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Rays, As Expected, Take Beckham With No. 1 Pick In Draft

The Associated Press

Tim Beckham, center, his father Jimmy Beckham, right, and his mother Ella Beckham, left, react after the Rays selected him with the No. 1 overall pick in the baseball draft on Thursday.

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By MARC LANCASTER | The Tampa Tribune

Published: June 5, 2008

The Rays made it official, selecting Tim Beckham with the first pick today in this year's Major League Baseball entry draft.

Beckham, a shortstop from Griffin (Ga.) High School, is considered a legitimate five-tool player with a tremendous upside. It'll be a few years before he reaches the majors, but he could have star potential once he arrives.

Tim Beckham

"It's great, man," Beckham told ESPN after Tampa Bay made the first selection of the draft. "It's great to be here with my family in Griffin, Ga., where I was born and raised, and it's great to get picked up by the Tampa Rays."

Beckham hit .482 with 13 doubles, four triples, six homers and 41 RBIs in 36 games for Griffin as a senior. He stole 23 bases and struck out just six times in 110 at-bats. The Bears fell to Loganville in the state championship series final last week, dropping the first two games in a best-of-three set.

"We project him to be a true impact player," Rays executive vice president Andrew Friedman said in a statement released by the team. "He has an advanced offensive approach, coupled with outstanding athleticism and a genuine enthusiasm for the game. We are anxious to get him signed and to begin the path to the major leagues."

ESPN's Karl Ravech noted there were a number of Rays fans in attendance at Disney and asked Beckham if he had anything to say to them.

"Thank you all, I hope you support me, I hope you'll be my fan," he said.

ESPN analyst Keith Law, a former scout, praised the Rays' selection.

"I give the Rays a lot of credit – they took the player with the best chance of anybody in this draft pool to be a superstar," Law said. "If he outgrows shortstop – he's certainly got the hands, the feet to stay there and plenty of arm – but if he outgrows shortstop, he goes to second, he goes to center field, his bat is still superstar-caliber there, as well."

Reports surfaced late last night that Florida State's Buster Posey, the other finalist to go first overall, might require $12 million to sign and that demand might have pushed the Rays to take Beckham.
Friedman strongly denied that was the case.

"That had zero factor in our decision," he said. "We're confident that whoever we would have taken, with the size of the check we were going to go to the table with that we'd be able to sign whoever we took. ... We trust our process and our ability to get players signed and the relationships that our area [scouts] have made with the players."

In a perfect world, the Rays would be able to get Beckham integrated into their farm system immediately, a la Evan Longoria a couple of years ago.

They won't have a deal done that quickly on this one, and it sounds like it will be at least a few days, but they're optimistic the negotiations won't stretch all the way to the Aug. 15 deadline as they did with David Price last year. That delay effectively kept Price from participating in minor-league games last summer, which the Rays didn't really mind because he had thrown so many innings at Vanderbilt.

Beckham is a different case, though. It's more important for a high school player to get acclimated to professional ball, and the Rays believe Beckham playing this summer could be a boon to his professional development. Plus, Beckham played in only 36 high school games and innings counts aren't a concern like they would be for a pitcher.

"Developmentally speaking, to get a high school guy out and playing this year is critical," Friedman said. "With a college guy, they've played a much bigger schedule and in most cases a lot of summer ball as well, so it's not as important to us. Obviously, you always prefer it, but it wouldn't be as important to us if we would have taken a college guy if it would have dragged until August.

"In this case, it was refreshing for us to hear how much Tim wanted to get out and play this year and didn't want this process to run until August. That said, we still have to sit down and find an overlap, but we're confident we'll do so."

In the 44-year history of the draft, the Rays today became the first team to hold the No. 1 overall selection for two consecutive years.

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