MLB - NL Contenders Home Grown

Now that we have reviewed the American League home grown teams lets take a look at the National League contenders.

Again, like I said within the article for the American League breakdown there is not a right or wrong way to build a team, each team has its own philosophy and some are successful and some are not.  This article is not to argue which philosophy is correct it’s intended for those curious minds that just wonder, like mine, which playoff contenders is the most “home” grown. 

The following will show the National League teams in contention and the players that were drafted by that particular team and that is on the active roster.  Again, I am only doing the teams that I believe still has a chance to make the playoffs via Division Winner or Wild Card.  I am also including foreign born players that were not drafted, because MLB teams need to go through many steps to obtain one of these particular players and most countries will not allow their players to be eligible for the draft.

National League East:  (% drafter players of Current Roster)

Atlanta Braves: (56%)                        
Luis Avilan                                                
Craig Kimbrel
Kris Medlen
Mike Minor
Julio Teheran
Alex Wood
Evan Gattis
Brian McCann
Freddie Freeman
Andrelton Simmons
Todd Cunningham
Jordan Schafer
Joey Terdoslavich
Jason Heyward                                

National League Central: (% drafter players of Current Roster)
Pittsburg Pirates: (40%)                  St. Louis Cardinals: (68%)             Cincinnati Reds: (40%)
Gerrit Coles                                       Joe Kelly                                           Homer Bailey
Jared Hughes                                    Lance Lynn                                       Aroldis Chapman
Tony Watson                                    Tyler Lyons                                       Tony Cingrani
Justin Wilson                                    Seth Maness                                    Ryan Hanigan
Tony Sanchez                                   Shelby Miller                                    Devin Mesoraco
Pedro Alvarez                                   Trevor Rosenthal                            Zack Cozart
Jorely Mercer                                   Kevin Siegrist                                   Todd Frazier
Neil Walker                                       Micheal Wacha                               Joey Votto
Starling Marte                                  Yadier Molina                                  Jay Bruce
Andrew McCutchen                        Matt Adams                                     Chris Heisey
                                                            Matt Carpenter
                                                            Allen Craig
                                                            Daniel Oescalso
                                                            Pete Kozma
                                                            Kolten Wong
                                                            Jon Jay
                                                            Shane Robinson

National League West: (% drafter players of Current Roster)

Los Angeles Dodgers: (32%)
Kenley Jansen
Clayton Kershaw
Paco Rodriguez
Hyun-Jin Ryu
Chris Withrow
A.J. Ellis
Yasiel Puig
Matt Kemp

Wild Card: (% drafter players of Current Roster)

Arizona Diamondbacks: (32%)
Josh Collmentor
Eury De La Rosa
Wade Miley
Matt Davidson
Paul Goldschmidt
Adam Eaton
Geranda Porra
A.J. Pollock

*All Research for the Players was through www.baseball-reference.com

As you can see the Cardinals with sixty-eight percent of their current roster being filled with draft picks, they are far ahead from any other MLB team on building from within.  The closest in the National League is the Atlanta Braves at fifty-six percent.

The biggest surprise while doing the National League side is that Brandon Philips was not drafted by the Cincinnati Reds.  For your homework you drafted him?  I can't give all of the answers.