That explains everything right there and no further comment need be made. Our draft strategy for most of the decade was so bad the mind had trouble fathoming it at times. The best player we got out of the 2000 draft was Jamal Strong, slightly edging out Jaime Bubela. In ‘01, it’s Bobby Livingston, unless you think Mike Wilson is a competent fourth outfielder or Rene Rivera is worth the time it takes to type out his name. Now, 2002 is a little different because we didn’t sign our first or third round picks, so there you have the choice of Troy Cate, who messed up his arm and resurfaced later as a LHRP, T.J. Bohn who was in just long enough to record a few outs, Bryan LaHair who has somehow stumbled into being the best first baseman in the system, or Hunter Brown (just for kicks).

Things turned around in 2003, even though we traded off the best part of that, and the rest is still working its way through, but there were some awful, awful drafts in that span where teams were picking up talent that was at least serviceable and we got guys now working in the service industry.

If not for the NDFAs we’ve picked up along the way, we’d be boned more severely than we are now, but assuming that hypothetical we probably would’ve played our cards differently, now wouldn’t we?