It has been about six weeks since the 2008 MLB Draft. That's about six years too soon to start discussing whether or not a draft's a bust but that doesn't stop us from trying. The first pick wasn't the greatest pick in the world, but all in all I like the Cubs draft. Last year I shadowed the Cubs for the first five rounds, and I did the same this year. I did not do that in 06, but I certainly would have taken Travis Snider that year, though Kyle Drabek was a close second choice for me. Last year I took:

2007
1.3 Jason Heyward,  OF - Henry County HS
1S.48 Michael Burgess, OF - Hillsburough HS
3.97 Will Middlebrooks, 3B - Liberty-Elyau HS
4.127 Chris Carpenter, RHP - Kent State
5.157 Taylor Martin, RHP - St. Michael HS 

2008
1.19 Shooter Hunt, RHP - Tulane ($1,080,000)
1S.41 Ross Seaton, RHP - Second Baptist HS (Unsigned - Hou 3S Rd)
2.65 Aaron Shafer, RHP - Wichita State ($625,000)
3.97 Brandon Crawford, SS - UCLA (Unsigned - SF 4 Rd)
4.131 Isaac Galloway, OF - Los Osos HS ($245,000)
5.161 Paul Demny, RHP - Blinn JC ($110,000)

Heyward and Burgess are well on their way to being top fifty prospects at the end of the season, top ten isn't all that unlikely for Heyward. This year I stressed high upside pitching. As before I tried not to take guys who fell because of signability. I listed their actual bonuses.  Had Seaton gone in the supplemental round, he would have been signable. The Astros are probably giving him the Troy Patton treatment. I'm not sure if you guys would rather have my six guys than the ones we ended up, but there's a lot of upside there. Now let's look at our top ten picks.

First Round, 19th Pick
Andrew Cashner, RHP - Texas Christian University
Hometown: Conroe, Texas
DOB: 9/11/86

Bio: This pick is a bit of a sentimental one for me. Andrew Cashner has been drafted four times, first out of high school, twice out of Juco and now. He was never a huge prospect coming out of high school in Conroe, a northern suburb of Houston. In fact, at times his senior and junior years he was a kid who didn't top 5'9 or 5'10 and threw in the mid 80s on his best days with a solid slider that showed quality spin and depth. He was certainly not first round material and not top ten round material either. Cashner was still drafted in the twentieth round. Cashner chose to go to Angelina Junior College in Lufkin, one of the prominent Juco programs in the country. He pitched sparingly his freshman year, just a handful of innings. He performed well and was drafted again by the Rockies in the eighteenth round. He didn't sign as a D&F and went back for his sophomore season where he exploded to become one of the top juco starting pitchers in the country. He was drafted again 2007, this time by the Cubs in the 29th round. He did not sign, as you know, and transferred to Texas Christian where he blossomed into a top flight pitcher while moving to bullpen. Why? In the last four years he's grown nearly a foot and now stands 6'6" and finally grew into his frame this season.

Strengths: His pure armstrength rivals any pitcher in the draft. Over his first two years in college his mid 80s fastball moved up to sitting around 88-91 hitting 93 occasionally, that's a dime a dozen in the college ranks. With Sam Demel gone, the Horned Frogs needed someone to shutdown opponents late in the game. Cashner moved into the pen, and got used to his newfound size. All of a sudden his fastball sat 94-95 touching 98 every outing. He's shown a quality slider that has served as a good out pitch thus far, but still needs to be tightened up and more consistent. He has fluid mechanics and throws "easy gas". He's always had the ability to get a strike out and that should continue in the future. His armslot is a pure three quarters and he does not seem to put extra stress on any of his joints like most guys.

Weaknesses: The biggest concern about a guy like him who sees his velocity jump considerably in a matter of months is health. We have no idea how long he will be able to last throwing with this velocity. Granted, every pitcher in the draft is young enough that this has happened to them. Only about 5% of human beings' elbows can sustain the amount of torque throwing 95 puts on their elbow. The simple fact he's only been doing it for a few short months means we don't know his durability with it. Also his control needs quite a bit of work, but he should have enough velocity to get away with problems. In the upper levels he's going to need to learn how to pitch once he faces guys who can catch up to his velocity every time they know it's coming. That's where the development of his slider is going to be paramount.

Sabermetric Prophecy of Doom: The Cubs could move him back into the rotation, but that seems unwise given the lackluster stuff he showed there as recently as last fall. There's precedent for college closers moving into the rotation. Names off the top of my head that come to mind are Shaun Marcum and Dave Bush. After the rapid success of college closers like Chad Cordero and Huston Street teams made a scramble to cash in quick on guys in the draft. The result was a three or so year period where college closers were taken early and often: Ryan Wagner, Billy Bray, Craig Hansen, etc. Their lack of instant success had made teams think twice about doing that again, that was until this year of course. That being said, a guy like this is going to be the safest move a team can make. His velocity alone should give him a lot of success up to about Double A. Once he's in AAA in the Majors how well he performs will be based on his sliders' development. As of right now he's probably neck and neck with Ceda as far as the Cubs top closing prospect goes.