The Yankees' pitching staff has a lot of stories about first-round draft picks.

Making the big leagues is an epic challenge. Become part of this select group of baseball players who make it all the way to the majors, while so many promising players, even those considered elite for their age, falter along the way. Being up there is already an outstanding achievement.

You may be wondering where I am going with all this. With that in mind, let's take a look at the Yankees' starting rotation and their nearly loaded first-round picks.

Scrolling through our roster resources, we see that four of the Yankees' five projected starting pitchers were all selected in the first round. Now, this is one of those cases where you know everything about this statement to be true, but you've probably never necessarily thought of it in that light.

Realizing this, I wondered if, while it's difficult to make it to the majors, there are many different paths even a first-round pick can take to get there. . Many of them don't even get to this point. Left-hander Ian Clarkin was a first-round pick along with Aaron Judge in 2013 and never made it to the majors after being traded by the team in 2017.

Extending the Yankees' situation a little further, veteran and former first-round pick Luke Weaver could very well be the first candidate. He has a big league contract and the team may still be hesitant to start Will Warren, so Weaver could fill in if someone gets injured during spring training. In the scenario where only Nestor Cortez is out and Weaver takes his place (which is somewhat reasonable), the Yankees' starting rotation would be made up entirely of first-round pitchers.

Admittedly, this should be considered as a very specific scenario. Either way, it's an interesting thing to think about in relation to the MLB Draft. Cole, Rodon, Weaver, Marcus Stroman and Clark Schmidt have little in common other than the fact that they were all former first-round picks. Those differences show all the paths one man could choose to get to the show.

Golden Boy — A Complete Success Story

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Cole was one of the best draft prospects of this century. As Josh detailed in his Yankee Top 100 article, Ace turned down an attractive offer to join the Yankees as the 28th overall pick out of high school in 2008. This turned out to be a smart move, as Cole pushed UCLA around and got everyone going. The path to being selected No. 1 overall by Pittsburgh in the 2011 MLB Draft.

There were few bumps in the road as Cole breezed through the minor leagues. He was a consensus top 20 prospect until 2012 and a consensus top 10 prospect until 2013. He had spent less than two full seasons in the Pirates' farm system when he debuted at PNC Park in June 2013.

I believe that due to how great he became after moving to the Astros, we lost some perspective on how effective he was in Pittsburgh. From 2013 to 2016, Cole pitched 579.1 innings with a 3.23 ERA and led the Bucs to their most successful run since Barry Bonds roamed the Steel City's outfield, winning the National League Cy Young Award. He also made it into the top five.

While 2017 was certainly disappointing, Cole still had a league-average arm, but the trade to Houston changed all that. Maybe from his first season he wasn't the beast he is now, but his every arm rarely is. Previous generations of players, including Justin Verlander, Clayton Kershaw, and Max Scherzer, all experienced some hardship early in their careers.

It's hard to find a success story as comprehensive from start to finish as Cole's.

Carlos Rodon — when injuries got in the way of commitments

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Back in 2014, Rodon was selected third overall in the MLB Draft by North Carolina State. His talent was so immense and widely recognized that he was traded to the White Sox ahead of future MLB stars like Kyle Schwarber, Aaron Nola, and left-handed Wolfpack teammate Torre. It would have been difficult to find someone to nominate him. Turner. After all, Rodon has already had a better career than the two previous prep pitchers, Brady Aiken and Tyler Kolek.

Like Cole, Rodon also reached the major leagues fairly quickly, debuting in 2015 and pitching over 300 innings in his first two seasons in the majors. He had league-average numbers, but the future looked bright for the 20-something on a rebuilding Pale Horse team. However, Rodon pitched less than 250 total innings from 2017 to 2020, with nearly half of that total coming in just one season (2018).

Rodon suffered from multiple injuries, including undergoing Tommy John surgery, all of which severely hampered his development. The southpaw appeared to be a first-round pick, but the White Sox made him non-tender after 2020. Anyone could have fooled him.

Fortunately for Chicago, they brought Rodon back for another shot in 2021, and it worked out beautifully. They finally got a glimpse of the arm they drafted. He pitched a no-hitter in April, was selected to the All-Star team, pitched 132.2 innings with a 2.37 ERA, helped the White Sox win their first division title in 13 years, and won the AL Cy Young Award. He finished fifth in the voting.

Successful in reinvigorating his status in the big leagues, Rodon will earn $21.5 million with the Giants in 2022, once again excel as an All-Star, and use his opt-out to earn his current lucrative deal with the Yankees. He helped seal the deal. Pessimists will say that Rodon was a shell of himself in 2021-2022, injured and the rest is history. However, the hope is that the left-hander can stay relatively healthy and find his best form in 2024. In any case, he has revived his career once before.

Stroman, Schmidt, Weaver — mixed results

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Behind this version of the Yankees' rotation are three first-round picks with their own stories. Stroman's work is solid, Weaver's work is less ideal, and Schmidt's work is still being written. None of them were draft picks as lofty as Cole or Rodon, but of course they all made it to the majors.

Stroman was drafted 22nd overall by the Blue Jays out of Duke University in 2012, and it didn't take long for him to reach the majors. He quickly emerged as one of the most exciting young players in the AL East, but like Rodon, he was plagued by early injuries (though they never lasted). Stroman carved out a path as a top-100 prospect, having a strong rookie season in 2014 and making a spectacular comeback from his torn ACL in the spring of 2015 to become a part of Toronto's playoff team for the first time in 22 years. Ta. He then pitched 200 innings in consecutive seasons in 2016 and 2017, and Edwin Encarnacion won the decisive 2016 AL Wild Card Game as the Jays' starting pitcher.

To some extent, Stroman never became the arm we once envisioned him to be, but he had a great career as a solid No. 3 starter on a good team. He hasn't experienced the heights of Rodon's outrageous 2021-22 season, but he's been far more consistent, making two All-Star appearances of his own and posting an ERA of over 116 in 1,303.2 innings. . Stroman has continued to do yeoman's work with the Mets and Cubs since leaving Toronto, and now he's looking to do the same in New York.

It's too early to make any real guesses about what 2017 pick Schmidt's career will look like, but it's interesting to consider them as one of the possible paths for Stroman and Weaver.

Like Schmidt, Weaver was often on the Cardinals' list of top prospects. St. Louis took Florida State late in the first round in 2014 and was on The Show just two years later. But it would be a lie to pretend that he has the career that Cardinals prospect enthusiasts once envisioned. He was unable to find a foothold in St. Louis from 2016 to 2018, but to the team's credit, they decided to let him go while they could better utilize his talents. Ta. Weaver was a key part of the deal that brought 2022 National League MVP Paul Goldschmidt to St. Louis.

What about Weaver? Well, he found a way to endure there for nearly a decade, even if only intermittently. He bounced around from Arizona to Kansas City to Cincinnati to Seattle to New York in the past two seasons alone. He's made a career out of being an occasional substitute starter and filling every role the team wants him to play, but even now that Weaver is 30 years old, pitching coach Matt Blake expects more from him. ing.

Post-draft Tommy John surgery and the COVID-19 pandemic have conspired to stunt Schmidt's development, making it difficult to find a major league rotation opportunity as New York remains a perennial winner. It has become. Still, he pitched 159 innings last year and will have a good chance to pitch even more innings in 2024. Just as he can continue to evolve and perhaps carve out a more lucrative career, as well as Stroman, who at least has the material and ability to remain that guy for the long term, as a reliable starter. established its position. It's too early to say that.