Pregaming for Draft Day - River Avenue Blues

We love the draft here at RAB, and strive to provide you with some of the best amateur draft coverage on the blogosphere (let’s face it, we can’t compete with the great writers at the Scout.com network). We’ll have plenty of scouting reports, links, photos, analysis, opinions, and just some random musings leading up to the big event, which kicks off Thursday at 2pm EST. Just as I did last year at IGWT, I’ll be liveblogging the Yankees picks, and probably chiming in on some of the other picks as well.

Here’s the links to some of our more substantial draft features from this year, but you can access all our draft coverage by clicking here.

Looking at some College Players
Looking at some High School Players
College Q&A (featuring Brian Foley of the College Baseball Blog)
Mock First Round (featuring DA Humber)
Interview with ESPN’s Keith Law

Here’s a poll question to sort of “kick off” the draft festivities:

If he falls to the Yanks at #30, should they draft Andrew Brackman out of NC State?

Jesse G.

I don’t know if you have espninsider but Keith Law just posted a new blog entry about the draft in which he says that “If Brackman’s off the board and Rick Porcello slides to the Yanks, I don’t expect them to pass on him.”

Have you guys heard anything else anywhere to suggest that Porcello has even the slightest chance of slipping all the way to 30? I haven’t and I am surprised he wrote this. Obviously he has better sources than most but, just as an example, John Sickels has Porcello rated the number 2 pitcher in the draft.

Any idea where Law got the idea that Porcello might slide dramatically?
http://www.riveraveblues.com Mike A.

I heard that Porcello/Boras wants “Josh Beckett money, adjusted for inflation.” Beckett got a $7M major league deal, so Porcello’s looking for $9-10M probably.

Since this is a deep draft class, I could see teams passing on his talent at that price. I don’t htink he’ll fall all the way to #30, but I suppose into the low-20s is possible.

There’s no chance he gets by the Tigers at #27, they aren’t afraid to open up the wallet.