. He trusted his strength hitting up the middle. “Watch him in BP and he hits balls with incredible power to all fields,” says Davis. “This isn’t about mechanics, it’s about approach and power, and most of all, confidence. There are no magical answers because this is a game played by human beings.”
“What makes this season so much fun for me is that these kids have so much energy, so much athleticism, and they not only work, but they listen. They watch video with me. They discuss what pitchers want to do to get them out; Mookie never stops asking questions, and he soaks in everything.”
That was what the neuro scouting programs told Sawdaye, Epstein, Ben Cherington, Mike Hazen and Mike Rikard in Boston, as well as Hoyer and McLeod in San Diego. It was five years ago, and in that time patience enabled the Red Sox to ignore the media howls to deal Betts and Swihart, Bradley and Bogaerts for the good (Cole Hamels) and the absurd (Josh Hamilton, Matt Kemp).
Three different general manages this week suggested that 2011 Red Sox draft might be the best ever. That’s difficult to say against the ’68 Dodgers or the 2009 Angels, because it’s still a developmental process. “What makes this group so interesting is how hard they work and how much they all want to be great,” says Butterfield.
Which is what makes the current Cubs team so interesting. There were only two teams who thought Mookie Betts was the sleeper of that 2011 draft, one team that Kyle Schwarber was one of the four best talents in the 2014 draft, two teams that thought Andrew Benintendi was in a top three grouping with Dansby Swanson and Alex Bregman last June, two branches from the same tree trunk that understand that baseball it a lot more than radar guns, stop watches and Wins Above Replacement.