The problem that comes with drafting players with the knowledge that you will probably trade the more succesful players in that given draft is that you are under immense pressure to consistently draft strong enough prospects that are good enough trade bait, furthermore you have to keep just enough of the stronger prospects so that they may be used in the majors as needed throughout the marathon MLB season.
It is a strategy that can be used far more effectively in the larger market teams that can afford to trade pretty much any decent prospect in their organization for high priced big league talent because even when they run out of prospects that can always pick up someone via free agency. The Yankees and Red Sox are prime examples in this case and it looks like the Cubs are heading that way. The problem of course is that this method is EXPENSIVE...for both the club and their fans.
Small market teams like Oakland and Florida must rely solely on their farm and drafts to consistently bring up fresh new talent as the "seasoned" (aka "expensive") veterans become free agents and undoubtedly move on to bigger and better things (ala Soriano, Vlad Guerrero a few years back, pretty much any Marlin, ditto the A's, and again ditto for pretty much any Expo of the mid-late 90's).
Is the best answer, as is most usually the case, in between these two extremes? I don't know. IMO this is where the Cardinals lay in the spectrum and it has brought as a very succesfull decade so far....and that World Series Championship. But the Marlins and Yankees/Red Sox have also won somewhat recently which suggests that the middle ground isn't always the correct solution.
But as long as the Cubs continue to be completely useless by September then all will be well :-) (Sorry, had to fill my weekly Cub bashing quota)
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