2012 MLB Draft Analysis - Who had the best drafts

Who had the best draft this year?  Well, that's a tough question because the playing field is always unlevel due to teams losing and gaining extra picks near the top of the draft due to free agent compensation.  So I did a semi-scientific analysis.  Scientific in that I collected the data, subjective in that I analyzed the data with my gut as well as my head.  Many people will do analyses of who had the best drafts. Here's mine.
1. No team spent more than 5% over their draft budget meaning no team loses a first round pick next year and there will be no supplementatl draft in which those forfeited picks are lotteried off.

2. Ten of the thirty teams exceeded their draft budgets with Toronto, overage plus 75% tax, leading the way by exceeding their budget by $770,000. 

3. There were a number of compensation picks created starting with Pittsburgh getting the #9 pick next year for failing to sign Mark Appel.  In case you are wondering, I think, even under the new CBA, Appel would have to allow the Pirates to re-draft him in 2013.

In terms of who had the best drafts, I looked at a number of things including draft slot, number of top prospects signed, draft overages, if they existed, all of which are captured in the table below.  From that data here are the teams who I think had the top drafts this year::

1. Oakland
2. Minnesota
3. San Diego
4. St. Louis
5. Toronto
6. Cincinnati
7. Cleveland

Note that 2 teams had less than 40 picks after losing top draft picks for signing free agents (LA Angels (38) and Detroit (39)), 9 teams (including the Indians) had zero extra picks, 8 teams had one extra pick, 5 teams had 2 extra picks and 6 teams had 3 extra picks.  It is really difficult to rate how well a team did when it had fewer picks than another team.  So, to level the playing field, based on the number of extra picks teams had, here are the teams that had the best drafts.

3 extra picks: Oakland/Minnesota (tie)
2 extra picks: Milwaukee
1 extra pick: Houston/Cincinnati (tie)
0 extra picks: Cleveland

OK, if you want the raw numbers, here they are:

			Signed/Drafted
Team	Slot	Picks Signed	BA Top 100	BA 100-200	Extra Picks	Spent vs Budget	Tax	Total Overage (Excess plus tax)
Houston	1	30	4/6	2/3	1	208,900	156,675	365,575
Minnesota	2	26	6/6	2/4	3	-298,500	0	0
Seattle	3	32	2/3	4/4	1	36,600	27,400	64,000
Baltimore	4	29	2/3	3/4	0	-200	0	0
Kansas City	5	31	1/1	2/3	0	148,000	37,000	185,000
Chicago Cubs	6	29	3/3	2/3	1	373,800	280,350	654,150
San Diego	7	40	5/5	2/2	3	-90,100	0	0
Pittsburgh	8	20	3/6	0/0	1	-92,600	0	0
Miami	9	30	3/3	0/0	0	-74,700	0	0
Colorado	10	34	3/3	3/5	2	-221,600	0	0
Oakland	11	33	5/5	4/4	3	-144,200	0	0
New York Mets	12	21	3/3	2/4	2	-185,600	0	0
Chicago WS	13	32	2/2	6/6	1	0	0	0
Cincinnati	14	30	4/4	3/3	1	-92,400	0	0
Cleveland	15	26	4/4	2/5	0	-195,000	0	0
Washington	16	29	2/3	1/2	0	112,300	87,100	199,400
Toronto	17	32	6/6	1/2	3	$441,000	330,000	770,000
Los Angeles Dodgers	18	33	3/3	4/4	1	98,500	73,875	172,375
Los Angeles Angels	19	36	1/1	3/3	-2	-46,900	0	0
San Francisco	20	32	2/2	3/3	0	54,100	40,575	94,675
Atlanta	21	29	2/2	1/3	0	-23,800	0	0
St. Louis	22	36	5/6	2/2	3	312,890	234,667	547,557
Boston	23	25	4/4	2/4	2	257,000	196,000	453,000
Tampa Bay	24	37	1/1	2/2	0	-49,000	0	0
Arizona	25	34	2/2	1/1	0	-113,500	0	0
Detroit	26	33	0/0	2/3	-1	0	0	0
Milwaukee	27	30	4/4	3/4	2	-5,600	0	0
Texas	28	31	3/4	3/4	3	-83,800	0	0
New York Yanks	29	26	2/2	2/3	1	-406,000	0	0
Philadelphia	30	24	1/2	2/3	2	-218,100	0	0

Mock Draft Updates - The signing is done. Now it's time to play the games

OK, no two people ever agree on how to conduct a baseball draft so I like to put my ring in the hat and see if I am better than the Indians. Every year I conduct what are called a "shadow" draft, where, right after the draft, I pick my players as if I was running the Indians draft board.  I do this based on available players at the time each Indians' pick rolls around.  I have examined my 2008 shadow draft last June to see where I was and in June I posted my shadow drafts with posts Shadow Draft Version 1 where I took a different path entirely from the Indians and Shadow Draft Version 2 where I took the same path as the Indians but just tweeked a couple of picks.

Now that the signing period is over I wanted to examine my picks vs the Indians based on who signed and whether my shadow drafts came in under budget or not, based on the guys I picked who signed.  In the chart below I have inputted best information on bonuses and the chart represents just the underages and overages for slot  for rounds after round 10 with the total budget at the bottom. 

Highlights of my strategy (Version 1) is that I signed Ty Buttrey, Sam Stafford, Michael Roth and Jose Mesa Jr.  I wound up signing SIXTEEN Baseball America top 500 guys and still finished under budget.  In my tweek of the Indians draft (Version 2), I subsituted Victor Roache for Tyler Naquin as the Indians are short on power.  I also signed Stafford and Roth, signed 13 BA top 500 guys and finished under budget, not surprising as this draft mirrored pretty much the Indians draft.   Compare this to the Indians strategy where they signed 13 BA top 500 guys and, as we know, finished under budget. 

Time will tell who had the better draft, me or the Indians, but here are both of my mock drafts for posterity.  Note that I prefer Version 1 as that is my strategy but I still think Version 2 will turn out better than the Indians.  Remember, in the lists below only the overage and underage vs slot is listed for rounds after round 10.  As in all other lists like this, the guys in bold are the guys who actually signed

Version 2			Version 1
1. Victor Roache	$1,600,000		1. Ty Hensley	$1,200,000
2. Mitch Brown	$800,000		2. Brett Adam Walker	$490,400
3. Kieran Lovegrove	$400,000		3. Mac Williamson	$390,000
4. D'Vonne McClure	$750,000		4. Ty Buttrey	$1,300,000
5. Dylan Baker	$200,000		5. Robert Benicasa	$145,300
6. Michael Roth	$70,000		6. Beau Amaral	$146,000
7. Josh McAdams	$250,000		7. Kris Hall	$137,200
8. Taylor Dugas	$70,000		8. Michael Roth	$70,000
9. Jacob Lee	$5,000		9. Jacob Lee	$5,000
10. Josh Martin	$4,500		10. Kevin Brady	$4,500
11. Logan Vick	$25,000		11. Logan Vick	$25,000
12. Jeremy Lucas	$0		12. Jeremy Lucas	$0
13. Sam Stafford	$50,000		13. Sam Stafford	$50,000
14. Matt Reckling	$0		14. Andrew Calica	$0
15. Nelson Rodriguez	$0		15. Ronnie Richardson	$90,000
16. Cody Penny	0		16. Cody Penny	0
17. Andrew Calica	$0		17. Louis Head	0
18. Louis Head	$0		18. Jeremy Schaffer	0
19. Colyn O'Connell	$0		19. Colyn O'Connell	0
20. Nick Pasquale	0		20. Nick Pasquale	0
21. Joe Sever	0		21. Joe Sever	0
22. Jim Stokes	0		22. Patrick Blair	0
23. Richard Stock	0		23. Richard Stock	0
24. Walker White	0		24. Jose Mesa Jr.	150,000
25. Cameron Cox	0		25. Cameron Cox	0
26. Justin Garza	0		26. Jimmy Rider	0
27. Ray Castillo	0		27. Justin Gonzalez	0
28. Josh Pigg	0		28. Josh Pigg	0
29. Randall Fant	0		29. Randall Fant	0
30. Josh Lester	0		30. Josh Lester	0
31. Daniel Holst	0		31. Andrew Potter	0
32. Paul Hendrix	0		32. Paul Hendrix	0
33. Corey Raley	0		33. Corey Raley	0
34. Matt Fultz	0		34. Pedro Pizzaro	0
35. Nick Hamilton	0		35. Nick Hamilton	0
36. Benny Suarez	0		36. Benny Suarez	0
37. Jacob Morris	0		37. Adam Ford	0
38. Joshua Nervis	0		38. Joshua Nervis	0
39. D.J. Brown	0		39. D.J. Brown	0
40. Anthony Hawkins	$0		40. Anthony Hawkins	0
Totals	$4,224,500.00		Totals	$4,203,400.00
Budget	$4,582,900.00