SF Giants: Worst draft picks of the 2010s

The SF Giants had a run of great drafts during the first 10 years of the Millenium that helped set up three World Series titles between 2010-14. And then they had some really bad ones.

Maybe it was the fault of consistently drafting later on thanks to all the winning. Maybe it was the fault of some flawed scouting and decision making. You can be the judge there.

What isn’t disputable is that just one first-round draft pick from the decade (Joe Panik) has turned into much of anything. Exactly one player drafted after 2012 has done anything worth mentioning in the big leagues — and that one got traded away.

The time hasn’t ticked out on the decade. There’s hope for prospects like more recent first-rounders Heliot Ramos (2017), Joey Bart (2018), and Hunter Bishp (2019). All three Giants made Keith Law’s top 100 prospects list this spring.

So it’s not a lost decade yet. But it’s hard to believe the Giants didn’t accidentally stumble into some better draft picks than they made.

On that note, here are three of the worst pick the Giants made during the 2010s.

SF Giants’ worst draft picks — 2010, Round 1, Pick 24: Gary Brown

Maybe you can frame this as the Giants justmissing out on Christian Yelich, who went 23rd. And maybe you can spin this as 2010’s first round just being a total dud. Six players who went ahead of Gary Brown didn’t even get into a major league game in their careers.

Brown can at least put “Big League Ballplayer” as a bullet point on his resume. That’s more than most of us. He played in seven games, all in September 2014. He had three hits in seven at-bats and was never seen in the majors again. He was designated for assignment in 2015, and in 2016 played in the independent leagues.

Quite a downfall for the Giants’ top prospect and center fielder of the future. Brown later told CSN Bay Area “I feel like I let my emotions get the best of me in the years after that (2011 season). I think I started to believe the hype that everyone started to give to me.”

So who’d the Giants miss out on that year? Aaron Sanchez went 10 picks later. Noah Syndergaard went 14 picks later. Nick Castellanos went 20.

A lot of other teams may have missed out, but for the Giants this was a major whiff.

SF Giants’ worst draft picks — 2014, Round 1, Pick 14: Tyler Beede

I suppose you can debate this one to a certain extent. Tyler Beede did start in 22 games in 2019. That arguably makes him a major league regular, which is better than most draft picks become.

But he had an ERA of 5.08 across 117 innings on the mound last season, good for an ERA+ of 82 (100 is average). He was worth 1 win under replacement level.

Beede had Tommy John surgery in March of this year, so you might argue that’s an extenuating circumstance. Still, in the years prior, it was clear the shine was coming off the star. For a player taken in the first half of the first round, you just hope for so much more.

Entering 2017, Beede was a top-100 prospect in baseball. He had a 2.81 ERA at Double-A Richmond in 2016 and looked well on his way.

In 2017, he took a huge step back at Triple-A Sacramento, finishing with a 4.79 ERA and pedestrian 1.47 WHIP. He made his major league debut in 2018, but allowed seven runs in two starts. His time in Sacramento didn’t go much better: a 7.05 ERA in 74 innings.

Would Beede have taken a step forward in 2020 if he didn’t require Tommy John surgery? We’ll never know. Could the Giants have drafted better? Probably.

Sean Newcomb went to the Braves just one pick later. He’s been worth 3.6 WAR since debuting in 2017. He made 49 starts during his first two years and had a 3.16 ERA out of the bullpen while making 55 appearances in 2019.

Further down, the Cardinals took Jack Flaherty with the 34th pick. He had a 2.75 ERA across 33 starts in 2019, finishing fourth in NL Cy Young voting.

That was a terrible draft in general for the Giants. Six players have at least spent some time in the big leagues, none of them worth more than 1 win for their careers.