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For a lot of people (just under 95 percent according to an MLB Trade Rumors poll), the Minnesota Twins' selection of California shortstop Royce Lewis with the first pick in the 2017 MLB Draft was a surprise. It shouldn't have been. Most knew there was no consensus number one pick in this draft. There were five potential number ones. The Twins took one of the five. This was originally published at FoulPlaybyPlay.com, a community for foul-mouthed, sports broadcasters providing uncensored, commercial-free play-by-play. Follow us at @FoulPlaybyPlay. Lewis can play anywhere and received the highest possible grade for his speed. Unsurprisingly, the Twins might have found another impact center fielder. Lewis already has a swing that stays in the zone a long time and allows him to barrel up a lot of balls. He struck out just seven times in 116 plate appearances this season. The mental makeup is everything you want in a player -- natural, born leader. He is still years away from the majors, so Byron Buxton fans need not worry. Many Twins fans bemoaned the pick, hoping for high school shortstop/pitcher Hunter Greene or college first baseman/pitcher Brendan McKay. Those fans shouldn't be disappointed. The Twins likely saved nearly $1 million by taking Lewis number one overall, which allowed new chief of baseball operations Derek Falvey to allocate more money to later picks. Since the Twins also selected at 35 and 37 overall, Falvey could use that money to sign more expensive or harder-to-sign draft picks that fell out of the first round. Falvey was rewarded with the best college hitter of the year. Mississippi State outfielder Brent Rooker (great baseball name) had a 1.371 OPS in 2017. He's set to become only the second player ever (Rafael Palmeiro) to win the SEC Triple Crown, batting .387/.495/.810. Some were surprised Rooker got past Oakland with the sixth pick. Then, Falvey scored Canadian high school right-handed pitcher Landon Leach. Leach is committed to Texas but could be persuaded to sign with Minnesota given the money the Twins have to offer. The approximate pick value is $1.8 million. You could say the Twins should have gone with pitching at number one overall, but that would have severely limited Falvey when offering Rooker and Leach contracts. And there's a lot of draft to go. The Twins next picks are 76 and 106. They will pick first in each of the next 36 rounds of the 2017 MLB Draft. I fully expect Falvey to target high school pitching he can develop, since that's sort of his thing. But I wouldn't be surprised if he takes Oregon State starter Jake Thompson if he's there at 76. Other pitchers ranked around that 76th pick for the Twins are right-handed pitcher Kyle Hurt (another great baseball name), and lefty Daniel Tillo, who the Twins drafted in 2015. Jackson Rutledge is interesting at 106. He's six-foot-eight and throws 94 mph with an expectation for more. While I can understand Twins fans' frustrations given the downfall of their pitching staff, there's no solution to that problem in the draft. Even Brendan McKay would likely be a year away from the majors, and perhaps more if given the time to adjust at the plate as well as on the mound. Hunter Greene has even more development time ahead of him. Evaluating a draft that can't be evaluated for at least three years is completely pointless. Reacting as if the Twins organization was "cheap" is incorrect. The Twins were "frugal," and it's already paying off.

We set a record for page views yesterday, approaching 100,000. A lot of that was on our Day 1 Draft Day thread. And starting at about the 500th comment or so, the reaction could be summarized in three letters: W. T. F. To the community’s credit, that was not the thought process immediately, when the Twins surprised everyone by picking prep shortstop Royce Lewis first overall. That’s because a good chunk of the wonks on this site understand there is a strategy that can accompany just such a pick, one which I explained in a series of tweets, starting with this one, yesterday afternoon. You can click through, but I’ll give the gist…Saving money on the first overall pick is a common strategy for MLB teams and has been used with much success. Drafting Lewis, who was considered along with Kyle Wright and Brendan McKay, to be a half step below Hunter Greene in terms of talent, could essentially give the Twins extra quality in some of their following picks. Again, click on the tweet for the details. So Lewis was the surprise pick at #1, but we heard reports that he was the pick because he gave the Twins a discount which they could use to essentially accumulate higher picks later in the draft. That’s a solid strategy; additional quality picks helps both with risk mitigation and with higher upside. And it costs nothing but a little negotiation. Plus, selfishly, it makes the rest of the night that much more fun. The Twins had two more picks last night, the 35th and 37th picks and lots of leftover money. Signing Lewis “below slot” gave them the opportunity to sign some higher ranked players who seemed to “tumble” down the draft board, not because there was anything wrong with them, but because they wanted more money than teams above the Twins in the draft (but below them in leftover money) could offer. What’s more, the most obvious of those players was a high school pitcher from Burnsville. Sam Carlson was projected to be a mid-first round pick. He’s a pitcher. He’s a hometown boy. And the fact that he was available at pick 35 made it seem like the Twins and he had conspired to allow him to fall into the Twins lap. Except that isn’t what happened. The Twins picked a college outfielder, Brent Rooker at 35. They picked a prep (Canadian) pitcher, Landon Leach, at 37. Both are legitimate top 100 prospects, but neither was a top 20 or even perceived to be a top 30 pick. In fact, one could reasonably project that both of them could also sign “under slot.” Carlson ended up going 55th to the Mariners who don’t seem to have the money to sign him. So WTF happened? We won’t find out all the signing amounts for several days, but I’ll float some scenarios, and you can add your own in the comment below. 1. Lewis didn’t sign for less than slot. I think that it’s already been reported that he did, but these moves make a lot more sense if Lewis' agent, Scott Boras, didn’t let Lewis sign for less than slot, or something happened that the Twins weren’t sure they had that extra money. 2. The Twins got sniped before #35. Whoever the Twins targeted with the 35th pick, was taken before they got their pick. Which would mean that either the player’s agent was incompetent, or the Twins didn’t get word to the player to make sure teams knew they needed to pass, or another team called their bluff or figured out a way to get their own leftover money. 3. A Carlson deal fell through. But they why do the Mariners take him at #55? They have to know they can sign him if they're going to use their second round pick on him, right? 4. The Twins have no intention of using their whole $14M draft budget. They saved money to save money. This just seems crazy. It would be a complete betrayal. 5. They're going to use the money on Day 2. OK, but now the top picks are already done. (Late add: track the Day 2 moves on Twins Daily's Day 2 Thread!) We are all left scratching our heads. Perhaps we'll get more information that clarifies what we witnessed. Or maybe this is the mess it appears to be. Click here to view the article