Aside from one more article tomorrow, I think I’m done with my online draft coverage for this year. Here’s what went up in the last few days, since my stuff isn’t always easy to find:
My day two recap, covering five teams that did something interesting. My day one recap was a little more expansive, since the bulk of the top prospects always go in the top three rounds anyway. My final top 100 ranking went up on Tuesday before the draft started.
I’m quoted a few times in this piece on prep players.
I did two chats this week, one on Wednesday and a predraft one on Tuesday. And yes, they’re working on the chat software bugs.
Radio:
- Brian Kenny show, Wednesday.
- Baseball Tonight, Wednesday.
- The Herd, Wednesday.
- AllNight, Tuesday.
- Tirico and Van Pelt, Tuesday.
Video:
- First round high school arms and signability.
- Tate, Stassi, and Matzek.
- Predraft piece on the 2008 draft’s early success stories.
It doesn’t look like my TV hits from Tues/Weds are online.
I also want to say publicly how grateful I am to the yeoman’s work done by Jason Churchill on the ESPN MLB Draft blog this year. Having Jason to get content up there daily while I was running across the country seeing players and catching stomach flus was an enormous help, and I thought the stuff he produced was outstanding and really moved our draft coverage forward this year. And I assume you all know that if I thought his stuff sucked, I would say so, meaning that what I’ve said here is genuine.
Finally, thanks to all of you for reading and watching and, in many cases, reaching out to me to offer compliments on the work that I did or that Jason did. The best part about this job is that I get to produce unique content that people want to read and like to read, and I don’t think I’ll ever tire of hearing people say that they enjoyed some piece that I read or some random radio hit that I did. Thank you.
Thanks KLaw for another great year of giving all the draftnicks our fix.
I read and watched draft coverage from three different outlets and yours and Jason’s was by far the best material that I saw. You had information first, scouting reports were more in depth, etc. Kudos, and I hope you get a vacation now.
KLaw, you are the man, and so is Jason. I hope ESPN will continue to show your great work and I hope to see more material from Jason, as well.
Off topic, but I just listened to Simmons podcast on tailgating/BBQ and needed to sound off. Can we pass a Constitutional Amendment declaring that we will no longer talk about hot dogs, sausages, and burgers when we talk about BBQ? Do people realize that grilling does not equate to BBQ? Anyone? ANYONE? I feel like I’m taking crazy pills!
BSK,
When I hear grill, I think BBQ. What’s the difference? Really, throw some meat on a gas grill… 😉
Keith, thanks for your hard work. I asked the question in the chat about the Braves change in draft philosophy, and while I’m sure you didn’t see it (with the many questions I’m sure were posted), you answered it in your day 2 column. Thanks for the insight–although I have to admit that it does nothing to erase the negative feelings that the Braves draft inspired.
Keith,
thank you for all of the hard work!!
Now, I have a question (not draft related) – should you come up with something better than TJU at this point??
BBQ is a specific style of food. Grilling is a method of cooking, sometimes used in BBQ. Lots of BBQ is not grilled (pulled pork, for instance) and lots of grilled food is not BBQ (a steak). I’m sure Keith can explain better, but BBQ is characterized by slow cooking over low heat. Grilling is often the opposite, fast cooking over high heat (though not necessarily).
Try slow cooking a burger or hot dog over low heat and let me know how that tastes.
Keith, between you and Kevin Goldstein at BP, I really enjoyed the draft coverage, with just the right amount of snark, as opposed to John Hart’s “everyone is going to be a star” routine. Good stuff
When I think of good Q, I think of smoke.
Keith,
Did you get our shirt in the mail the other day? Daniel and myself are really hoping you can come to Matt Wieters Facts Day on the 27th!! You know you wanna accept:
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=86970223429&ref=mf
Keith, this is not in response to your post, nor meant to be ass-kissing, but thanks for all the hard work and great content throughout this draft. I’m sure I speak for many when I say that I’ve enjoyed it immensely.
I sincerely appreciate your work on this year’s draft. Watching NFL draft for few years now and I come to wonder baseball draft would be like that kind of event someday, and it seems to happen a lot sooner that I expected, thanks to you and Jason’s hard work.I cannot wait to see how all the prospects drafted this year reaching their potential as you guys analyze. Thanks again.
Thanks Keith. Living in the UK watching 2 or 3 games a week not with any particular allegiance (Jays if pressed) I really had no care of the draft etc but thanks to your writing, and Jason’s, I’ve avidly followed this draft and will be awaiting a few years from now the principals appearence.
I am sure you are well paid, by some standards, but I think you go beyond what we traditionally get and can reasonably expect from a writer.
My main US correspondent on baseball is a Nats fan so it should be pretty entertaining few years.
I’ve always wondered: when you link here to an ESPN article that we might make a comment on, do you prefer we comment here or directly on the ESPN article. The latter seems to make more sense but I recall with that Neyer/Strasburg article everyone posted their comments here.
On college splits, it breaks down pitchers stats by inning. I noticed Strasburg had more IP in some later innings than earlier innings. How could this be?
After the great work you did in preparation for the draft, you definitely deserve a vacation. But don’t make it as long as you did last year! At least continue with your weekly chat. You can just comment on the various happenings in the majors. Otherwise I’ll surely be lacking in my snark intake.
Ugh. ESPN has the absolute worst web site of any major company. How is this possible? I can’t find anything, the chat software is, well, awful, and they imbed autoplay video that crashes my work computer (where I would have to get an IT guy to upgrade my browser). Just ridiculous.