The 2025 draft was not considered a very deep draft. There was no Paul Skenes in this draft. There were 5 players that were projected at 1/1, but it was a High School SS not named Ethan Holliday who got the call from the Nationals, Eli Willits, in somewhat of a surprise.
The 2nd overall pick by LAA was RHP from UC Santa Barbara, Tyler Bremner was a huge surprise.
Why did Willits and Bremner go before LSU’s LHP Kade Anderson, and the other Oklahoma high school SS, Ethan Holliday? One big reason could be that neither Willits nor Bremner are represented by Scott Boras. The next four picks, Kade Anderson, Kade Anderson, Liam Doyle, and Aiva Arquette, are all represented by Boras.
With Willits and Bremner drafted, that dropped Kade Anderson to #3 with Seattle, and Holliday to #4 and Colorado. Seattle has earned a reputation of developing elite SP, and Anderson fell into their laps.
Ethan Holliday was taken #4 overall by the same team that drafted his father, Matt Holliday, in the 7th round, 27 years earlier.
Two Pictures
In the first round (43 picks) by position:
- SS – 17 (13 High School)
- RHP – 7 (1 High School)
- OF – 6 (1 High School)
- LHP – 5 (1 High School)
- C – 4 (1 High School)
- 3B – 2 (1 High School)
- 2B – 2 (1 High School)
That totals 24 college players and 19 high school players.
7 conferences and 17 colleges were represented in the 1st round.
- SEC 13 players (7 universities)
- ACC 6 players (5 universities)
- Sun Belt – 1 player, 1 university
- Big 10 – 1 player, 1 university
- Big 12 – 1 player, 1 university
- Big West – 1 player, 1 university
- Independent – 1 player, 1 university
One player that the Dodgers had familial ties with is HS 3B, Brady Ebel, son of Dodgers 3B coach, Dino. Brady was drafted #32 by Milwaukee. He and Milwaukee made a history with that pick. This was the first time in the MLB draft that three players from the same high school were drafted in the 1st round. Corona High School had three players drafted:
- Seth Hernandez – RHP – #6 overall Pittsburgh
- Billy Carlson – SS – #10 overall CWS
- Brady Ebel – 3B – #32 overall Milwaukee
Corona High School (Panthers) is located in the Inland Empire in Southern California. Corona has had 20 players drafted, with 4 reaching MLB. The most well known is Joe Kelly. Mike Darr was the first to reach in 1999. Tristan Beck and Samad Taylor are active players from Corona. The Panthers have 2 in AAA, including the Dodgers reliever, Michael Hobbs, who should reach MLB. They have 1 in AA and 1 in rookie league.
NYY drafted Kaeden Kent, son of Jeff Kent, in the 3rd round, #103 overall. Kent was the SS for Texas A&M, who should slide over to 2B in pro ball. And he is reported to have an attitude.
Boras did not waste any time with getting Anderson signed by Seattle. Anderson signed for $8.8MM which was slightly lower than his slot value of $9.5MM.
The Dodgers are always difficult to anticipate in the draft. Patrick Forbes, Quentin Young, Jack Bauer were the most mocked for the Dodgers. Forbes went #29 to Arizona and the Dodgers passed on Young and Bauer. In fact all 30 teams passed on Bauer. It seems clear that he let everyone know not to draft him. He was strongly committed to Mississippi State.
The Dodgers drafted 21 players.
- 9 – RHP (Some things don’t change)
- 5 – OF
- 4 – LHP
- 2 – C
- 1 – 3B
17 college draft picks, 3 high school picks, and 1 JC pick.
It almost appears that the Dodgers were looking at signability and keeping the bonuses in line. The Dodgers have a bonus pool of $9,031,300.
The Dodgers often look for high ceilings early on. In this draft, they drafted a LHP from the University of Arkansas, Zach Root for the 1st round pick at #40. Root has a higher floor, and figures to be able to reach that.
Root has an unorthodox delivery with a high leg kick and a deep arm swing that produces a three-quarters arm slot that helps him stay on top of his pitches. He throws consistent strikes but catches the heart of the plate more than he should. He’s a safe bet to become a No. 4 starter.
- Baseabll America Scouting Grades: Fastball: 50 | Slider: 50 | Curveball: 55 | Changeup: 55 | Control: 55.
- MLB Pipeline Scouting grades: Fastball: 50 | Curveball: 60 | Cutter: 55 | Changeup: 60 | Control: 50 | Overall: 50
Root’s changeup is his money pitch, and he throws strikes. In 99.1 IP, Root has a 3.62 ERA in the SEC with 126 K with 35 BB.
The Dodgers CB-A pick #41 was OF Charles Davalan, Root’s Arkansas teammate. Davalan is a potential plus 4 tool.
- Baseball America Scouting Grades: : Hit: 55 | Power: 45 | Run:55 | Field: 50 | Arm: 45.
- MLB Pipeline Scouting grades: Hit: 60 | Power: 50 | Run: 55 | Arm: 45 | Field: 55 | Overall: 50
His fringy arm might make left field or second base his most likely pro positions. Davalan could go inside the first two rounds with his top-of-the-order profile. He’ll be able to enhance his value as a pro if he can play up the middle at second or in center.
It will be fun to monitor the OF that the Dodgers passed on to draft Davalan:
- Brendan Summerhill – Arizona – Taken #42 by Tampa Bay.
- Cam Cannarella – Clemson – Taken #43 by Miami
- Devin Taylor – Indiana – Taken #48 by the A’s
- Ethan Petrie – South Carolina – Taken # 49 by Washington
My favorite draft pick was RHP Cam Leiter from Florida State taken in the 2nd round. He has not pitched in a year and a half due to shoulder surgery. But he was projected as a potential top ten pick before the injury. This is more of a LAD pick than the first two.
The 3rd round pick was a huge reach. Cincinnati OF, Landyn Vidourek. This is the player the Dodgers take in the 4th-6th round as a bonus save for above slot bonuses in the early rounds. The scouting reports are all over the place for Vidourek. The belief is that he has untapped potential that could blossom.
I plan on writing up a more thorough report on many of the picks.
Rays are being sold for 1.7 billion dollars. Raleigh wins the HR derby. Davis sold to the Twins.
The Rays. Now they should move to Montreal.
Portland, OR.
such an underrated city!
Great food, beautiful buildings.
I prefer Quebec
Can’t go wrong, I’m just retaining young life issues with the Quebecois.
I hear the train ride from Montreal to Toronto is really pretty? It’s on my list.
there is a trans-Canada train ride that is very pricey, very pretty and very awesome.
Root’s ERA against SEC competition was 4.97. Against non conference teams it was 1.72. No doubt there’s something the Dodgers see they believe they can improve. I find the fact that he doesn’t throw 100 mph encouraging. Maybe he’s a pitcher not a belly itcher. (when was the last time you heard that one?)
The draft. It’s the same every year. The Dodgers, obviously because of their success, are never in on the top prospects. That doesn’t mean they won’t land one or two, but, how many in the last few years have sailed through the system? We’ve talked about this before. Draft, develop, trade, sign free agents win the Division. Works for me.
Ok, now it’s the trade deadline. What, if anything, will the Dodgers do?
My new thinking (based on a different discussion )is they HAVE to do something, because the players will react negatively if they do not.
Still don’t see much room for a reliever or starter, so I’ll say LFer.
i guess?
I’m gonna guess pitching. With an outfield of Conforto, Pages, Teo, Outman, Edman, Kiké and Kim all positions should be manned and backed up. And will the starters remain available? If they do (big if) I can’t help but think a back of the pen guy, you know, like Scott and Yates were LAST year, will be the focus. Again, just a guess.
Not a bad guess since that appears to be where all the discussion seems to go with the Dodgers.
Back end of the pen. They have no clue when Treinen or Graterol will be ready.
I’m sure they have more than a clue.
Roberts recently said this about Treinen:
“Blake Treinen I thought was really good as well,” Roberts said. “Both those guys should be ready at some point in time shortly after the All-Star break.”
Even if those two don’t come back, Henriquez will and Kopech will both as per Roberts.
It’s a #s game.
And the Dodgers have numbers. Even the numbers say so. (+210 WS winner)
I have read some reports on SI that they might target the Twins late inning relievers, like Duran. No rumor anywhere I have seen about getting a bat.
They are supposedly talking to Minnesota for Jhoan Duran (closer) and/or Griffin Jax (setup). Some of the reports have both Philadelphia and LAD looking more at Jax than Duran because of the cost.
Minnesota is 4.0 GB in the Wild Card. They have 2 weeks to figure out if they are buyers or sellers. If they are sellers, they will have no problem getting a good haul for either of the relievers on July 31.
Thanks for the great draft review Jeff.
I have some thoughts from the 2025 MLB draft as well:
*Thanks to a pair of reaches by Washington and especially LAA, the pitching rich Seattle Mariners picked up prize LHP Kade Anderson. Seattle who had all the pool money somehow got Anderson for $8.8MM, slightly below slot value of $9.5MM. Seattle had to be pooping their knickers when this kid fell to 3.
*The draft surprised me with the number of high school players taken. The fact they were shortstops isn’t surprising. Scouts were generally unimpressed by the quality of position players in college this year.
*WTF is with the Angels. The whole organization sucks and has for some time. I watched a player, Kyren Paris, a 2nd rounder, pick 55, in 2019 advance through to MLB, where he has played 80 games. He hit .235 in MiLB and .157 in the show. In the first half of the minor league play, their franchises finish last in AAA, last in AA, 2nd to last in A+ and last in A. And they passed on Holliday or Anderson. Brutal
*I’m wondering how much the new legislation and rules for colleges will affect MLB draft picks and signability? With all the high school players taken, some brand name college programs potentially took big hits.
In the recent years, programs like LSU could offer significant NIL money and get commits to turn down large signing bonuses to hone there skills in college. It was rumored that LSU baseball spent $10 million in NIL money last year.
Who knows how much Paul Skenes got at LSU but I bet it was above his current MLB salary of $875,000. Yeah, I know he signed for $9.2 million and will break the bank someday as a free agent.
College sports entered an entirely new, and entirely unprecedented, era on July 1, 2025, when the House v. NCAA settlement finally took effect. For the first time ever, schools can directly pay players for performance via revenue sharing contracts.
Each school is expected to start at $20.5 million per school in 2025-26 and steadily increase by as much as 4 percent annually over the 10 year deal.
The breakdown of the $2.8 million is up to each school but expected to be 75% to football, 15% to men’s basketball and 5% to women’s basketball and 5% to athletes in other sports, which included baseball
Scholarship limits of 11.7 per baseball team will go away. Now a college baseball team can have unlimited scholarships if they want to come up with the $.
But here’s the HUGE change to me. With this pay for play, there will be restrictions on Name, Image and Likeness (NIL) money.
To coincide with the change with revenue, the College Sports Commission (CSC) was created to handle regulation and enforcement of player compensation issues.
NIL GO. was created to ensure “fair market value” and valid business purpose based on an actual endorsements. NIL $ sourced from collectives will be subjected to way more scrutiny.
The NIL Go portal requires student-athletes to report third-party NIL deals over $600 to be evaluated for rules compliance. NIL deals will be judged on a set of three criteria: 1) Payor Association: “The relationship between the payor and the student-athlete’s school” 2) Valid Business Purpose: “Whether the payor is seeking the use of the student-athlete’s NIL for a valid business purposes and 3) Range of Compensation: “Whether the compensation paid to the student-athlete is commensurate with compensation paid to similarly situated individuals”
Once an athlete submits a third-party NIL deal to the NIL Go portal, the CSC will analyze the information provided. There are three outcomes that can be reached: Cleared: The deal can proceed, Not Cleared: The deal does not meet necessary requirements, but there are other options or Flagged for Additional Review: If there are legitimate concerns about any of the above categories, the athlete will be notified and and investigation will be launched to review the terms. So the days of undocumented and unregulated NIL payments to athletes are over.
This Commission will certainly be challenged in court but as it stands, any large NIL payouts to keep college baseball players from signing could be impacted, starting right now. Maybe the signability of draft picks who were lured to college with a fat NIL deal will be so reduced that those MLB signing bonuses will look more attractive.
Time will tell.
That’s complicated
Could you repeat that please?
If I read it right, a lot of peoples is getting rich playing college sports.
Badger, maybe not so much anymore. With the new NIL rules, transparency and scrutiny, there may be far less money available.
There will be schools who don’t give a damn about rules. Many in the SEC come to mind.
Which RH closer will the Dodgers trade for? My quess is Fairbanks
Fairbanks is probably a target. AF likes to deal with TB. Fairbanks will cost less than Duran.
Fairbanks – 36.0 IP, 15 SV, 3 BS, 2.75 ERA, 2.97 FIP, 1.139 WHIP, 1 HR, 31 K, 15 BB
Duran – 43.1 IP, 15 SV, 2 BS, 1.66 ERA, 2.14 FIP, 1.131 WHIP, 0 HR, 49 K, 16 BB
However, I would focus more on Pittsburgh’s David Bednar:
Bednar – 32.0 IP, 13 SV, 0 BS, 2.53 ERA, 2.02 FIP, 1.123 WHIP, 2 HR, 45 K, 9 BB
Even more impressive is Bednar’s last 18 games (since May 23):
17.1 IP, 9 SV, 0 BS, 0.00 ERA, 1.29 FIP, 0.692 WHIP, 0 HR, 23 K, 4 BB, 8 Hits, 1 XBH (double)
Fairbanks’ 2025 salary is $3.87MM with a $7MM club option for 2026 with a $1MM buyout. If option exercised, FA in 2027.
Duran’s is 2025 salary $4.13MM. Controlled through 2027 with arbitration years in 2026 and 2027. FA 2028
Bednar’s 2025 salary is $5.9MM and is arb eligible for 2026. FA in 2027.
Fairbanks is 31, Duran is 27, and Bednar is 30.
I prefer Bednar and his ability to throw strikes and miss bats with a 5.0 K/BB ratio vs a 2.07 K/BB for Fairbanks, and 3.06 for Duran.
The prospect capital will be highest for Duran, then Bednar, then Fairbanks. Griffin Jax should be less than Fairbanks. I think AF/BG will continue to give Scott chances and not put a proven closer in his way. They are convinced that all of their FA signings will have big 2nd halves. Thus, I see the Dodgers look more at Griffin Jax than the three closers.
Treinen has had 2 successful rehab appearances. 2 games, 2.0 IP, 0 hits, 1 unearned run, 1 BB, 3 K, 29 pitches/16 strikes. Treinen should be back in LA once he goes back to back. Probably before the deadline.
May should go into the bullpen and probably in a high leverage situation. But he cannot be counted on. The Dodgers are going to need a lockdown bullpen for the playoffs.
Brusdar Graterol is controlled through 2026. In 2024, Graterol only pitched in 7 games, the last one 09-24. Will he be able to get back in 2025? Will he be as effective as he was in 2023? Knowing the Dodgers are going for the WS win in 2025, I suspect he could be moved in any trade for a currently effective high leverage reliever if they decide to go for a closer. Setup reliever, Griffin Jax, is controlled through 2027, but I do not believe AF/BG will trade Graterol for Jax.
Would be just fine with me. Since the Rays are being sold, makes a ton of sense. Someone on Yahoo Sports thinks LA will trade for Arenado and Nootbaar. Not a chance that happens. D-Backs in sell mode.
I agree. No on Arenado
Adjoining Jeff’s excellent post:
Dodgers Digest had just amazing coverage and discussion:
https://dodgersdigest.com/
Kiley McDaniel on day 1
https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/45709412/2025-mlb-draft-kiley-mcdaniel-favorite-day-1-picks-best-available-day-2-prospects
Michael Baumann on the draft:
Longenhagen on Day one: ($$$$)
Baseball America’s Favorite Day 2 picks ($$$$)
https://www.baseballamerica.com/stories/2025-mlb-draft-day-2-drafting-our-10-favorite-picks/
8. Mason Ligenza, OF, Tamaqua (Pa.) HS
Dodgers 6th round, 195th overall
Baseball America Podcast on the draft:
https://www.baseballamerica.com/stories/why-the-nationals-drafted-eli-willits-no-1-overall-more-mlb-draft-reactions-hot-sheet-show/
They were intruiged (in a good way, I think) about Vidourek
On The Clock (I’m meh on these two) had a Draft recap.
Get into the Dodgers around 1:50:00 in.
Ok I already love the ABS system.