ESPN MLB Draft expert says everything about Yankees' first-round pick with silence

The New York Yankees entered the 2024 MLB Draft with a mission. Unfortunately, that mission was "weird everyone out."

New York's brass opened the proceedings with seven consecutive pitchers before taking a Grand Canyon outfielder in the eighth round. Several of those pitchers sported less-than-special collegiate statistics; the Yankees believe they can unlock their true power, and they might be right, but it still stings to read about a fleet of 5.00+ ERAs.

When the dust settled, the Yankees took a few obvious overslot candidates: Mack Estrada in the 11th round, who might be the top Junior College pitcher in the nation, and prep arm Cole Royer in the 20th, who's probably following through on his Georgia Tech commitment.

Whether the Yankees secure those two or not, they'll still have added a fleet of prototypical arms to their Arm Barn, and now it's time to get to work. So what did the experts think?

Usually, you can count on a team's first-rounder immediately impacting their top prospect list, even while their pro debut remains a twinkle over the horizon. Not according to Kylie McDaniel of ESPN. Not these Yankees. He believes second-rounder Bryce Cunningham, their best value pick, will rank highest on his next top 30 ... at No. 15. That means first-rounder Ben Hess falls below that line of demarcation in an already thinning Yankees system? Yikes.

Yankees' first-round pick lower than we can recall in already weakened ESPN Top 30

There are certainly those who like the Hess pick -- like The Athletic's Keith Law, who's garnered a reputation for being bearish on Yankees prospects (and, given their propensity to bust, he may be right). Law, in the wake of the draft, noted Hess' maxed-out extension, and admitted that you could "dream on" the righty as a "mid-rotation workhorse." That's, of course, if everything goes right, but it sounds like Lance Lynn.

All that dreaming still wasn't enough for McDaniel to rank him above another project right-hander in Cunningham in a system that's lost credibility on Oswald Peraza, Roderick Arias and Will Warren this season, while Chase Hampton has been laid up with injury. This was a prime time for any incoming first-rounder to crack the Yankees' Top 10, and Hess is too much of a question mark to comfortably do so.