There has been a notion going around that the Cincinnati Reds can’t draft and develop position players or hitters for a while not. Looking at their current big league team they have developed Jay Bruce, Joey Votto, Devin Mesoraco, Billy Hamilton, Zack Cozart and Tucker Barnhart. There’s varied degrees of success in there, particularly when it comes to what those guys can do at the plate. A large part of the thought that goes into the part that the Reds can’t develop hitters is that since Devin Mesoraco showed up in 2012, the team hasn’t brought in an every day player who has shown that they can hit. Couple that with a minor league system that’s full of pitchers and lacking on too many hitters and the theory starts to make more sense.

That’s a big deal given that the Cincinnati Reds have the 2nd overall pick in the 2016 draft. The fact that there seem to be more hitters available than pitchers makes that even more important as the Reds are more likely to draft a guy who hits than one who pitches, regardless of the “need” of the organization, the pure numbers just suggest it’s more likely to happen.

Baseball, unlike the other big sport drafts, is an enormous crapshoot. While this chart is now 7 years old, and a little bit has changed since it came out, it still holds true for the most part. This shows the average WAR posted by a draft pick taken at each spot in the draft, with all credit to The Baseball Analysts.

Take a look at the big drop off from the very top, which is likely anchored and skewed by a few inner circle Hall of Famers (Alex Rodriguez, Ken Griffey Jr and Chipper Jones). Once you reach the 50th pick in the draft, the decline becomes pretty stagnant, but steady as you get further down the draft.

What that tells us is likely that once you get to that point in the draft, it’s pretty much up to chance rather than some set of skill identification ability or development ability of a team.

Chris Buckley is the Cincinnati Reds Director of Amateur Scouting and essentially runs the draft for the team. He’s been in the job since the 2006 season and from 2006-2011 every first pick he selected made it to the Major Leagues as a starting position player or a starting pitcher, and the next few years resulted in guys that are top prospects in the system.

Despite that kind of success, Buckley and the Reds scouts and development team have a current stigma that they can’t draft and develop position players. With the chart above in mind, let’s take a look at the position players that the Cincinnati Reds have drafted in his time inside of the Top 50 players taken in the draft.

Drew Stubbs was the first pick that Buckley ever made as a Reds employee. While there’s plenty of people who think he was a poor selection, it’s worth noting that he went 8th overall and still has the 6th most WAR from that 1st round. He was a very successful pick. The next draft saw the Reds take two position players in the Top 50 and both turned into future All-Stars in Devin Mesoraco and Todd Frazier.

In 2008 Buckley and the Reds scouts had another Top 10 pick and they took Yonder Alonso with the 7th overall pick. He didn’t get much time with the Reds as he was blocked by Joey Votto before he was traded to San Diego. Playing in Petco really put a damper on his numbers on the surface, but his OPS+ for his career says he’s an above-average hitter (105, where 100 is average). He hasn’t been great, and for his position he’s a below-average hitter, but overall, he’s an above-average hitter.

The next time that the Reds selected a position player in the Top 50 was in 2010 when they took Yasmani Grandal. He never played for the Reds as he was traded before reaching the big leagues, though he did reach Triple-A with the organization. In his big league career he’s posted a 115 OPS+, which is well above-average overall and very, very good for a catcher.

After 2011 where the organization selected a pitcher with their only pick in the Top 80, the team picked up Jesse Winker with the 49th overall pick in 2012. He hasn’t yet reached the big leagues, but he’s currently one of the top position prospects in all of the minor leagues. That was followed up in 2013 with the selection of Phillip Ervin. The 23-year-old is hitting .223/.347/.466 for Double-A Pensacola this season. The average is lower than you’d like to see, but his .813 OPS is 127 points better than the league average OPS, so he’s certainly producing. He’s also added 14 steals in 15 attempts.

In 2014 the Reds had two picks in the top 30, going with a pitcher at 19 and then selecting Alex Blandino 29th overall. He got out to a slow start in 2016 after beginning the year on the disabled list, but has been crushing the ball lately. He’s one of the Reds Top 10 prospects no matter which prospect list you look at (though I’d suggest looking at mine).

Then last season the team selected Tyler Stephenson in the first round and a pitcher with their 49th overall pick.

Let’s recap all of the position players that the team has selected inside of the Top 50 since Chris Buckley took over as the Director of Amateur Scouting for the Reds in 2006:

Drew Stubbs

Devin Mesoraco

Todd Frazier

Yonder Alonso

Yasmani Grandal

Jesse Winker

Phillip Ervin

Alex Blandino

Tyler Stephenson

That’s a heck of a list with no one who has been truly missed on. While the latter four haven’t reached the big leagues yet, none of them have shown anything to suggest that they can’t and only Tyler Stephenson isn’t in Double-A or Triple-A. Essentially, the Reds drafting and developing of position players taken inside of the Top 50 has been very good. So, why is it that they have the stigma that they can’t draft-and-develop position players?

Part of it may be simply because since 2010 they’ve only taken four position players inside of the Top 50, selecting Jesse Winker in 2012 being the furthest player back and he’s all of 22-years-old. Both Ervin and Blandino are a tad older than Winker is, but have also had less time to come through the system since they were selected in 2013 and 2014.

The theory that the Reds have an issue of drafting and developing position players/hitters probably doesn’t hold much water given how they have performed in doing so. It’s more due to the fact that there’s simply been a gap since the team last produced one, in part due to how the drafts have played out for them and the trading of Yasmani Grandal and Yonder Alonso, leaving the last time the Reds drafted and developed an everyday player from the Top 50 and gotten plenty of time from that player was in the 2007 draft.