Beyond the tortured efforts to make the MLB draft a television product, it's quite possible that pushing it back a month and then compressing its 20 rounds to two days is eventually going to melt the brains of scouting directors across the league.
"Right now my head, I’m a little taxed," said White Sox scouting director Mike Shirley. "In the old days, you had just one phone in the draft room. No one could text you. In today’s world, all the agents have your cell number. Your phone is going off nonstop, nonstop. Everybody is trying to feed you information, from not only in your room, but outside your room - agents, players, friends. So many people sending you information. I think I called seven college head coaches [Sunday] about the first three round guys as it was unfolding."
Even with that mounting headache, after emphasizing up-the-middle positional talent at the prep level in the days leading up to this week, the Sox went out and selected 11 position players, four high school players, and four shortstops.
"Extremely excited about being disciplined with what we're trying to accomplish: middle-of-the-field players," Shirley said. "Things we talked about yesterday like contact, decisions, some damage stuff in there. I really liked just the baseball players that mix in with that crew. More position player-dominated than we've gone in the past, which we're excited for because we are looking for some offense and we're looking to continue to try to build that out.
"When we looked at the draft at a whole, we thought it was a little light college pitching-wise. We knew there were going to be limited opportunities on the high school front, just dollars and where they were probably going in terms of the investment in the position player, what they were going to cost. So we knew on pitching front, on the high school front, we were going to be a little bit light from a signability standpoint and we did think the college pitching was a little bit not up to par for us. It was a little bit tough navigating that, plus we also wanted to invest in these bats and try to continue to build out the offense."
How will they financially manage all this?
There is no Myles Bailey pick here this year -- Shirley certainly spoke with confidence that all four White Sox prep picks will sign. Whereas fourth-rounder Landon Hodge was discussed as a stretch of the White Sox pool room that had to be accounted for later, the 11th-round pick of Texas shortstop Matthew Boughton sounds like a case of a player's price point making a late tumble.
Seven college seniors and/or grad students were selected to make room for prep selections that should require some over-slot bonuses, but of that group, Shirley insisted stocky small school masher Anthony DePino, the sixth-rounder out of Rhode Island, was a darling of the research and development group.
How much new input was there?
This was the first White Sox draft with Ryan Fuller on staff, and alongside a class centered around positional talent, he got name-dropped a lot. In particular, Shirley often cited Fuller's preferred principles -- contact ability and swing decisions -- as qualities the team was targeting. This matches a player group that certainly has a lot of hitters, but not necessarily many traditional power-hitting profiles, which aligns with a major league roster that is making better swing decisions and contact but doesn't hit for much power.
So does this mean the White Sox feel like they can develop power, especially with springy, athletic shortstop types? Or simply that they'll err on the side of contact skills and swing decisions regardless?
How do they feel about 19-year-old shortstops?
Both Billy Carlson and Matthew Boughton are 19-year-olds, at least in the eyes of the draft (Carlson doesn't actually turn 19 until July 28, but the cutoff date is Aug. 1). That's something they have in common with Colson Montgomery, who was 19 when he was drafted. At the time for Montgomery, Shirley explained that his lack of time exclusively focused on baseball left him with more room to develop than his age might indicate. And while Shirley couched his assessment of Montgomery with "to be determined on Colson, but we like how that looks," it seems already fair to say that whatever issues there are with Montgomery, it's not because he was getting by against younger competition with polish over tools.
But with two more 19-year-old prep selections in tow, it's also fair to say a Shirley-led operation does not get too hung up on age at draft time. In the case of Hodge and Boughton, they don't let it get in the way of what they viewed as surprising chances to sign higher-ceiling talent.
"You have to be able to jump over a few hurdles in this game," Shirley said. "If you're not willing to take risks, you should probably do something else."
Jaden Fauske's White Sox ties
If the White Sox are going to repeatedly draft off their own Area Codes team, like with second round pick Jaden Fauske, ideally it will afford them an up-close view to the progression of the players on it.
"We thought he was going to catch, shoulder had a little bit of a football injury to it, so last summer couldn’t catch as much," Shirley said of Fauske. "Leaving California, the run tool wasn’t to where it needed to be. So I think the diligence to what he went home and accomplished in terms of the run tool, I couldn't believe how well he was running when I went to go see him the first time, six weeks ago in the spring."
The run time improvements were part of a physical transformation that Fauske said were somewhat initiated by moving from catcher to center field, but also part of a larger effort to make himself a more compelling pro prospect.
"I changed my body, cut down a little bit," Fauske said. "Increased my mobility and explosiveness and that really translated on the field for me. It's the leanest I've ever been right now. I worked really hard on that. Lean without sacrificing exit velo or bat speed or anything like that despite dropping a little bit of weight. So I'm really happy with where I am right now."
The Willowbrook native grew up a White Sox fan and is thus more fond of Adam Eaton and Avisaíl García than the average Zoomer. But even with Fauske bringing up his tight relationship with White Sox crosschecker J.J. Lally, his most notable connection to the franchise is being part of the Nazareth Academy baseball team. It's there where Fauske was teammates with Landon Thome, son of Hall of Famer and former White Sox slugger Jim, who helps out with the program.
Maybe it's only widely known that Thome is a shortlist contender for kindest person in baseball in media circles. But with his having developed a close relationship with Fauske, he had the requisite amount of very nice things to say about the White Sox's second-round pick.
"I love the kid," Thome said. "Hard worker. Extremely talented left-handed bat. Athlete. Football player at Naz. Really really good family. Just a wonderful kid. Loves baseball. Loves to work. And is really talented. I think this kid is going to keep getting better and better and it’s exciting to be around him and to be able to be around him for the last three years, it’s just been a joy and a pleasure."
Thome said he takes care to separate his personal relationship with Fauske from the information he shares when the White Sox request his insight. And you could hear him switch between scouting talk and personal warmth toward the player a few times in just a 10-minute conference call, even if neither perspective toned down his positivity.
"The thing that stood out for me was the hit tool: It’s hit tool with the chance to have really really good power also at the next level," Thome said. "We didn’t really know how he was going to be in the outfield. He moved to center field and did very well. He got his body in really good shape, was moving really good in the spring and it carried on. For me, and this is a compliment to the kid, I don’t know where he eventually ends up defensively but athletic-wise, he's so talented athletically that it could be a variety of different spots."
