Flashback Friday: 2007 MLB Draft

by Drew Brown

The Pirates have definitely had their fair share of “bad draft picks” over the years but when you look through the list, 2007 has to be somewhere near the top. David Price went first overall in the draft to the Tampa Bay (Devil) Rays and Mike Moustakas followed him being drafted to the Kansas City Royals. With the third pick the Chicago Cubs picked Josh Vitters and that put the Pirates on the clock. Pittsburgh selected the left handed, relief pitcher, Daniel Moskos. Moskos got called up twice to the Pirates in 2011 due to injuries to Evan Meek and Joe Beimel and posted average numbers, with an ERA under three.

Still though, is that what we want out of our fourth overall pick? Let’s see who else was on the board at the time.

The Baltimore Orioles followed up the Pirates by picking Matt Wieters, the switch hitting, 6 foot 5 tall, catcher. Since then, Wieters has been an all star, gold glover, and if you click here, he's picked by some to be the best catcher in the American League this year. Not only is he the fastest catcher to ever get called up to the big leagues, but he hit 22 homeruns last season. Some say the Pirates were scared of his agent Scott Boras, and that might be the reason the Pirates passed on him. Whether that’s true or not, we certainly know who has panned out to be better throughout the first couple years of their careers.

In case you’re not a big fan of Matt Wieters, let’s take a look at the other players taken later on in that draft.

Jason Heyward, right fielder for the Atlanta Braves, went 14th overall. Here’s a guy who has been an all star as well, to go along with a two time rookie of the month award winner. He barely finished second to Buster Posey in the 2010 National League Rookie of the Year voting, and is one of the two players ever to homer in his first at bat of the season, twice. He performed better his rookie season than he did his sophomore season, but is certainly better than Daniel Moskos.

The tenth pick rolled around and that’s when the San Francisco Giants scooped up Madison Bumgarner. The left handed pitcher was a huge contributor to the 2010 World Series run, judging by his performance in game four of the fall classic that year, a game in which he threw eight shutout innings. Bumgarner, who was three behind the league leader in quality starts this season, can be seen again in the “Bold Predictions”, might end up being the best San Francisco pitcher in years to come, and will be looked at as one of the top southpaws in the game pretty soon.

Those are, so far, the best players that the Pirates could have had in that year’s draft. Other players such as J.P. Arencibia , Rick Porcello and Ben Revere were taken later on in that draft as well. Those are three other guys, who I, and I’m sure a lot of you, certainly see being better than Daniel Moskos.

Hopefully Moskos can make me look like a fool, and turn into a shutdown reliever that the Pirates can rely on in years to come, but until then, the 2007 MLB Draft won’t be one to remember for the Pittsburgh Pirates.