Like the Mets, I’ve got nothing for the top of this
Full list of 2021 Mets draft picks
It feels strange having the draft pushed out to July, but MLB decided that the best way forward was to have it immediately be overshadowed by the All-Star event. Now slimmed down to 20 rounds, it was over before most people knew it was even happening. Nobody beats MLB when it comes to self-promotion…
For Mets fans, the big news was that Vanderbilt pitcher Kumar Rocker, one of the top names in the draft, fell to them at number 10. While it had been speculated just before the draft that this might happen, there seems to have been a misinformation campaign to float a higher asking price to the teams at the top to encourage them to pass on him, much like the Matt Allan situation in 2019. The Mets made the obvious choice and took Rocker with their first pick.
The implications of that pick were predictable – the Mets used their next few picks on players they could sign to underslot deals to save bonus pool money to use on Rocker. Among them are a few players who had previous Team USA or Perfect Game cards – Christian Scott, Mike Vasil, Keyshawn Askew, and Matt Rudick. All of the Mets’ subsequent 19 picks signed in short order, leaving only Rocker, who had a deal in place pending physical.
If you’ve followed the Mets for any length of time, that last bit just gave you chills. We all know how this one goes – all is well pending physical, then silence, then leaks about something having been found during medical review, then talks breaking down, deal unlikely. In the end, the Mets didn’t even make Rocker an offer, deciding that having the 11th pick in 2022 was worth more than having Rocker at any price.
So what about Rocker’s medicals scared the Mets off? From what has leaked, there were both elbow and shoulder issues, but it was more a long-term durability concern than an immediate problem? Rocker’s agent, Scott Boras (of course), claimed that independent medical review found nothing wrong. There’s not enough information out there to figure this one out, so we’ll just have to wait and see.
As for the bonus pool money the Mets freed up with the intention of signing Rocker, well, that was all for nothing. Without a backup plan stashed in the later rounds (like Cameron Planck in 2016), the Mets were left with nobody to spend the money on. They took lesser talent and saved a few bucks, stop me if you’ve heard this one before. The reasons change, but the Mets somehow keep finding themselves in the same situation. And if you’re sick of hearing that, you might want to skip over the trade deadline…
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| 1 Kumar Rocker (DNS) | 2 Calvin Ziegler | 3 Dominic Hamel | 4 JT Schwartz |
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| 5 Christian Scott | 6 Carson Seymour | 7 Kevin Kendall | 8 Mike Vasil |
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| 9 Levi David | 10 Keyshawn Askew | 11 Rowdey Jordan | 12 Jack-Thomas Wold |
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| 13 Matt Rudick | 14 Nathan Lavender | 15 Wyatt Young | 16 Trey McLoughlin |
| 17 Nick Zwack | 18 Kolby Kubichek | 19 Jake Osborn | 20 Justin Guerrera |
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