Stephen Strasburg Not The First No. 1 Pick In D.C. History

In three days, the Washington Nationals will know if the hell of the past two months was worth it. At one second to midnight on August 17^th, the team will be either pitcher rich and dollar poor, or the other way around.

And frankly, I’m not sure which is the better scenario at the moment.

But if nothing else, having the No. 1 pick in the draft, and drafting the No. 1 college pitcher ever, has given the Nationals a great deal of national media attention.

Granted, it has been mostly bad, but any Hollywood starlet will tell you that the only kind of bad press is no press at all.

Getting the top pick in the draft doesn’t happen often. In fact, this year was the first time in the franchise’s 40-year history that they’ve had the “honor” of picking first and is in elite company as one of just eight teams who have picked first just once.

Here are the five franchises with the most No. 1 picks since 1965, the first year of the draft:

5—New York Mets (’66, ’68, ’80, ’84, ’94)

5—San Diego Padres (’70, ’72, ’74, ’88, ’04)

4—Seattle Mariners (’79, ’81, ’87, ’93)

4—Tampa Bay Rays (’99, ’03, ’07, ’08)

3—Pittsburgh Pirates (’86, ’96, ’02)

For the most part, it looks like multiple No. 1 picks don’t tend to help in the long run.

Though this is the first top pick for the Nationals, it isn’t the first for Washington baseball. In 1969, the Washington Senators had the top pick in the draft and selected Long Beach California high schooler Jeff Burroughs.

He signed for $88,000. That's about $500,000 in today's money, or about 1/40th of what Strasburg will likely get.

The next morning, the Washington Post’s sports page had a huge photo of Burroughs in a pinstriped uniform holding a bat in front of him. He had a huge smile on his face.

But remember, this was 1969. We had never heard of him, or any of the other picks in the first round. We just hoped that he was good.

You would think that the Senators would have screwed up the pick—Bob Short was the owner/general manager by then—but really, it was a pretty good choice. There were only a few first rounders that year that made an impact in the major leagues.

J.R. Richard was the number-two pick, and while his 107-71 record was excellent, he suffered a stroke in 1980 at the age of 30 and never pitched in the major leagues again. 

Dan Stanhouse was chosen ninth by the Athletics and had a poor 38-54 record, but was best known as the reliever for the Baltimore Orioles that, according to Earl Weaver, "caused him to smoke three packs of cigarettes watching him try to close out the game."

Pitcher Don Gullett (14^th pick, Reds) won 101 games but retired in 1978. Roger Metzger (16^th pick, Astros) was a good field, no-hit short stop who cut off the tops of four of his fingers in a kitchen accident in 1979. Luckily, he couldn't hit any worse than he did with all his digits.

Gorman Thomas was selected 21^st by the Seattle Mariners/Milwaukee Brewers. While he hit 268 home runs, he also had a .225 career batting average and a .324 on-base percentage.

Burroughs tore up the Appalachian League in his first year, batting .355-6-48 for Wytheville in 52 games. He was promoted to Triple-A Denver of the American Association in 1970 and, as a 19-year-old, batted .269-17-71 in 115 games.

Burroughs got a cup-of-coffee with the Senators that September. His California laid-back, surfer-dude lifestyle often clashed with manager Ted Williams, who was as wired as a Chihuahua on speed. That said, Burroughs later said that Williams taught him more about baseball than anyone else during his career.

He played most of the next two seasons with Denver before joining the Texas Rangers for good in 1973. As a 22-year-old rookie, Burroughs hit .279-30-85.

Burroughs was hindered by a stiff south wind that blew in from left field at Arlington Stadium. In four full seasons with the Rangers, he hit just 35 home runs at home while stroking 68 on the road. He tried to make up for this handicap by swinging harder, which just led to more strikeouts.

Burroughs played for the Rangers, Braves, Mariners, Blue Jays and Athletics, hitting 240 homers and driving in 882 runs. He was a two-time All Star and was the American League MVP in 1974, joining Chipper Jones, Ken Griffey Jr. and Alex Rodriguez as the only top draft picks to win the award.

Defensively, he was every bit as good as Adam Dunn, if you get my meaning. One spring, he announced that his goal was to win the Gold Glove, to which teammate Joe Lovitto said, “It could happen. You don’t make any errors because you get to the ball after it stops rolling.”

He returned to Long Beach after retiring and helped coach the local Little League team which, led by his son Sean, won the championship in both 1992 and 1993. Sean eventually became a major leaguer too, but not with great success.

The younger Burroughs was nicknamed “The Bachelor” because all he could hit were singles. He hit just 11 home runs in more than 1,500 major league at-bats.

If Strasburg signs—a big if—he would do well to have a major league career as good as Jeff Burroughs. Sure, he wasn’t a super star, but he was a very good player, someone who could be counted on to hit .270-30-90 during his prime. For his career, Burroughs averaged .261-23-85 with a .365 on-base percentage.

A pitcher’s equivalent would be something like 16-12, 3.65 with a 2:1 strikeout to walk ratio. And yes, Strasburg could do so much more, but with Jordan Zimmermann’s elbow still quivering in the breeze, I think we’d all take “good” right now.

Even for $25 million.