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  1. #1

    The Newest New York Yankee is a 6'10" Power Forward...

    The Yankees selected Andrew Brackman of NC State today with their first round selection in the MLB draft. I guess that his decision to quit the basketball team, while controversial at the time, has worked out well for all sides. Andrew Brackman has taken the first step towards breaking into the bigs (in which he would be one of the biggest!) and Sidney Lowe has brought some much-needed excitement to the Wolfpack.

    Speaking of State, they should have a pretty nice front line next year with McCauley (spelling?), Costner, and JJ Hickson. I guess they didn't need Brackman after all! I do think that they'll be hurting without Engin Atsur, though. They were not the same team without him.

    Time flies like an arrow
    Fruit flies like a banana

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Los Angeles

    Go Brackman!

    Kudos to Andrew and to NCState! As a MLB baseball fan -- and even more of an ACC fan, this is GREAT news! Developing MLB players should be a staple of the ACC. (...let's save Duke baseball for another discussion for now).

    I was thrilled by his draft -- although as a former New Yorker -- I wish he had gone to my beloved Mets. (I still have a piece of 3rd base from the '69 WS victory)

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Watching carolina Go To HELL!

    Thumbs up Big Unit II

    Quote Originally Posted by dukemomLA View Post
    Kudos to Andrew and to NCState!
    I was thrilled by his draft
    I'm glad the Yankees took him. I hope he has (at least) half the success that Randy Johnson has had and a better career in NY with the Yankees!

    I can't believe this thread hasn't been moved to the OT board (yet, but sure to happen soon I'm sure).
    Ozzie, your paradigm of optimism!

    Go To Hell carolina, Go To Hell!
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  4. #4
    Join Date
    Mar 2007
    Location
    New Orleans
    Though he'll get a six-figure bonus, I'm not so sure how good a move this was for him, if he has NBA potential in basketball. He had a very undistinguished baseball season this year and dropped to 30th in the draft from speculation several months ago that he might go number one (don't know if he's a Scott Boras client, which could explain a lot of the drop).

    Pitchers his size seldom make it in the majors -- Randy Johnson and Chris Young being the only two exceptions who come to mind. Scouts are in love with these tall pitchers, but the fact is that over 90 percent of the game's great pitchers have been between five-ten and six-two.

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Hot'Lanta... home of the Falcons!
    Quote Originally Posted by dkbaseball View Post
    Though he'll get a six-figure bonus, I'm not so sure how good a move this was for him, if he has NBA potential in basketball. He had a very undistinguished baseball season this year and dropped to 30th in the draft from speculation several months ago that he might go number one.
    His arm was fatigued this past season, that is what scared the scouts off.

    As for whether he made a good or bad move, baseball was always considered his best sport. He will get a signing bonus of right around a million dollars (the #30 pick in last year's draft got a $950,000 bonus) and will be fasttracked to the major leagues as the Yankees need pitching and want to show off their newest draft picks. I'd bet on him being in the bigs some time next season or the year after.

    I don't think anyone ever really considered him a big-time NBA prospect. 6-10 guys who are not all that fast and who average just 7 ppg at a mediocre Division I school are just not likely to be high NBA draft picks. He had potential, for sure, but I think focussing on baseball was the smarter career move for him.

    Heck, he's gonna have a million dollars in the bank as a college grad. That's not too shabby!!

    -Jason "I wish I had a million in the bank right now!" Evans

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Raleigh, NC
    "Developing MLB players should be a staple of the ACC. (...let's save Duke baseball for another discussion for now). "

    It is a staple. The ACC develops lots of MLB players. Some even from Duke, e.g. Chris Capuano or Scott Schoenweiss, the latter in his 9th season in the majors.

    Brackman was NEVER considered as good an NBA prospect as MLB prospect. His stock dropped this season because of some elbow problems and because he is being advised by Scott Boras, who has a reputation for protracted and difficult contract negotiations. Boras also has a reputation for getting his clients lucrative deals. Teams with limited financial resources tend to give Boras clients a wide berth.

    There are other tall pitchers. Mark Hendrickson is 6'9" and played hoops at Washington State. Andrew Sisco is 6'10". The Niemann kid who led Rice to the CWS title a few years back is in that neighborhood and is still a prospect. There are others.

    Back in the day, there were a handful of NBA players who also pitched in the majors, including 6'8" Gene Conley, 6'6" Ron Reed, and 6'7" Dave Debusschere.

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Mar 2007
    Location
    New Orleans
    Can't say I disagree with you, Jason, and I meant to say seven-figure bonus. I think he'll get over a million because he's seen as having a high upside, and he still has the basketball leverage.

    I believe Sid said he has NBA potential, though that may have been to entice him into playing hoops. Being an enforcer in the NBA is probably an easier path for him than getting out major league hitters. But the enforcer role is the only one in the NBA I could envision for him.

    But I didn't think his predecessor as State power forward/pitcher, Tim Stoddard, was going to make it in baseball, and he ended up having a long career out of the pen.

  8. #8
    Join Date
    Mar 2007
    Location
    New Orleans
    If Brackman is a Boras client I predict he will get at least a $2 million bonus out of the Yankees. And I revise upward my estimate of his abilities (formed solely heretofore on posted results from ACC competition). Boras has a formidable team of scouts, one of whom is, or used to be, Bob Brower, who played football and baseball at Duke circa '78-'82 and got some time in the majors. Boras' people look only for premium talent and usually find it.

    It's interesting that the very tall pitchers who do make it in the majors usually don't confirm the scouts' theory, which is that they will develop more velocity as they mature and be especially difficult to hit because of the sharp angle of downward trajectory in their delivery. Show me one who fits that mold. Johnson and his teammate Micah Owings (a six-six rookie who looks like a keeper), both have the arm slot of a guy about five-ten. Hendrickson is a junkie who can't get his fastball out of the 80s. I believe Reed was a side-armer. Anybody know if Brackman comes over the top with his delivery? If so, could be problems. The overhand pitching motion seems to be as difficult for a big guy to pull together as a golf swing.

    To answer my own question above, now that I think about it, Ben McDonald was a six-seven pitcher who came over the top. The scouts have never been higher on a pitcher coming into the draft. But he proved easy to hit in the majors because the fastball just didn't have enough movement with the over the top delivery.

  9. #9
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Washington, D.C.

    Jon Rauch

    Quote Originally Posted by dkbaseball View Post
    If Brackman is a Boras client I predict he will get at least a $2 million bonus out of the Yankees. And I revise upward my estimate of his abilities (formed solely heretofore on posted results from ACC competition). Boras has a formidable team of scouts, one of whom is, or used to be, Bob Brower, who played football and baseball at Duke circa '78-'82 and got some time in the majors. Boras' people look only for premium talent and usually find it.

    It's interesting that the very tall pitchers who do make it in the majors usually don't confirm the scouts' theory, which is that they will develop more velocity as they mature and be especially difficult to hit because of the sharp angle of downward trajectory in their delivery. Show me one who fits that mold. Johnson and his teammate Micah Owings (a six-six rookie who looks like a keeper), both have the arm slot of a guy about five-ten. Hendrickson is a junkie who can't get his fastball out of the 80s. I believe Reed was a side-armer. Anybody know if Brackman comes over the top with his delivery? If so, could be problems. The overhand pitching motion seems to be as difficult for a big guy to pull together as a golf swing.

    To answer my own question above, now that I think about it, Ben McDonald was a six-seven pitcher who came over the top. The scouts have never been higher on a pitcher coming into the draft. But he proved easy to hit in the majors because the fastball just didn't have enough movement with the over the top delivery.
    Jon Rauch has been pretty good here in D.C. the last two years, at six feet 11 inches tall. But he certainly is not a dominating force on the ground.

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