Redrafting top 10 picks in every MLB draft from 2015 to 2024 - ESPN

The 2025 MLB draft is around the corner, with the first round beginning July 13.

There are a lot of challenges in baseball. Hitting sometimes seems impossible given the velocity and stuff from pitchers these days, and for those pitchers, throwing quality strikes is a test and staying healthy a huge challenge. But the most difficult thing in the sport might be drafting. It's one thing to scout tools, it's another to project an 18-year-old high school kid as a 25-year-old major leaguer. Finding the baseball players among the athletes or the velocity kings seems more difficult nowadays than ever.

How difficult is it? We went through the past 10 drafts, from 2015 through 2024, and redrafted the top 10 selections. Leaving aside the two most recent drafts, whose players are still very early in their evaluation, only 16 of 80 top-10 selections made the redrafted top 10. Two of the drafts are 0-for-10 in any of their top-10 selections ranking in the redrafted top 10. This helps explain why teams such as the Colorado Rockies, Pittsburgh Pirates and Miami Marlins remained mired in the muck of the standings: They haven't drafted well (although the Pirates at least got the No. 1 pick in 2023 right last year and might have crushed last year's top-10 pick as well).

Let's go back through the past 10 drafts to see what the redrafts look like right now. View this through the lens of a specific moment in the baseball timeline. If we redo this piece in a few years, it will look much different than it does now, especially for the more recent drafts.

Jump to a draft… :
2010 | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 | 2014
2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019

1. Arizona Diamondbacks

New pick: Alex Bregman | Original pick: Dansby Swanson
Where new pick was