It wasn't the plan, but sometimes you have to diver from what you wanted. Lumberjacks General Manager Chris Wilson had led his draft team to the decision the club was selecting a pitcher in the opening round. With 3 viable options going into the draft, Wilson felt fairly confident one of the trio would fall to the club with the 6th pick. Wilson was wrong. All 3 arms he'd have selected went in the first 5 picks and it left the front office scrambling. In the end, the team decided to go with the best player on their board. And that person was corner outfielder Bill Fredrick.
"Fredrick wasn't our first option, but he's a damn good hitter" commented Wilson on the pick. "We know corner outfielders are a dime a dozen and we'd have loved to fill a more needed void. But there are plenty of things to like about Fredrick and we're excited to watch him develop into a staple of the Lumberjacks offense in a few years."
So what's to like about Fredrick? He's a lefty and lefty bats tend to strive more in Portland than right handed hitters. Not to mention a majority of the pitchers in the league are right handed which favors Fredrick if he turns into a platoon type player. He has good contact potential and solid power, which should be a nice addition to some of the young guys Portland has now or on the horizon. He's also a little further developed than some 17 year olds so he could easily fit into the time frame that Portland is looking at building a contender.
What's not to like? Well, corner outfielders are easy to find in the league. There are plenty still hanging around the free agent market as we speak. Defensively, Fredrick isn't great. And with Mynorli Gaajlimitz staking claim to the DH spot in a few years it means Fredrick will have to play a position down the road. Finally, Fredrick is demanding a king's ransom to sign.
"He's asking around $9 million to sign with us" added assistant GM Kate Fiscus. "Fortunately we upped our draft budget this season to make sure we added some flexibility to sign draft picks since the future is our goal right now. So even though he's asking a lot to sign, we have it in our budget."
So while Fredrick won't fix any pitching woes in Portland now or in the future, fans of the Lumberjacks can at least be excited over all the pretty blue 70s and 80s on their top prospects list at the moment. The addition of Fredrick might just be enough to vault Portland ahead of Yellow Springs with the top system in the league!
