~BASEBALL DAYS, WINE NIGHTS~
Greetings Baseball and Wine Enthusiasts -
The amateur draft is less than a month away. Many questions come up at this time from players, parents and scouts. With over 28 years of Major League Scouting I have fielded many questions. Today I am going to speak to those most frequently asked.
WHERE AM I GOING TO BE DRAFTED AND WHAT ROUND? That seems to be the #1 issue. From a scouts stand point, we don't always know what other talent is outside our area and around the country. A club only has a 1 in 30 chance of drafting a player...so it is often quite difficult to determine what round you will be drafted in. IS IT BETTER TO SIGN NOW OR GO TO COLLEGE? The percentage of all signed players who play in the Major Leagues is 6-7%. The percentage of all High School signed players in the M.L. is 10-11%. The majority of All-Star position players are High School signs, whereas the majority of All-Star pitchers are college signs. WHAT IS BETTER, HIGH SCHOOL OR COLLEGE? The only "winning" answer is simply that it is up to the player and his family!
A little story for you: I drafted a H.S. shortstop in the 10th round and his Agent (advisor) told him he was going to be drafted in the 5th round. On Draft Day the family was quite disappointed. I made a very fair offer to the player (no names mentioned!) and his family and they turned it down. The player got 5 times less just a year later. "Moneyball" said it was bad to draft H.S. players in the 1st round - when I was with the Toronto Blue Jays we were 5 for 5 drafting H.S. players who played in the Big Leagues and were 1st rounders and 4 of the 5 made an All-Star team. That just goes to show that "Moneyball" is a good read but not entirely practical. Scouting is not an exact science like the "Moneyball" disciples try to make out. In a 10 year period the Blue Jays were in the playoffs 5 times and won the World Series in 1992 and 1993 with the second rated Farm System next to the Dodgers (producing 64 major leaguers in a ten year period)....just goes to show what good scouting fundamentals and professionalism can do in spite of looking only at the stats!
Back on the farm and in the winery it is time to work the wines and get some serious planning done in the vineyard. In the vineyard we go through the vines four different times. The 1st time is suckering and shoot thinning on each vine (we have 22,000 here at RIO SECO!)...The 2nd time we go through and train the 1st and 2nd year plants. Third time we go through the vineyard and shoot thin again. The fourth time through the vineyard we leaf pull around the grape bunches and drop fruit. As harvest approaches we will test each block for sugar content of the juice so we can determine when to harvest.
This harvest season late August through October we will offer to have people stay in our guesthouse so they can work (and vacation) the "harvest season" with us...Learning the fundamentals of wine-making and talking a few baseball stories will be a great memory for sure! Until next time,
From the Club House to the Barrel Room...
Tom Hinkle
