The Orioles are four months from another No. 1 overall pick. Expectations for who it could be, even now, could lead to disappointment.

Where the Orioles are concerned, it's never to early to start hand-wringing about what they'll do with the first overall pick in the July draft.

It’s going to happen again, isn’t it?

This summer’s MLB draft is four months away, and in the two drafts since the Orioles’ last picked No. 1, there has been a defining sense of disappointment on draft night that the names put forth from outside the organization as the ideal choices were left on the board so the Orioles could take a productive college hitter they loved who also had a lower bonus requirement than their slot called for.

That’s not the part that’s fated to happen again – there’s no way the Orioles know who they’re taking the way they probably knew at this time that Adley Rutschman would be their guy early on in 2019. But judging by the consensus building around the prodigious high school talents ranked at the top of this draft class – and Orioles fans’ interest in adding them to the stable of young stars Mike Elias has built in his elite talent pipeline – the stage is going to be set for potential fury yet again.

I almost called it a zag away from that group, but in reality, the Orioles would be zagging into it. And to the extent on can get a weird feeling just thinking about how the first overall pick is going to go, the clear track record this front office has established means the idea of what they do with this pick and how it’s going to be received is already making me a little uncomfortable.

To recap: in 2019, the Orioles’ first overall pick was Rutschman, who was part of a two-man elite tier of draft prospects along with prep shortstop Bobby Witt Jr. A year later, picking second overall, they took slugging Arkansas outfielder Heston Kjerstad over players ranked higher publicly, including Vanderbilt infielder Austin Martin. Top-rated prep talents like Brady House and Jordan Lawler, plus Vanderbilt ace Kumar Rocker, were on the board at No. 5 overall in 2021 when the Orioles selected Sam Houston outfielder Colton Cowser.

In each case – even Rutschman – the Orioles signed their top pick for below the allotted slot value to enhance the quality of talent they could take with later picks. Rutschman’s $8.1 million bonus was still a record, but the slot was $8.42 million. Most of the difference went to prep shortstop Gunnar Henderson, who in the draft process had limited contact with the Orioles but fell out of the first round and was their pick at No. 42. He’s now their No. 4 overall prospect, according to Baseball America, and is a consensus top-100 prospect in the game after reaching Double-A last year.

The Orioles got an infielder into the top-100. What will the next sign of progress for the farm be?

The shortened 2020 draft featured just five rounds, and as such, the Orioles used Kjerstad’s below-slot agreement at $5.2 million (slot was $7.79 million) to go over $1 million above slot for each of their last two picks – prep slugger Coby Mayo and Iowa high school right-hander Carter Baumler.

Consensus on both Kjerstad and Cowser were that they were end-of-the-top-10 talents, so it was a bit less of a shock when the Orioles took the latter fifth overall with a $4.9 million bonus (slot was $6.18 million). The savings there helped them pay overslot bonuses to draft-eligible sophomore outfielder John Rhodes and Texas prep catcher Creed Willems, who I have smiled at the thought of since watching this video around draft time.

After each draft, Orioles officials were adamant that they picked the player they believed to be the best on the board. Of course they would. But it’s also their belief, and their beliefs are pretty specific, and informed by a lot of different factors. 

Meet Chandler Couch, the Orioles' scouting coordinator carving out a crucial role for herself in their draft prep

They have an underrated and experienced amateur scouting department that does homework on players’ backgrounds, for starters. They have analysts who break down the reams of data available on amateur players, and there’s simply a lot more of that information available for college players who have full seasons and summers at stadiums with data-tracking equipment than the high school showcase circuit can provide. More data means better modeling, and can give those college players a leg up.

That’s before the human element of decision-making comes in, and the Orioles have given the appearance of being dogmatic in how they apply these beliefs. My understanding is they haven’t deviated from best-player-available in recent drafts, and at least from the outside, it seems that draft board is constructed based on a model that heavily weighs both the markers that makes college hitters project well as big leaguers and the inherent risk in drafting pitchers.

Fortunately, it doesn’t seem like the top of the draft will feature any arms in the Orioles’ range, which will make that tired aspect of the draft moot. (I believe when I’m told they do more work on pitchers than any other group of players, but have just come to understand that whenever there pick comes up it’s really likely there’s going to be a hitter atop their board that they like more.)

We just haven’t gotten to see how a potentially elite high school hitter would stack up for the Orioles, and this draft seems to feature three such options. Atlanta-area prep stars Druw Jones and Termarr Johnson, plus Florida high school outfielder Elijah Green, are consensus top prospects in this draft. Given their age and current talent levels, and what the Orioles have established in their minor league hitting program, the amount of upside possible there simply doesn’t exist in their system.

Baseball America @BaseballAmerica

There’s plenty to like in the 2022 class 😈💪 baseballamerica.com/rankings/2022-…

baseballamerica.com2022 MLB Draft Top 200 ProspectsUpdated scouting reports and information on the top 200 players in the 2022 draft class.

Most rankings also feature some players who history shows the Orioles might look favorably on: infielders Brooks Lee (Cal Poly), Jace Jung (Texas Tech), Jacob Berry (LSU), and Robert Moore (Arkansas), plus outfielders Chase DeLauter (James Madison), Brock Jones (Stanford), and Gavin Cross (Virginia Tech). 

The Orioles will have years of scouting and data reports on them, have seen them against high-level competition last summer either for the US Collegiate National Team or on Cape Cod, and hold plenty of conviction over what they could become as pros. They’ll also have leverage from a negotiating standpoint, should their view of the best player available be one that also allows them to allocate a couple million dollars of his bonus pool allotment to later picks.

All those decisions will be made in July as the draft nears. There’s four months worth of scouting and meetings between now and then, and so much will change in the interim.

One thing that won’t change, though, is the likelihood the Orioles aren’t much to watch at the major league level and how interested fans are in what they do for the future, meaning draft prep amongst the locals is well-underway. If, as in years past, anyone chooses to lock onto one particular player as the only right pick, fair warning: you might be creating a scenario where it happens again.