Best draft picks of all-time for every MLB team
The Major League Baseball draft is unique among professional sports drafts. The 30 organizations pick teenagers and college students who will not join their big league clubs for years—if ever.
These athletes will spend that time honing their craft in the minor leagues, where long bus rides and minuscule paychecks are the norm. A few will move quickly up the ranks, seizing playing time opportunities to advance their careers and making their names known to scouts, fans, and other observers around the country.
Some of the best will become MLB stars, but there's minimal correlation to draft position. Four of the players on this list were picked after hundreds of other diamond darlings, and only two were #1 overall selections.
There's also more than a handful who didn't do much for the teams that drafted them, including superstars such as Nolan Ryan, Ozzie Smith, and Randy Johnson. Each of these players was traded before they evolved into Hall of Famers.
Still, calling the draft a "crapshoot" might be going too far. College players are "slightly more likely" than high schoolers to reach the revered stadiums of the majors, and third-rounders have a better chance than fifth-rounders, for example, though the margins are slim, as Vice reported. Teams not only make picks based on years-in-advance projections but also whether they can sign players, a step that must be completed before those youngsters begin playing professionally.
To see how clubs have fared since the inaugural draft in 1965, ATS.io compiled a list of the best draft pick by each franchise using data from Baseball Reference. The players were ranked using career wins above replacement, so not one recent choice was named. The amazing Mike Trout, a 32-year-old selected in 2009, is the youngest player. Unsigned picks were not considered, and players who were traded as picks were credited to their acquiring teams. Data is as of June 5, 2024.
