So, the draft happened, and as I’ve noted, I’m no expert. But what I can do for you is point you to where you can watch some of these players on TV in the next couple weeks – starting with tonight. Right now, the NCAA baseball playoffs have just kicked off the super-regionals level, which is a best of three series, with 16 teams still in the mix. In addition to the pleasure of seeing some of our future top prospects, I find college baseball to be a lot of fun to watch. Just think of the difference between the other professional vs. college level sports like basketball and football. Even the ones that are taking off for professional baseball show  just crazy amounts of passion in the college world series – so it’s always a good time. Not to mention, we’ve got some decent draftees in the mix as well.

BEST BET: UCLA vs. TCU 

This matchup features our supplemental round pick Jeff Gelalich and his teammate , 9th round pick Beau Amaral, both playing for the UCLA Bruins. Gelalich is an impressive looking Junior outfielder, and a very polished seeming left-handed hitter. He’s got plenty of tools – he lead UCLA in a host of offensive categories – from AVG/OBP/SLG to BB and HR, as well as stealing 15 bases in 19 attempts.Amaral is Gelalich’s fellow outfielder, and the son of major leaguer Rich Amaral. Apparently, he doesn’t have a lot of upside, but could be a 4th outfielder type.

Game 1: Friday (tonight!), at approximately 9:00 PM ET, on ESPN/ESPN3

Game 2: Saturday, 6/9, 9:00 PM ET, on ESPN/ESPN3

Game 3 (if necessary): Sunday, 6/10, 10:00 PM ET, on ESPN2/ESPN3

Arizona vs. St. John’s 

Game 1 of this series has already started (by the time this gets to press), but the previous game (LSU vs. Stonybrook) just tied in the 9th, so we might not get there. This game boasts the Reds’ 8th roung pick, Arizona 3b Seth Mejias-Brean. SM-B looks like he has a lot of different possibilities for position- and his defense and his arm are some of his best attributes. It looks like he could hit for average, but without too much power. Arizona is facing St. John’s, who is a little bit of an underdog, ranked 46th overall, but not on the Kent St./Stonybrook level

Game 1: Friday, today, 3:00 PM ET, watch on ESPNU (now) but later ESPN2

Game 2: Saturday, 6/9, 3:00 PM ET, watch on ESPN2/ESPN3

Game 3(if necesssary): Sundary, 6/10, 4:00 PM ET. watch on ESPN 2/3

Florida vs. NC State

Our horse in this race is 9th round draft pick Daniel Pigott, another outfielder, this one for Florida. Pigott isn’t the most exciting pick in the world, but he’s a senior, and likely to sign, so he could be in our system for a good few years in the future.

Game 1: Saturday, 6/9, 2:00 PM ET, on ESPNU/ESPN3

Game 2:Sunday, 6/10, 1:00 PM ET, on ESPNU/ESPN3

Game 3 (i.n.): Monday, 6/11, 1:00 PM ET, on ESPN2/ESPN3

Oregon vs. Kent St., South Carolina vs. Oklahoma

There are also a Reds draftee each on the Oregon and South Carolina teams – RHP Joey Housey for Oregon, and LF Adam Matthew for South Carolina.

Oregon: Game 1: Saturday, 11:00 PM ET, ESPNU/ESPN3; Game 2: Sunday, 10:oo PM ET, ESPNU/ESPN3; Game 3 (i.n.): Monday, 7:00 PM ET, ESPNU/ESPN3

South Carolina: Game 1: Saturday, 8:00 PM ET, ESPNU/ESPN3; Game 2: Sunday, 7:00 PM ET, ESPNU/ESPN3; Game 3: Monday, 7:00 PM ET, ESPN3/ESPN3.

Or, as I like to call it, the 10th anniversary of the day that Joey Votto joined the Reds organization. Hurrah!

It should be a reasonably fun day – even though the experts mostly agree that this is not the greatest draft class we’ve ever seen, the Reds have several early picks. Due to the departure of Cordero and Hernandez, the Reds are looking at 3 picks in the first 60, which isn’t bad.

I admit, I’m no draft expert. It’s a stretch to call myself an expert in anything about baseball, really, but the draft, more so. The draft is, even now, the area of baseball still most dominated by scouting. Thousands of kids, playing in different levels, different leagues, in every nook and cranny of the country. Not something that lends itself to macro-level number crunching.

For the best draft coverage, there’s plenty of places to go, though – like the oeuvre of Mr. Thundering Turtle – a man with plenty of connections and tons of experience who does comprehensive  draft coverage over at Red Reporter. And of course, the lovely Steph Diorio will be live blogging the draft over at Around the Horn here on Aerys.

Still, I wanted to contribute a little. So I took a little at Jocketty’s overall draft history with the Reds. The results, perhaps interesting, but not necessarily illuminating – here’s a little positional summary of Jocketty’s four Reds drafts compared to the whole MLB draft.

Nothing particularly revelating here, since you have to take this into account that we could be talking about drafting for need here, or just draft trends, or scouting differences. The breakdown of 4yr/JC/HS players is similarly non-thrilling. It is interesting to note that Jocketty heavily emphasized pitchers in his first year – I think that may indicate that he saw it as an organizational weakness. While drafting for need may not make a lot of sense, there’s something to be said for supplementing organization wide  issues, rather than just “Oh hey, we need a third baseman, let’s draft some.”

I think that draft was also considered pitching strong – the first round focused on position players, but in round 2, it seemed like everyone went straight for pitchers – and Jocketty really went to town, drafting 29/49 pitchers in his first ever draft as Reds GM.

In any case, it’s something to think about on the off day.

Stephenson is a highschool pitcher from Alhambra HS in Martinez CA. He’s been listed as 6’2″ or 6’3″, with a 95 mph fastball, touching 98, and a “biting” curve (now, who does this remind me of….?). He also has a 4.12 GPA (heheh, I almost wrote ERA….one of those would be good, the other would be baaad), and a scholarship to Washington.

It’s not a bad choice to take a change on a guy like this, especially since we’ve tended towards position players in the first round ever since…. ah, yes, Homer Bailey. (The Reds of course, took Mike Leake in the first round in 2009, but Leake was a very different kind of pick). It looks like many Mock Drafts had Stephenson a little higher, so it’s nice that he’s dropped to us.

I guess we’ll just have to wait and see if he turns out to be a Treasure Island, a Jekyll and Hyde story, or if we feel Kidnapped, after being misled by his great potential. (Yeah. Yeah. That’s pretty bad. I’ll have to think up some better puns before he reaches the majors. Fortunately, I think I have awhile.)