NEWSLETTER
The Milwaukee Brewers are set to make their first-round selection in the 2024 MLB Draft with the 17th overall pick.
Exploring Potential Fits for the Milwaukee Brewers in the 1st Round of the 2024 MLB Draft
It’s a new week, which means we’ve got updated mock drafts from the game’s biggest names, now complete with intel from the MLB Draft Combine, which took place at Chase Field in Arizona last week. Let’s start with the latest mock draft from MLB.com, a collaborative effort between Jim Callis, Jonathan Mayo, and Brendan Samson.
MLB.com has the Milwaukee Brewers taking Oklahoma State outfielder Carson Benge with the seventeenth overall selection in next month’s MLB Draft. However, as Jonathan Mayo points out, many of the names in this range are interchangeable in a very top-heavy draft.
“A lot of these names are kind of interchangeable. Jim and I are at the point now where we’re talking to teams all the time, and it’s either, ‘Yeah, in this scenario, I guess I would consider him,’ or like, ‘Hey, is there any chance this guy could get down to me from this same bucket?’ And Benge is in that bucket.”
ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel also has the Brewers taking Benge at No. 17. So, while the group of players who will likely be available here may be interchangeable, the read on Milwaukee seems to point to Benge. Here’s what McDaniel had to say about the Benge selection for Milwaukee:
“I’m hearing Milwaukee is on Benge at this pick, and he fits their type of hitter: up-the-middle fit, contact first, with some doable minor swing/approach adjustments to make. Rocket-armed righty Brody Brecht fits the Brewers’ stuff-first approach on pitching (I think he’s the second option at this pick), as does prep righty William Schmidt. College position players Malcolm Moore and Kaelen Culpepper also come up as candidates here. For later picks, prep SS Luke Dickerson comes up along with the players I mocked to them.”
Over at The Athletic, Keith Law has Milwaukee going the college bat route as well, but he has the Brew Crew taking Florida State’s Cam Smith.
“The Brewers scored last year when the loaded draft class pushed Wake Forest’s Brock Wilken down to their pick, and my best guess right now is that they’ll do something similar this year — be prepared to take whoever happens to “fall” to their pick even though the player should probably go higher, like Cam Smith or Waldschmidt.”
Ultimately, this lines up with the Brewers’ recent first-round moves. Since 2019, six of the seven players the Brewers have selected in the first round have been collegiate players.
