(Photo: Royals Primacy)
The Kansas City Royals announced this morning that they have purchased the contract of outfielder Jarrod Dyson from Triple-A Omaha. This news is largely unremarkable except for one small detail: Dyson was Kansas City’s 50th round pick in the 2006 draft.
Assuming Baseball-Reference’s draft database is somewhat current, this makes Dyson something of a unique player. Since 1998, when the draft was capped at fifty rounds, only four other players taken in the final round have reached the major leagues: David Murphy (2000), Zach Jackson (2001), Chris Davis (2004), and Buster Posey (2005). Each turned down the team that drafted them, went back to school, and was later drafted again, in a much higher round. Murphy, Jackson, and Posey became first rounders; Davis was taken in the fifth round.
Dyson, though, was just a fiftieth rounder, a 21-year-old community college kid who signed a contract and entered the world of minor league baseball. That should’ve been the beginning of the end. He should’ve signed that deal, played a couple years without distinction, been released, and moved on to the next chapter of his life. That’s what happens to guys chosen in the fiftieth round – out of 320 players chosen in that round since 1998, only Dyson signed immediately, worked his way up, and eventually reached the majors.
How did this happen? Well, Dyson climbed through the system using his speed (131 steals in 163 attempts, an 80% success rate). He doesn’t get on base a ton (.344 career on-base percentage, and it’s gone lower as he’s moved up), but when you’re that fast, I think teams are willing to forgive some poor plate discipline. He’s also handled 213 outfield chances this year, with three errors, ten assists, and a range factor per game of 3.13. Those all sound reasonably good to me, so why not give the guy a shot as a pinch-runner/defensive replacement?
However you look at it, the mere fact that Dyson is on a major league roster right now is exceptionally cool. He started out almost as close to the bottom of the minor league ladder as you can get, worked hard, and made it to the top. Good for him.
