Brewers Draft: Complete Draft grades for the Brewers 2024 Draft class

The 2024 MLB Draft has come and gone and the Milwaukee Brewers have made 22 selections. How did the Brewers do with all those picks?

Before we get into the grades, we need to remember a standard caveat here. We won't truly know how good these picks were for at least another 3-5 years. Drafts can look good on paper now, or even look terrible on paper now but that can all flip on its head as players develop.

These initial grades can serve to help us understand how the Brewers did in the Draft in the moment and can be looked back on as a check of just how right...or wrong the Draft experts were at the time. With all that said, let's get into the report card.

Round 1 - Braylon Payne, OF
Grade: C+

Braylon Payne was a surprise selection in the first round. Most prognosticators had Payne outside the Top 50 prospects in the Draft and the Brewers took him at 17 overall. The Brewers are going to save a bunch of money in their signing bonus pool with this pick as Payne's a well under-slot selection. That's a large reason why they took him here.

There's still a lot of good in Payne's profile. He's incredibly fast, and should end up as an elite glove in centerfield because of it. He'll steal a ton of bases and he's still just 17 years old, so there's a lot of room for projection and growth.

However, there are some drawbacks. The hit tool is very raw and may never be above-average, which it'll need to be in order to make full use of his speed on the bases. Power is presently not there, but perhaps could show up with added strength as he physically matures and gets stronger. The throwing arm also is not great, it should be good enough for centerfield, but is nothing special.

Payne described himself as a five tool player and perhaps he could be in time. In order for this grade to improve, he'll have to develop into that. Payne will most likely not be moving quickly through the minor leagues and so much is dependent on that bat developing. Yes, the Brewers were looking to save money here, but there were other options on the board where they could've saved money with a little less risk in the profile.

Round CB-A - Blake Burke, 1B
Grade: B

Blake Burke played a big role on a National Championship team with the Tennessee Volunteers. He was a slugger in the heart of that powerful lineup and productive college bats always catch the Brewers attention.

However, Burke is a first base-only profile. There is no chance he can play third base, there is no corner outfield spot for him, he is a first baseman on a DH, making pretty much everything dependent on the bat here.

The good news is, it's a pretty good bat and a left-handed slugger with a pretty strong hit tool should thrive in American Family Field. It seemed a little early for Burke, and it should save some money. He could move quickly through the system, but with Tyler Black, Brock Wilken, Mike Boeve, and now Burke, the Brewers all of a sudden have a logjam of corner infielders.

Round 2 - Bryce Meccage, RHP
Round CB-B - Chris Levonas, RHP
Grade: A

I'm going to loop these two picks together because they're very similar, they went back to back, and they're the two best picks of the Brewers draft class in my opinion.

The Brewers took big swings on upside here late on Day 1 and they're the targets the Brewers were saving money for with their first two selections similar to what Eric Bitonti and Cooper Pratt were last year.

Meccage and Levonas have "top of the rotation upside" according to Brewers scouting director Tod Johnson. Their fastballs are already up in the mid-90s and both have a pair of high spin rate sliders and curveballs. The Brewers love high spin rates in their pitchers and both these guys have full starter's arsenals to work with in the pitching lab.

High school right-handed pitchers are the riskiest demographic there is in the MLB Draft. That inherent risk and how far away these two arms are from contributing to the big league level is what keeps this grade from being an A+. There's a lot to like here and these two pitchers will likely be the highest rated prospects from this class when the Brewers top prospects list gets updated.

Day 3

Round 11 - Caedmon Parker, RHP
Round 12 - Tyson Hardin, RHP
Grade: A-

The Brewers start Day 3 with some guaranteed signs with college relievers. However, the Brewers will send both out as starting pitchers initially and there's reason to believe they could make that jump. Parker has big time stuff and a full arsenal while Hardin had a great season at Mississippi State.

It was a decade ago the Brewers took a Mississippi State reliever early on Day 3 and turned him into a starting pitcher. The Brandon Woodruff experiment turned out to be quite the success. Perhaps Hardin could follow in those footsteps. However, I'm not trying to put that expectation on Hardin to be that, but it is a possibility. These two won't cost the bonus pool anything and they could develop into big leaguers.

Round 13 - Joey Broughton, LHP
Round 14 - James Nunnallee, C
Grade: A+, if both signed

Now we get into the tough part of Day 3 and signability questions. If the Brewers are able to save enough money to sign both away from college commitments, this will be a huge coup on the third day and both prospects could soon enter the Brewers top 30 prospects list.

Let's start with Broughton. A lefty pitcher, Broughton has a big fastball that has great movement on it and a pair of breaking balls with big time spin rates. He's like the left-handed version of Meccage and Levonas, except perhaps a little more raw with the command. He had more of an early Day 2 grade but could have second round value. His stock fell a bit after an injury this spring and the Brewers nabbed him on Day 3 and if he signs, that's a big lefty pitching prospect to add.

James Nunnallee would be an equally huge signing. High school catchers are also notoriously risky and take a long time to develop. But Nunnallee was a second round talent by some prognosticators and he's committed to UVA. A left handed hitting catcher with great bat to ball skills and potentially some power to come could be the future behind the plate for Milwaukee. If they get him to sign, he likely becomes the Brewers top catching prospect behind Jeferson Quero.

Round 15 - Travis Smith, RHP
Grade: A

Smith is a pitcher who was ranked far higher than he went and as a college pitcher, his leverage is much lower than any of these high school picks. There may be some thought that Smith won't sign as he's committed to Mississippi State in the transfer portal, but while returning to school as a senior may get Smith a Day 2 pick next year, the money will likely be lower.

Smith has really good stuff, and is getting further away from Tommy John surgery. His ERA was bad, but the pitch data is good and he should get better results being beyond his first year back from surgery.

Round 16 - Jayden Dubanewicz, RHP
Round 17 - Cooper Malamazian, SS
Round 18 - Tyler Renz, RHP
Round 19 - Noah Wech, RHP
Round 20 - Henry Brummel, RHP

Grade:
If 3 of 5 sign, A+
If 2 of 5 sign, A-
If 1 of 5 sign, C
If 0 of 5 sign, D

Five more high school dart throws to finish out the Draft for the Brewers. They won't be able to sign all of them. Dubanewicz is committed to Florida, Malamazian and Brummel to Indiana, Wech to Oklahoma State, and Renz is committed to St. Johns. They will all be tough to get but the Brewers should have enough money left to convince some of them to sign.

Renz is the highest rated and is going to the lowest profile school, so getting him would be a big signing. Malamazian is an exciting player with speed to burn and a strong hit tool. If the Brewers can sign him, that's another exciting late addition like Josh Adamczewski last year. If I had to pick just two to sign from this group of five, those two would be my choices.

The four pitchers are all very similar profiles. They sit in the upper-80s or low-90s with their fastballs and have breaking pitches with high spin rates and very projectable body types to go with it.

Overall Draft
Grade: B+

Overall it was another solid Draft class for the Brewers front office. A lot will depend on how many of those Day 3 picks sign. Last year the Brewers got way more than most expected and Tod Johnson expects they'll sign a similar amount of Day 3 prepsters this year.

The top of this Draft class is different than last year's though. While Wilken was under-slot, he was a college performer that was expected to go first round, could move quickly, and has a very high floor. Payne was a surprise first rounder and the Brewers can only save 25% maximum on that slot value since he was a Combine attendee.

The risk with Payne is super high. There's a ton of risk in this Brewers Draft class in general, actually. There's a lot of pressure on the high school pitchers to carry this class, the riskiest basket you could possibly put your eggs in.

The most surefire big league contributor from this group might be Blake Burke. Even then, he's probably an average-ish defender at first base and likely a DH eventually.

With so many pitchers, even though the risk level is high on most of them, the Brewers pitching development staff is arguably the best in baseball and they should be able to develop at least one or two of these arms into major league contributors. If at least one of Meccage and Levonas, plus one more pitcher from the rest of this class turn into useful arms, this will go down as a very good Draft class.