Grading the Yankees' last 5 first-round draft picks

On Sunday evening, the New York Yankees' prospect pool will get one player larger, as the team will welcome the 26th overall selection in the 2024 MLB Draft into the fold.

For years, the Yankees' picks -- all towards the bottom of the first round, due to decades of relative success -- mostly brought befuddlement. Plenty of similar franchises seemed to find workable chips or hidden gems in the supplemental round and below. Why were the Yankees always stuck selecting Kyle Holder?

In recent summers, though, things have turned, with the Yankees selecting bonafide major leaguers time and again. How talented they ultimately turn out to be at the level remains in question.

We're only going to be ranking the past five Yankees picks here, and plenty of their stories have yet to be written. Given all that's up in the air, we'll throw in an older one for good measure: Jon Skaggs, 2001's second first-round selection out of Rice, sure was a total bust!

Ok, now onto the judgment calls.

Ranking the New York Yankees' Past 5 First Round Draft Picks

2023: George Lombard Jr., SS

Grade: B+

Lombard Jr. was not the consensus Yankees selection at the time of the draft. Most believed they'd look in their own backyard to Sammy Stafura, a homegrown shortstop in the Anthony Volpe/grinder mode.

As it turns out, cries of, "Another shortstop?!" turned out to be accurate, but they preferred a different guy, selecting a son of a former big-leaguer as Stafura fell to the Reds.

The jury's certainly still out on the toolsy, quick-twitch Lombard Jr., and if we were basing this entire grade on his .708 OPS and trio of homers at Single-A Tampa as a 19-year-old, it'd be significantly lower. But, as eagle-eyed Yankee fans saw in the Spring Breakout game, Lombard Jr.'s talent really pops in showcases. Hopefully, next year's his year.

2022: Spencer Jones, OF

Grade: A+

Again, even if Jones -- a toolsy project still -- doesn't pan out and fulfill evaluators' dreams, it's extremely unlikely you're going to get a better shot at elite talent with the 25th pick than what the Yankees received here.

This is a top-100 prospect fighting his way through Double-A with occasional bursts of greatness while the defense manifests as upper-echelon. Jones, at his most raw, possesses almost unequaled power. No team was better suited to develop him than the Aaron Judge-led Yankees.

If it never works, the experts are wrong, and he doesn't reach the league-wide top 10 on prospect lists let alone the bigs, fine. But anyone who wants to retroactively beg for Dalton Rushing or Xavier Isaac at 25 is just looking to cause trouble for trouble's sake.

2021: Trey Sweeney, SS

Grade: B

This all hinges on Jorbit Vivas, as this point, as swapping Sweeney for Vivas and Victor González certainly didn't give the Yankees the sort of valuable left-handed reliever they were looking for.

Vivas' strong lefty bat has played up nicely in recent weeks at Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre, while Sweeney has reached the top level of the minors in the Dodgers' system, too. He's hitting .242 with 11 homers and a .739 OPS, middling numbers while displaying his still-solid-but-not-elite bat. The Yankees won't miss Sweeney if Vivas pans out, but right now, the two players seem roughly equivalent. Odd one.

2020: Austin Wells, C

Grade: B+

If Austin Wells' defensive profile continues to unexpectedly improve, the Yankees may have found a fantastic one here. Oddly, Wells' bat was supposed to be the sure thing; while he's improved month-over-month, the Yankees were certainly looking for over a .650 OPS in his rookie season.

Year 2 (2025) will be massive for Wells, as the Yankees use the rest of this season to determine their level of commitment to him. Either way, it's difficult to dog a pandemic pick who reached the majors at the end of his third minor-league season and is contributing to a playoff hopeful.

2019: Anthony Volpe, SS

Grade: A-

Despite Volpe's enigmatic status, it's difficult to grade a high school shortstop from the very, very back of the first round who's already risen so much any lower than an A. The minus comes from Volpe's confounding regressions and waffling on whether he should hit for power (yes) or contact (also yes, but don't lose the power).

The jury's still out on whether Volpe will be a future face of the franchise, and the Yankees clearly should've supplemented his rise by signing Corey Seager or Carlos Correa, both of whom would look fairly excellent at third base right about now. But in Year 2, the Yankees already have a WAR accruer with Gold Glove defense who's shown flashes of being a pest and leader. The question they now must ask themselves is why the bat keeps disappearing as the season drags, and why recent losses have affected Volpe's world-renowned motor. He's not a finished product, but he's a great first-rounder.