2021 Giants: Draft Man From Mars in the First Round

And I have to imagine that Moonman Minton enjoyed the heck out of this draftee!

Will Bednar was taken 14th overall in the MLB Draft by the San Francisco Giants (San Francisco Giants take Mars native Will Bednar in first round of MLB Draft).  It should be noted that some were disappointed the Giants passed over Khalil Watson, a top ranked HS SS, who likely fell because he wanted a lot more than what teams wanted to give him (which could be his way to get the team he wants to join to end up with him; or he really wants to see the money). 

Here are the free sources I read to gather intel on our new pitcher:

• MLB report (Maria Guardado) on Bednar selection, including Holme's quotes
• MLB Prospect Pipeline
• The Athletic: Keith Law and Melissa Lockard (subscription needed; highly recommended, includes Andy Baggarly as the Giants beat writer).
• Fangraphs: Keith Goldstein and Eric Longhagen
• Perfect Games Brian Sakowski tweet
• NBC Sports: Dalton Johnson
• SF Draft Talk: Brian Recca (I actually found this after I had pasted in the vast majority of the below, he covers similar thoughts, plus he covered the top five picks, in case you want to read beyond the first round pick, as I used to cover the first few picks, depending on my interest level in them)

As many of my readers know, I haven't been happy with Zaidi's fixation on position players during this tenure as head of Giants baseball operations (in his first draft, he selected 9 hitters in the first 10 rounds). So I was very happy, as a corrective, that the Giants drafted pitchers with their first nine picks of the 2021 Draft, ending with a position player (OF) in the 10th round (link).  

Feeling the Need to Write: Giants Great Season so far reminds me of the 2010 Padres

I've been following this season, and been enjoying it so far, pleasantly surprised, but if you follow me, you know that I have not been happy with Zaidi's strategy for the starting rotation, which is basically what the Dodgers did when he was the GM there: overflow the starting pitching on the roster with starting pitching projects, whether projects who they can improve or frequently injured starting pitchers who will be on and off the roster, mixed in with farm system prospects. 

One of the key components of the 2010's dynasty is the starting rotation, so I wanted to dig into their performance so far to see whether this is a sustainable. For now, it reminds me of the 2010 Padres, who, as I wrote about back then, led the NL West with great ace level pitching by a staff that had no real history of being ace starters, and as that staff reverted to their mean, the Giants caught up with them, though it took a superlative stretch of starting pitching on the part of the Giants pitching staff at the end of the season.