Looking back at the 1st Round of the 2005 Draft

As most of you know the Reds selected Jay Bruce, a high school outfielder from Texas with their first round pick last season. There were 3 high school players taken before him, all outfielders in Justin Upton(#1), Cameron Maybin(#10) and Andrew McCutchen(#11). There were 5 college position players taken before him, one who is currently in the Major Leagues, Ryan Zimmerman of the Washington Nationals. All of the high school players are currently playing in Low-A baseball, where the college players are playing at different levels throughout the minors, which is to be expected as they are older and more advanced in most cases in terms of their talent and ability. With the exception of Zimmerman, all of the players drafted before Bruce are still playing in the Minors. I went through the stats of every first round position player pick in the first round of the draft. There were 22 position players taken in the first round, both high school and college. Zimmerman is being held out of this, becuase his numbers are against Major League pitchers, so there are 21 players available for this.

Jay Bruce ranks the following in these stats:

• Home Runs- 1st with 8.
• RBI- Tied for 1st with 27.
• Runs- 2nd with 27
• Doubles- Tied for 2nd with 13
• Slugging Percentage- 2nd with a .568 SLG
  

As for how he stacks up against the other High School players drafted in the first round, he ranks 1st in all the above categories. As a little side note, I think that 2005 may be one of the better drafts ever for producing talented hitters in the first round between Upton, McCutchen, Maybin, Bruce, Rasmus and John Drennen.