Ferd Lewis: Path to Major League Baseball gets steeper with shortened draft

If Shane Victorino was coming out of St. Anthony High this year, you wonder if he would have had an opportunity to wear a major league uniform, much less earn four gold gloves and appear in two All-Star games.

Similarly, would any team have put a ball in the hands of Kauai’s Kirby Yates as an undrafted free agent coming off Tommy John surgery, starting him on a path to be an All-Star who led the major leagues in saves last season?

Could Saint Louis School graduate Jordan Yamamoto have been the rookie revelation he was in 2019?

The severely scaled back numbers for the MLB’s two-day, First-Year Player Draft that opens today certainly provides food for thought just as it is bound to dampen the dreams of others this week.

MLB plans call for only 160 players to be drafted in the five rounds instead of the usual 1,217 over 40 rounds. Consider that Yates, a 26th-round pick and 798th overall selection out of high school, was undrafted out of Yavapai (Ariz.) Community College. Yamamoto was a 12th-round pick and 356th overall selection in 2014. Victorino was a sixth-round pick and 194th overall selection in the 1999 draft.

You’d like to think that, one way or another, their talent would have shown itself and their drive would have eventually propelled them to the big leagues.

But maybe not. With MLB reducing the draft and planning to cut its number of minor league team affiliates for 2021, just getting a look would have been tougher. The road to “the Show” would have been steeper, the opportunities would have been significantly reduced and the amount of time the teams would have been willing to invest in player development would have certainly been limited.

“I wouldn’t be where I am today if they had only five rounds,” Yamamoto said. “That is just how it is. It is sad for the kids who have worked and dreamed of it since they were 5 years old.”

Yates said, “I don’t think I would have ever gotten a chance to play professional baseball let alone be in the position that I am now. I did sign as an undrafted free agent after the draft, which is pretty rare. I feel terrible for the high school kids and everybody that it kind of (impacts).”

The best example of a long shot made good is Hall of Fame catcher Mike Piazza, who was a 62nd-round selection.

Part of MLB’s reduction of draft rounds this year has come as a result of COVID-19, which figures to close down minor league play for 2020. But months before the word “pandemic” was dusted off for use, MLB had announced plans to eliminate as many as 42 of its 162 minor league affiliates as a cost-saving measure and reduce draft rounds from 40 to 20, or less, in 2021.

Players drafted in the sixth round in 2019 were slotted for signing bonuses of $237,000-$301,600 while signing bonuses for 10th-round picks ranged from $142,000-$147,900.

This year, however, players who might have been taken in rounds six through 10 will have to go the free-agent route, where their signing bonus is a standard $20,000.

Still, Yates says, “I wouldn’t deter anybody from their dream. I think there is still a way you can probably get signed and I would encourage everybody to keep their hopes up and not let their dreams die. You really never know what’s gonna happen.”

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@staradvertiser.com or 529-4820.