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The Draft To Be Televised This Year


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ESPN2 to televise MLB's 2007 First-Year Player Draft

 

05/07/2007 1:58 PM ET

ESPN2 to televise MLB's 2007 First-Year Player Draft

Draft, to be held in Orlando, will be aired on television for the first time

 

 

Major League Baseball's 2007 First-Year Player Draft will be carried live by ESPN2 from 2:00-6:00 p.m. (EDT) on Thursday, June 7th, marking the first time that the Draft will be telecast. The Draft will be held at The Milk House at Disney's Wide World of Sports Complex in Orlando, Florida.

 

ESPN2 will air each Club's first round choice. Clubs will have a maximum of five minutes to make their picks during the first round. Following the pick-by-pick coverage of the first round, ESPN2's telecast will continue as the Draft is ongoing until 6:00 p.m. (EDT). After the completion of ESPN2's coverage, the first day of the Draft will proceed until approximately 8:30 p.m. (EDT). On Friday, June 8th, the Draft will resume at 11:30 a.m. (EDT) and then will continue to its conclusion.

 

"Major League Baseball is delighted that ESPN2 will provide live coverage of our Draft," said Baseball Commissioner Allan H. (Bud) Selig. "I am glad that this agreement will give fans access to see this critical function of an organization's development. This is an idea whose time has come."

 

The selection order is determined by the reverse order of finish at the close of the previous championship season. The Tampa Bay Devil Rays will have the first selection of the 2007 First-Year Player Draft. The San Francisco Giants will have three selections in the first round, while the Toronto Blue Jays and the Texas Rangers will each have two first round choices. Supplementary selections are given as compensation to those Clubs that lost Type A or B free agents.

 

The Draft will have 50 rounds and will conclude after all 30 teams have passed on a selection or after the final selection of the 50th round, whichever comes first.

 

MLB.com, the official website of Major League Baseball, will offer comprehensive coverage of the 2007 First-Year Player Draft, highlighted by two days of live multimedia coverage from Orlando on The Baseball Channel and live interactive pick-by-pick results via the exclusive Draft Caster.

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I just hope they don't extend the first round. I love how it's about a minute per pick. Also, they are going to be hanging around for several rounds if they are going 4 hours. I'm looking forward to it though, that's for sure. Then again, I look forward to the draft anyway.

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Damnit. ESPN is so going to f*** this up. I personally loved the conference call way of doing it, nice and quick. It's five minutes this year, but just wait -- in the coming years that'll move to ten minutes, and eventually, it'll be like football where the first four picks take an hour. Oh joy!

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This should be cool, just because I look forward to seeing the draft from a bit different of a perspective and I think TV can help. However, I don't want to see it turned into this long drawn out spectacle that the NFL draft has become.

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QUOTE(danman31 @ May 7, 2007 -> 03:12 PM)
I just hope they don't extend the first round. I love how it's about a minute per pick.

Clubs will have a maximum of five minutes to make their picks during the first round.

 

And it's normally not even a minute per pick, it's more like 30 seconds.

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I really wish there was a baseball draft website... a free one. Like all of those NFL Draft websites or Basketball draft websites. I don't have much time to follow college sports as I'd like, but those sites help me a ton.

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QUOTE(Heads22 @ May 7, 2007 -> 06:54 PM)
FutureSox will help with the Sox, if Jason still exists.

He lives in a hole in my basement now... he won't put the lotion in the basket though.

Edited by BearSox
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Let me just say that I'm completely psyched about the draft being on TV this year. I love the idea. Watching on my computer last year kinda sucked, though at the time, it was better than nothing.

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QUOTE(Chisoxfn @ May 7, 2007 -> 03:40 PM)
This should be cool, just because I look forward to seeing the draft from a bit different of a perspective and I think TV can help. However, I don't want to see it turned into this long drawn out spectacle that the NFL draft has become.

 

I really despise the NFL draft coverage. Talk about overhyped. Here's to hoping the baseball draft does not turn into that mess. :cheers

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also, I don't see how the could ever turn the MLB Draft into something like the NFL Draft. MLB Draft is 50 rounds. Be kinda tough to have something like the NFL Draft for 50 rounds, and I doubt they would make it a week long process.

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I wonder if teams are worried this brings more accountability to their draft selections. In the past selections were quick, on the telephone, and without much public fanfare or media attention.

 

Now, more than any other year, you'll have thousands more fans tuning in to watch who their team will select. Most not even familiar with one solitary name in the draft. If their team's first round selection doesn't reach the majors, experiences setbacks, etc. the criticism should naturally increase simply because more are exposed to the draft.

 

This will especially be true for the Top 10. I can imagine future Sportscenter pieces involving someone's fall from grace. There will inevitably be an opening shot of said person placing on a hat of whichever team drafted them.

 

What I enjoy the most concerning this draft is there is NO f***ing way Chris Berman is involved. In fact, ESPN would be smart to hire experienced draft writers outside their organization. Aside from Keith Law and Jim Callis, I can't think of anyone who understands what a team's needs are and whether player A or B fulfills them.

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QUOTE(WHITESOXRANDY @ May 9, 2007 -> 12:40 PM)
How embarrassing this will be for the White Sox.

 

They would be better off trading all of their draft picks to any team that will let them pick their top 2 prospects.

 

I see you have a ton of knowledge about how the draft and draft picks work in MLB.

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QUOTE(Balta1701 @ May 9, 2007 -> 01:14 PM)
It would be really nice to be able to trade picks in the MLB draft someday, IMO.

I disagree. It's a crapshoot as is, but when you are trading the picks ahead of time and don't have a clear picture of who would even be available at the pick, it's just not worth it. If traded during the previous July deadline, a 1st round pick would have the value of a mid-level prospect. Especially considering the teams trading a draft pick in July would more than likely be buyers and their draft picks would not be top 15 where you are getting the more sure things of the draft. Also, who is going to want to wait for a traded pick to turn into something? Even the quickest guys to make the majors (other than the guys like Lincecum, Huston Street, Chad Cordero, or Khalil Greene. There's maybe 2 of those per draft and not outside the top 15) take a few years so teams would be waiting 4+ years for a player, and that's if he was a highly developed player in the draft, and actually does develop. Most teams wouldn't want to wait 4+ years for someone they have little idea who it is (or really even position). The only way I could see it working would be if teams were limited to pick for pick(s) trades on the day of the draft. Even then, most teams wouldn't want to give up 2 for 1, but I could see it happening.

 

In order for trading picks to work the draft would have to become more of a sure thing or development time would have to be significantly less. If players were required to go to college and the 3 year minimum was maintained I could see it possibly making sense, but that's still assuming a lot. In a fantasy world if teams were able to draft players out of, say, low A ball then I could also see it working.

 

As a sidenote, I would be a big fan of making players go to college. It would make longevity records harder to break because less freaks of nature would be able to debut at 20 or 21, but if the college game became stronger it would almost be like drafting out of the minors. The argument can be made that the top conferences in D1 ball are comparable to A ball of some sort, but another problem is the players need to adjust to not having aluminum bats. If they make college players use wood bats it could cut almost a year of development off of college players. For any sort of college requirement to take place MLB would have to work with the NCAA anyway.

 

Back to the original point, yes, it would be cool as a fan to give teams the ability to trade draft picks, but I don't think it would be better for the game.

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