THE ORIOLES' AMATEUR DRAFT HISTORY:  AN INTRODUCTION

In 1965, Major League Baseball held its first amateur draft.  As many fans know, the Kansas City Athletics made Arizona State's Rick Monday the first player drafted by a big league team.  The rest, as they say, is history.

The problem is that, for the Orioles, it's been a mostly lousy history.  Only three players chosen by the Orioles in the inaugural draft made it to the big leagues--Frank Tependino, who reached the show with the Mets, Bill Dillman who had a cup of coffee with the Birds, and Charlie Sands, who made it with the Mets.  Despite the fact that for years the Orioles were known as an organization that developed its own players, the fact is that, with a handful of exceptions, the Orioles have drafted quite poorly over the years.  It has, of course, gotten a whole lot worse since the late 1980s, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

This represents an introduction, of sorts, to what will be a series tracing the Orioles' drafting history and comparing it to other franchises, with particular attention paid to divisional opponents (excluding the Devil Rays, who haven't been drafting long enough to make a valid comparison).  The lion's share of specific information for this series comes from a phenomenal new book from McFarland & Co.:  Baseball's First-Year Player Draft by W.C. Madden.

As most of you know, only players from the United States (but not its possessions) were initially required to go through the draft upon its inception in 1965.  In 1985, foreign players attending school in the U.S. were added to the draft pool and in 1989, players from U.S. possessions such as Puerto Rico and the American Virgin Islands also lost "true free agency" rights and were subject to the amateur draft.  Canadian players were added to the list a year later.  But players from all other countries/territories, as long as they aren't playing amateur ball in the U.S., are currently not subject to the draft.  One of Bud Selig's proposals for restructuring Major League Baseball involves adding a foreign player draft, but that remains only a proposal at the time of this writing.

For the sake of clarity and analysis, I'm going to establish a player typology of sorts, which should help us assess the overall success or failure of various teams' drafts.  We'll divide players, first, by position players and pitchers.

Position Players Typology:

• Star players:  no strict criteria (like Potter Stewart, we'll know it when we see it); Orioles examples:  Cal Ripken, Eddie Murray
• Starting players:  not quite stars, but good enough to start at the big league level for more than a year or two...and typically a lot longer than that; Orioles examples:  Rich Dauer, Al Bumbry
• Journeymen:  a career, but not as a starter for more than a year or two; Orioles examples:  Terry Crowley, Wayne Krenchicki
• Cup of coffee types:  guys who just barely reached the big leagues at all; Orioles examples:  Drungo Hazewood, Pete Stanicek

Pitchers Typology:

• Star pitchers, either starter or reliever; Orioles examples:  Mike Mussina, Gregg Olson
• Contributors; not stars, but solid starters or relievers for more than just a season or two; Orioles examples:  Mike Boddicker, John Habyan
• Journeymen (more or less the same as the position player version); Orioles examples:  Jeff Ballard, Mike Oquist
• Cup of coffee types (see above); Orioles examples:  Allan Ramirez, Gordie Dillard

We'll use these typologies as a short-hand way of drawing comparisons between organizations.

Next:  The O's Draft History:  Not a Pretty Picture