In 2020, the COVID pandemic resulted in a stilted cadence to the typical draft evaluation process. Nevertheless, the draft continued onward and the Royals picked Asa Lacy fourth overall. However, the Royals recently released Lacy, who threw only 80 professional innings in the minors since being drafted.
Lacy had only 4 starts and 24 innings pitched in the 2020 college season before it was shut down prior to the draft. He put 88+ innings on tape in 2019, but across his three seasons at Texas A&M we’re
talking 152 innings. Something like a quarter of those innings came as a reliever in 2018. Lacy was no exception – Max Meyer, who was picked third overall, had 148 innings of college tape with an even higher percentage of innings as a reliever.
All this to emphasize – teams were working with precious little data going into the 2020 MLB draft.
Having said that, the industry still did its normal rankings process. FanGraphs rankings had Lacy at number 2. MLB Pipeline had Lacy at number 3. Max mentioned in his early news article about Lacy’s release that Baseball America also had Lacy at number 3.
Again, all this to emphasize – given the limited information everyone had, the industry held Lacy in high regard. Picking him at fourth overall was a totally reasonable pick.
But, it being 2026, we have a lot more information on how the other players picked in that draft panned out. Could the Royals have made a “better” decision? I don’t really think they could have given the information at the time, results-based analysis, blah blah blah. But let’s look anyway!
You can see the whole first round on Baseball Reference here.
Spencer Torkelson went first overall to the Tigers. As a guy who made it to the major leagues and is still playing for the Tigers in 2026, picking Tork went better for them than picking Lacy did for the Royals. But that’s not much of a bar to clear. Tork’s accrued 2.6 fWAR across 2200 plate appearances, something like a 0.7/600 PA fWAR pace. He has two 30+ homer seasons but his career wRC+ is exactly 100 to this point. Not what you want from a first baseman, but he’s only 26. Maybe there’s more to come.
Heston Kjerstad went second overall to the Orioles. He also made it to the majors but has yet to make an impact with a career wRC+ of 83 and a negative fWAR.
Max Meyer went third overall to the Marlins and is maybe only just now emerging. He made a handful of starts in 2024/25 but the cumulative performance was about replacement level. This season, he has five roughly average-ish starts under his belt and may grow into a contributor for another team after the Marlins inevitably trade him.
Austin Martin went fifth overall to the Blue Jays. He never played a game at the MLB level for the Blue Jays as they traded him to the Twins for José Berríos at the trade deadline in 2021. Martin showed an Isaac Collins-like performance in 2025 – high OBP, low power, OF spot – and is really showing out so far in 2026 with a .484 OBP in 62 plate appearances. He is 27 years old and who knows what else he’s got in the tank.
Emerson Hancock went sixth overall to the Mariners and has mostly forgettable/replaceable performance prior to 2026. Similar to Max Meyer though, he has taken a step forward *so far* this season with a FIP under 4 and ERA under 3 in 5 starts. We’ll see if that holds.
Nick Gonzales was taken 7th overall by the Pirates and has a career 83 wRC+ in almost 1000 plate appearances. Robert Hassell III was picked 8th overall by the Padres and was the first high school player selected. He has 70 games of bad hitting so far, but he’s only 24. Zac Veen was taken by the Rockies at 9 and hasn’t hit since AA. Reid Detmers was taken 10th overall by the Angels, has shown some promise, and is not yet 27.
You can keep going on this kind of analysis yourself if you’d like. The next guy was Garrett Crochet, who has been excellent for the past two season but is getting knocked around this season. Pete Crow-Armstrong was taken 19th by the Mets and just signed a big extension.
Overall, six guys taken in the first around in 2020 never made the majors. Lacy just happens to be the highest pick of those guys. To me, that’s roughly a normal rate for the first round as a whole. It’s unfortunate that it happened to a guy picked fourth overall with such a high prospect evaluation. Typically a guy picked that high *does* at least make it to the majors. But I think the Royals made a good pick with the information they had, and they’re not the only team whose pick in this particular first round did not work out.
I hope Lacy can get healthy and catch on somewhere, if that’s what he wants.
