2C-72: RHP Alex Santos, Mount St. Michael HS (NY)
3-101: RHP Tyler Brown, Vanderbilt
4-131: OF Zach Daniels, Tennessee
5-160: SS Shay Whitcomb, UC San Diego
For a team that really shot themselves in the foot by engaging in one of the biggest cheating scandals the game has ever seen, the Astros put together a really nice draft class despite not picking until #72. They split with two arms early and two bats late, putting together a nice balance of upside and safe bets. I really like the Alex Santos pick at 72, and if they can go above slot to sign him, it could pay off in a massive way really quickly. If he had gone to Maryland, I think he could have pushed his way into the first round, and he could have done so pretty easily. Behind him, Tyler Brown is a safer bet to offset the risk a high school arm like Santos brings, while you see something similar on the bat side – Zach Daniels is a boom/bust kind of guy, while Shay Whitcomb is a much steadier hitter. As much as we wanted the Astros to suffer for the scandal, they did a nice job of working with the hand they were dealt (or the hand they dealt themselves).
Full index of team reviews here
2C-72: RHP Alex Santos, Mount St. Michael HS, NY (my rank: 36)
The Astros may not have picked until #72, but they just might get first round value with their compensation pick for losing Gerrit Cole. Personally, I'm a huge fan of this pick. Santos is a projectable, 6'3" pitcher out of high school in the Bronx, bringing with him tremendous ceiling. Right now, he has a fastball that sits in the low 90's without a ton of effort, and it's easy to envision him adding significantly more velocity as he fills out his lanky frame. He has great feel to spin an above average curveball that could be a plus pitch in time, and his changeup is relatively advanced for a high schooler as well. His strike throwing ability is coming along as well, giving him a really nice all around skill set that will only get better from here. I think there is legitimate impact upside here, and if he were to head to Maryland instead of sign here, I think he could easily come out a first round pick in 2023. The Astros are heading that off right now, and I think it will pay off for them big time. Slot value is $870,700, but he will probably command significantly more than that to sign away from Maryland. Pre-draft profile here.
3-101: RHP Tyler Brown, Vanderbilt (my rank: 125)
The last guy to make my public top 125, Brown has an interesting backstory. He grew up in rural Ohio and lost his mother to cancer at 13 years old, then moved to Columbus to live in foster care. After blowing out his elbow and requiring Tommy John surgery in high school, many of the schools recruiting him backed out, but Vanderbilt held firm and it paid off. While at Vanderbilt, he had a daughter with Down Syndrome, who has since become a fixture around the program. Brown has served as the Commodore closer and was fantastic in that role on the way to winning the National Championship, posting a 2.19 ERA and a 65/9 K/BB in 49.1 innings, then put up a 2.53 ERA and a 14/4 K/BB in 10.2 innings this year. Though he's been a reliever in college, he has the 6'4" build and stuff to start if the Astros want to go in that direction. He has a low to mid 90's fastball, a sharp slider, a decent curve, and a solid changeup, and he attacks the zone and throws everything with conviction. His curve and changeup will need additional work if the Astros want to send him back to the rotation, and the velocity might tick down closer to 90, but his mentality fits well in the bullpen and he could move quickly in that role. Given how bullpen roles are changing these days, he could be a long reliever and provide significant value that way as well. Definitely an interesting pick at 101. Slot value is $577,000, though Brown has expressed a willingness to go back to school and I doubt he takes much of a discount.
4-131: OF Zach Daniels, Tennessee (unranked)
This is a trajectory selection, not a track record pick. Zach Daniels hit just .161/.339/.344 as a freshman and .200/.262/.417 as a sophomore, then struggled on the Cape as well. Then he got off to a white hot start to the 2020 season, going 8-17 with three home runs in his first five games of the season and never looking back. Through 17 games, he finished at .357/.478/.750 with four home runs and a 14/13 strikeout to walk ratio, helping evaluators feel much, much better about his huge raw power. He packs a ton of strength into his 6'1" frame, and he uses a very compact right handed swing to muscle balls out to all fields. However, his pitch recognition has been below average throughout his career, and the swing might be so short that it limits the amount of time his barrel is in the zone. It's hard to say whether a 17 game stretch means that Daniels has made the necessary adjustments to his approach at the plate, but it was enough for the Astros to roll the dice and see what happens. Daniels is also a good runner who could stick in center field with a little refinement, which would buy his bat more slack. Slot value is $430,800, and this could be somewhere the Astros save a little money for Santos.
5-160: SS Shay Whitcomb, UC San Diego
It's weird to talk about "Mr. Irrelevant" being drafted at 160th overall, but here we are. Probably the best Division II prospect in the country (Chapman's Nick Garcia has Division III locked down), Whitcomb has been a hitting machine for three years at UC San Diego slashing .315/.423/.516 with 21 home runs and a 105/84 strikeout to walk ratio over 136 games. Unlike Daniels, he raked in the Cape Cod League as well, crushing eight home runs in 36 games. He can really smoke the ball from the right side, finding the barrel very consistently and channeling his strength into some really nice pull power. If he played at a Division I school, he might have gone significantly higher, but his track record against advanced pitching only goes through those 36 games on the Cape. Defensively, he'll likely have to move to second base, but the bat plays there. I like this pick at the end of the draft, and the Astros could pick themselves up a legitimate starting second baseman with a balanced, all-around bat. Slot value is $324,100.
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