This article is part of our MLB Observations series.
Last Sunday, Eric Karabell from ESPN Fantasy joined Todd Zola and I to participate in our Daily Draft series, this time covering the All-Time Philadelphia Phillies. We quickly realized that pitching would dry up sooner than it would in other drafts, despite the Phillies having been around for a long time.
As always, we gave our guest his choice of draft slots, and as almost always, Eric opted to pick first and went with Mike Schmidt. That's the thing with most of these "All-Time" drafts - the first choice is usually obvious. I thought that the second choice was also obvious, but ... I was wrong. I thought that Steve Carlton was the play, but Todd played the positional scarcity card instead and went with Chase Utley (who I was hoping to take instead). Thus I tapped Carlton and went with Utley's double play partner, Jimmy Rollins, thinking that there was a monstrous gap between Rollins and the other Phillies shortstops. In fact, after Rollins, it required a concerted effort for Eric and Todd to avoid being stuck with someone like Steve Jeltz.
Here are the full results of the draft, first overall, then by team:
Round | Team | Player |
1 | Karabell | Mike Schmidt |
1 | Zola | Chase Utley |
1 | Erickson | Steve Carlton |
2 | Erickson | Jimmy Rollins |
2 | Zola | Robin Roberts |
2 | Karabell | Pete Alexander |
3 | Karabell | Dick Allen |
3 | Zola | Richie Ashburn |
3 | Erickson | Bobby Abreu |
4 | Erickson | Cole Hamels |
4 | Zola | Scott Rolen |
4 | Karabell | Curt Schilling |
5 | Karabell | Jim Bunning |
5 | Zola | Ryan Howard |
5 | Erickson | Ed Delahanty |
6 | Erickson | Roy Halladay |
6 | Zola | Chris Short |
6 | Karabell | Larry Bowa |
7 | Karabell | Nap Lajoie |
7 | Zola | Tug McGraw |
7 | Erickson | Garry Maddox |
8 | Erickson | Aaron Nola |
8 | Zola | Sherry Magee |
8 | Karabell | Cliff Lee |
9 | Karabell | Charlie Buffington |
9 | Zola | Chuck Klein |
9 | Erickson | Darren Daulton |
10 | Erickson | Curt Simmons |
10 | Zola | Kid Gleason |
10 | Karabell | Von Hayes |
11 | Karabell | Del Ennis |
11 | Zola | Charlie Ferguson |
11 | Erickson | Lenny Dykstra |
12 | Erickson | John Kruk |
12 | Zola | Carlos Ruiz |
12 | Karabell | John Denny |
13 | Karabell | Johnny Callison |
13 | Zola | Billy Wagner |
13 | Erickson | Juan Samuel |
14 | Erickson | Placido Polanco |
14 | Zola | Jim Thome |
14 | Karabell | Billy Hamilton |
15 | Karabell | Mike Lieberthal |
15 | Zola | Granny Hamner |
15 | Erickson | Steve Bedrosian |
Results by team:
Karabell | Zola | Erickson | |
C | Mike Lieberthal | Carlos Ruiz | Darren Daulton |
1B | Dick Allen | Ryan Howard | John Kruk |
2B | Nap Lajoie | Chase Utley | Juan Samuel |
3B | Mike Schmidt | Scott Rolen | Placido Polanco |
SS | Larry Bowa | Granny Hamner | Jimmy Rollins |
OF1 | Von Hayes | Richie Ashburn | Bobby Abreu |
OF2 | Del Ennis | Sherry Magee | Ed Delahanty |
OF3 | Johnny Callison | Chuck Klein | Garry Maddox |
UT | Billy Hamilton | Jim Thome | Lenny Dykstra |
P1 | Pete Alexander | Robin Roberts | Steve Carlton |
P2 | Curt Schilling | Chris Short | Cole Hamels |
P3 | Jim Bunning | Tug McGraw | Roy Halladay |
P4 | Cliff Lee | Kid Gleason | Aaron Nola |
P5 | Charlie Buffington | Charlie Ferguson | Curt Simmons |
P6 | John Denny | Billy Wagner | Steve Bedrosian |
Who won this draft? Which players were the significant omissions? As always, remember that you only get the player during his tenure with the Phillies. Also, the Billy Hamilton listed here is not the contemporary player, despite the link. The Phillies version of Hamilton was a significantly better player.