.... 

Q.  So.  How have "reasonable 1-1 slot college pitchers" done, as far as ML success?

A.  Feel free to correct me where I'm wrong, as far as constructing this little list.  Likely, I've missed a few pitchers who could have, on draft day, made somebody happy at 1-1.

2009:  Stephen Strasburg.  No other pitcher taken before #5.

2008:  Nobody taken in top 3.  Brian Matusz not what I think of as a best-player-in-draft.

2007:  David Price.  The other high pick spent on a pitcher... the laughingstock Pirates took Danny Moskos #4 overall.  Moskos was a reliever the Pirates tried to convert to starter.  ::whew::

2006:  ::deepbreath:: Luke Hochevar, Andrew Miller, Brandon Morrow, Tim Lincecum, Max Scherzer and Brad Lincoln all.  ... Greg Reynolds was taken #2 overall, but I'm leaving him off the list.  I did include Lincoln and Scherzer as feasible 1-1 picks.  I left off Clayton Kershaw as a high-schooler.

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2005:  The first five guys were hitters:  Upton, Gordon, Braun, Zimmerman, and the M's blown pick.  The first pitcher, Ricky Romero at #6, became an excellent ML pitcher, and he would make the chances look better for Hultzen.  But we'll exclude Romero; he wasn't highly regarded enough to be taken 1-1 by very many teams.

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2004:  The first four pitchers taken were Verlander, Philip Humber, Jeff Neimann and Homer Bailey.

Verlander of course was a classic 1-1 pick, despite the fact that the Padres foolishly took a HS shortstop at that slot ... 

Should Humber or Neimann be considered feasible 1-1 picks in the sense that Hultzen was?  Hmmm... I don't like including Neimann, but objectively speaking, you could argue that he was about where Hultzen is.  We'll include him.

Humber was a whale of a college pitcher.  He was taken right after Verlander.  If you're going to argue that Hultzen was a feasible 1-1, I guess you've got to give that to Neimann and Humber, too.

Bailey wasn't a feasible 1-1.  Lots of teams took other pitchers ahead of him in that draft.

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2003:  Delmon Young was the 1-1 pick.  After that, there was a loose grouping, and Ricky Weeks was the 1-2.  

The next couple picks, Sleeth and Stouffer, were probably teams reaching for a pitcher; the Padres signed Stauffer for a mere $750,000 bonus (!).

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