Inside the War Room: 2015 MLB Draft
Three of the most important days for the St. Louis Cardinals organization took place this week. Not the final three games of the season. Not the opening days of Spring Training. But the three days of the 2015 MLB Draft.
That’s because without the draft, without fielding the future of the franchise, those elusive, final three games in the post-season wouldn’t be possible.
“I think over time everybody has noticed the importance of the amateur draft to the St. Louis Cardinals and obviously we emphasize that and it’s part of how we build our pipeline,” explained Cardinals General Manager John Mozeliak. “We still obviously deploy resources to the international market. But having said that, when you look at how we’ve had success over the past 10 years, it’s really come from the draft.”
For this mid-market team, the importance of the draft is not understated in it’s preparation.
Currently, 13 of the team’s 25 active players on the roster were drafted by the organization first-hand. That talent was scouted by the more than 20 scouts dispersed throughout the country, with 15 “Area Scouts” responsible for an area of North America, seven “Cross Checkers” that oversee a region or the entire country to get additional looks at players and the St. Louis Cardinals Director of Scouting himself — Chris Correa, who is in his first year at the helm.
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“It’s been really exciting to get to know this really talented scouting staff, as well as I’ve gotten to know them,” Correa commented on his first year as director. “Been out on the road a lot all spring, spending time with scouts, spending time looking at players and it’s just in this past week or so that we’ve really been able to come together as one group, start to share our observations and prepare for the draft.”
On the 50th anniversary of the draft, the St. Louis Cardinals stated they would make their selections based on talent, more so than need — landing them with outfielder Nick Plummer out of Brother Rice High School in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, as their first pick in the 2015 MLB First-Year Player Draft at 23 overall Monday evening.
“It was the offensive side of what we were attracted to,” Mozeliak said of the pick. “And in his case he was somebody that we were excited about that was there. The fact that he is a position player, an offensive player was really attractive to us.”
All 40 rounds of the 2015 MLB Draft took place Monday, June 8, through Wednesday, June 10. You can track the club’s picks here and learn more about the history of the draft in the second issue of Cardinals Gameday Magazine on sale now.
So what happens next week?
“Understand, this is really a 12 month process. We’ll start for the 2016 draft next week. So it’s always on-going,” Mozeliak said.
~Teryn Schaefer
Teryn Schaefer is a reporter and producer for the St. Louis Cardinals and #CardsInsider
