A Grip on Sports: Mariners are surprised about who is available in the MLB draft, but that has always been the nature of the event
A GRIP ON SPORTS • Probably no sporting event has changed more in my lifetime than the MLB draft. Want proof? It didn’t exist until I was playing Little League. The results were not made public when I was playing in high school. Today? TV coverage. A crowd watching. Cameras in the franchises’ draft rooms. And an unpredictable nature. Wait, that last one has always been there.
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• The Seattle Mariners had the third pick in Sunday’s draft. There was something of a consensus on who they would pick. Oregon State shortstop Aiva Arquette. A power hitter who might just be ready to man third base for the team next year, the one year all Mariner fans know as the year the M’s will win it all. Every year.
Then an owner flapped his wings in Washington D.C., the Nationals had new people in charge of the first pick and LSU pitcher Kade Anderson disappeared from their plans. The lefty was considered the most “now” player in the draft, polished enough to help any team in 2026 – after he had rested some from carrying the Tigers to the College World Series title. The Nats picked a high school shortstop. The future is not now, it seems, in D.C.
The Angels, picking next, took a local prospect from up the road at UC Santa Barbara, a right-handed pitcher who finished the year strong.
Lo and behold, Anderson was sitting there for the M’s. Jerry Dipoto pounced. And maybe, just maybe, the team’s prospect of actually being successful next season improved markedly.
Dipoto? He had a smile on his face reminiscent of another Jerry, Krause, the Chicago Bulls general manager when Michael Jordan fell to third in the 1984 NBA draft. Ok, there is little chance Anderson will reach such heights in baseball. But unless something happens to his left arm – always a possibility these days – between now and this time next year, the M’s may actually have a lefty in their rotation.
And once again, chaos reigned at the MLB draft.
The draft’s history is different than, say, the NFL’s. Yes, back in the day Pete Rozelle would oversee football’s selection in a hotel room in front of a chalkboard, writing down names. Pretty prehistoric, compared to today’s over-the-top production. But even then anyone who cared about football knew the names of those selected. They had been in the public eye – or ears, as TV was still second to radio – for years in the college ranks.
Baseball? As I said, no draft. Just signings until 1965, when the owners decided they were spending too much money to gain the services of what were termed “bonus babies.” Rick Monday, Arizona State’s centerfielder, was the first player drafted.
It didn’t take long for baseball to realize the drafted players were comparing notes. Comparing signing bonuses. Deciding to not sign and return to school. One way to put the kibosh on that? Keep the results out of the public eye. At least for a while. Not too many years later, Soviet spies knew more U.S. nuclear secrets than they did, say, of the player the Phillies took in the fifth round.
Even then, owners were doing everything they could to keep salaries down. Related to that, front offices kept plans out of the public eye prior to the big day. It was nearly impossible to cut through the smoke, the misdirection and the outright lies to determine just who might be drafted where.
In 1981, Allan Simpson, who had founded a new publication, “Baseball America,” asked me to write a draft preview. I was covering college baseball in Southern California at the time, had written a story or two for him previously based on some decent sources in the area’s scouting community. Simpson? He was trying to make a name for his magazine with its college and minor league coverage.
He offered me money. I said yes.
Over the course of the spring, I talked with a lot of scouts. Guys – yes, it was a pretty closed fraternity in those days – I knew peripherally and ones who I had interacted with in my playing days. For some reason, they were honest. Forthcoming. Actually helpful. And I put together a list of the top 10 prospects.
Seven of them were taken in the first 10 picks. Not in order, mind you, but it still might have been the reporting highlight of my career.
Simpson was happy. Ecstatic even. Of course, looking back it wasn’t a tough class to discern. Mike Moore to the M’s as the first pick. Joe Carter to the Cubs. Ron Darling, Matt Williams and Kevin McReynolds. Pretty safe predictions. But I was happy I unearthed Bobby Meachem and Mark Grant, even if the latter didn’t pan out as a big-league star.
I was happy about one other thing too. I cashed a check. Kim and I celebrated with a big dinner. At McDonald’s.
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WSU: Around the (current, old and future) Pac-12 and the nation, John Canzano examines how much talking about sports can help your outlook and life. … Oregon State will host Wake Forest in the fall. You know what that means. Jake Dickert will get another chance to do something his WSU team couldn’t do last season, win in Corvallis. … Colorado’s kicker is something of a star. … Utah’s Kyle Whittingham doesn’t see how college football can survive if something doesn’t change its course. … We knew this would happen. An Arizona beat writer played as the Wildcats in College Football 26.
Gonzaga: Drew Timme is an old man compared to many of the players trying to make a mark in the NBA’s Las Vegas summer league. But he has the same goal, impress someone enough to find full-time work in the league. He took a big step toward that Sunday. Theo Lawson was at the game at the Thomas & Mack Center in which Timme, using all the guile and smarts he showed in Spokane for years, scored 30 points and heard MVP chants. … Theo also has another story today, one about the Zags’ future. Maybe. Tyon Grant-Foster, who wants to transfer to GU from Grand Canyon, is still waiting on an NCAA waiver.
Indians: Tight games galore. Too many losses too. Spokane will take its All-Star break having lost another one-run game against Eugene, 11-10. Dave Nichols has the game story.
Mariners: The opposite end of the spectrum from the Indians? That would be the Mariners, who scored and scored and scored some more in Detroit over the weekend, including Sunday’s home-run driven 8-4 victory. … We linked the M’s draft story above. And do it again here. … Cal Raleigh will compete in the Home Run Derby tonight (5, ESPN). Liam Bradford wonders if it is a risk for the record-setting catcher. … If you are wondering, there is some evidence he can win. And some that says he won’t. … Others are wondering if Raleigh can catch Aaron Judge in the MVP race. … As for the MLB draft overall, we have a few stories to pass along. Well, more than a few. There are also grades.
Storm: Another fourth-quarter lead for Seattle, another loss, this on to the Mystics. The Storm have wasted some opportunities lately.
Wimbledon: When we finished writing yesterday, we sat down to watch two-time defending champion Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner battle for the men’s title. Though the tennis was played at a high level, it wasn’t the battle most had hoped for. Sinner won his first Wimbledon title in four sets.
Golf: One other thing we watched yesterday? The replay of the women’s Evian Championship from Paris, one of the tour’s majors. Well, to be honest, just the last few holes. We can say this with certainty: There have been few shots better in a major tournament than the second Grace Kim hit on 18 to end regulation. The 4-hybrid she hit into the par-5’s green ended up within a foot and allowed her to tie Jeeno Thitikul and force a playoff Kim would win. What a shot.
Sounders: Champions League winner Paris Saint-Germain was a heavy favorite going into Sunday’s Club World Cup final against Chelsea. And the match turned out not to be close. Except Chelsea won in a rout, 3-0.
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• In case you are wondering, I still have the 1981 issue of Baseball America in a box downstairs. With other back-in-the-day newspaper stories I wrote, including when I covered the Dodgers on the road for a week, an Earl Weaver feature, a couple of women’s sports columns about subjects as varied as Machine Gun Molly Bolin and an ultramarathon runner. And more. They are all pretty yellowed and brittle. It was a long time ago. Until later …