MILWAUKEE — As the MLB draft unfolded inside the Milwaukee Brewers' war room at
Miller Park on Monday night, the usual suspects — general manager Doug
Melvin and director of amateur scouting Bruce Seid, among others —
gathered to pore over draft boards and scouting reports.
But
Monday night's first-round company was a bit different than usual, as
they were joined in the room by an unlikely and unorthodox scout.
Brewers
ace Zack Greinke stopped by the war room on his off day to observe the
draft process and offer a bit of his own expertise when it came to
scouting the future of Milwaukee's organization.
"It's fun,"
Greinke said. "I just like that stuff … trying to see something other
people can't see. It's just interesting to me."
It's not the
former Cy Young winner's first foray into the world of scouting, as he
analyzed top pitching prospects before last year's draft and offered
recommendations before the team drafted two pitchers in the first round,
Taylor Jungmann and Jed Bradley. He also spent some time during this
year's spring training scouting with the assistant to the general
manager, Craig Counsell.
Greinke had been in Brewers manager
Ron Roenicke's office on Sunday with his iPad, going through his own
compiled list of prospects, when Melvin asked him to name a few of his
favorites. After Greinke ran down his list, Roenicke, Melvin, and
assistant general manager Gord Ash all came away impressed with the
pitcher's knowledge of the prospects available in the draft's first few
rounds.
So Melvin invited him to be a part of the war room on Monday
night. And when all was said and done, Greinke had spent even more time
in the room than Roenicke.
"He knows (the prospects)," Roenicke
said. "It's not just that he looks at some numbers. He knows them. He
watches video. He knows the size of them. And he really likes it."
One
would think that Greinke's expertise would be in scouting pitchers, but
in fact, the right-hander said he's much more accurate when it comes to
evaluating hitters. Pitchers, he said, are too hit-or-miss for him to
get a good grip on potential, at least at this early point in his
scouting career.
Greinke even had a hitter in mind for the
Brewers' No. 27 overall pick last night, but according to Roenicke, the
hitter Greinke had picked out — Clemson third baseman Richie Shaffer —
went two picks before Milwaukee's choice, to Tampa Bay.
With a keen eye for scouting and evaluating talent, Greinke could have found his calling after his time on the mound is over.
"It's
great to know that a young player likes that and wants to follow it,"
Melvin said on Monday. "He had his comments and we enjoyed having him up
there. … It's good to see players are interested in that."
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