FOR THE COREY HATERS

My take on Corey has evolved over the years to this: Probably too stubborn, not very coachable, doesn't "get it" when it comes to how to use his skills to maximize production, nor does he "get" how to approach each at-bat. He is not as good as we all thought he would be. He is not as good as you would think the 3rd overall pick should be. But I maintain that if you took away his name and face and concentrated solely on the numbers, you'd be pretty pleased to have a CF like Corey. He also is a good defensive CF with a lot of range. So I found the following info interesting. Something for the Corey bashers out there to take into account.

Corey was the 3rd overall pick of the 1998 MLB Draft. Picked ahead of him were Pat Burrell and Mark Mulder, in that order. Now, here are the players chosen after Corey in the 1st round. You'd be hard pressed to say that you'd want one of these other guys more than Corey, with a few exceptions.

#4- Jeff Austin. Big Bust. 6.75 ERA over 38 MLB appearances. Currently pitching in the Independent League.
#5- J.D. Drew. He has had a better career than Corey to date. But remember all the acrimony involved in his signing--he was a Boras client and didn't sign with the Phils. He re-entered the draft in '98. Not many teams wanted to deal with that--still don't.
#6- Ryan Mills. Pitcher who hasn't played in the bigs yet, and isn't likely too with his career minor league record of 17-40.
#7- Austin Kearns. They are still waiting for him to bust out in Cincy. Plenty of injuries and has underachieved. Only hitting .225 this year.
#8- Felipe Lopez. So far, 2005 is his breakout year. He is hitting over .300 and has 8 HR. But he's still hasn't played in more than 85 games in a season. Career OPS of .683.
#9- Sean Burroughs. Another guy who was supposed to dominate the bigs. In approx. 1300 MLB at-bats he has all of 11 HRs. Not a bad hitter, but going into this year a career slugging pct. of .374, from a 6'2" 3rd Baseman. Yikes.
#10- Carlos Pena. Got sent down to AAA recently after hitting .181 and whiffing 41 times in his 127 ABs.
#11- Josh McKinley. Catcher who is out of baseball.
#12- Adam Everett. Cubs actually did draft him in 4th round of '95 draft, but he went to college. Good. Anemic offensively. Think "Mike Caruso" with a better glove.
#13- J.M. Gold. Has not yet played in the bigs.
#14- Jeff Weaver. Currently on his 3rd MLB team. League average at best. And that'd be generous.
#15- Clint Johnson. 1B who toils in AA for the Pirates.
#16- Kip Wells. What. Ever.
#17- Brad Lidge. Well here is where it gets really interesting. He had a dominant 2004 season striking out 157 in 94 IP. That's insane. Would you trade Corey straight up for him though? This year Lidge has returned to earth, while still posting solid numbers. This here is a toughy.

I'll stop here noting the other possible player from the 1st round you would want more than Corey--C.C. Sabathia. I think that's a tough call too. Anyway, it puts some of the Corey talk in perspective.