From Wayne Gomes to Cole Hamels, Mike Arbuckle’s 16 years of hits and misses as the Phillies’ scouting director

Mike Arbuckle, who is retiring from baseball at the end of October after 40 seasons, spent 16 years with the Phillies.

Here’s a look at the hits and misses in the team’s 16 drafts during Arbuckle’s time first as the scouting director and later as the assistant general manager in charge of scouting and player development. The WAR (wins above replacement) calculations are from BaseballReference.com.

Comment: Rolen’s 70.1 career WAR was the second highest of any player in the 1993 draft behind first overall pick Alex Rodriguez and by far the highest of any player ever taken 46th overall. Kevin Sefcik had a seven-year career as a 33rd round pick.

Arbuckle on Rolen’s 2002 departure: “To watch him grow up and to come through our system and become Rookie of the Year … and to see the situation develop to the point he wanted out … that was a tough pill to swallow at the time.”

Comment: Wendell Magee, a 12th-round pick, was the only player in the draft with a positive WAR at 0.1.

Comment: Roy Halladay was taken three picks after Taylor. Anderson’s career WAR ranked 21st among the top 100 players drafted that year.

Arbuckle on the Taylor draft: “Roy Halladay was almost a Phillie out of high school. I had seen him good and Marti [Wolever] had seen him good, but our cross-checker who saw him later in the spring thought his arm action was funky and he was not throwing as well, so we backpedaled and took Reggie Taylor. Obviously that was one of the biggest mistakes I ever made as the scouting director.”

Comment: Arbuckle struck gold a second time with the 46th pick. Rollins' career 47.6 WAR is the best of any player taken in the 1996 draft.

Arbuckle on Rollins: “I had other scouting directors say to me, ‘Wow, I couldn’t have taken him there because he’s such a little guy.’ I would just chuckle to myself. My view was that Jimmy wasn’t a little guy. He was a short guy with body strength.”

» READ MORE: Mike Arbuckle’s 40-year baseball journey left an indelible mark on Phillies history

Comment: The Phillies failed to sign Drew after long and controversial discussions with agent Scott Boras. Wolf’s career WAR was seventh best among the players who signed in that draft.

Arbuckle on Drew: “For me, it was like a 12-month root canal.”

Arbuckle on Wolf: “The day I saw him pitch in college, he got knocked out in the second or third inning and I told our area scout to get me out there because the more I saw him the less apt I was going to be to draft him. But when the time came, I trusted our people who told me I didn’t see the real Randy Wolf that day.”

Comment: Burrell’s career WAR ranked sixth among the first-round picks in the 1998 draft, but his 292 home runs ranked first. This was by far Arbuckle’s deepest draft.

Ed Wade on Madson: “My job was to make sure we could get the money to take the guys that Mike wanted to take and the Madson thing was one of those times I had to go down and have that conversation with David Montgomery. David knew if Mike had the passion for the player that it was incumbent upon us to get him.”

Comment: Myers had the seventh-best WAR among 1999 first-round picks. Byrd’s greatest success came after he left the Phillies.

Arbuckle on Myers: “I wanted to take a kid from Washington by the name of Jason Stumm, but fortunately I listened to our people.”

Comment: Utley was the best player taken in that draft and remains the best 15th overall selection in draft history.

Arbuckle on Utley: “It still to this day floors me that he didn’t sign with the Dodgers out of high school.”

Comment: Only fifth overall pick Mark Teixeira hit more career home runs than Howard among the players in the 2001 draft.

Arbuckle on Howard: “By that point, Marti was running the draft and he and our area scout Jerry Lafferty would not give up on him even though he had a rough junior year.”

Comment: Only sixth overall pick Zack Greinke and second-round selection Joey Votto have a higher career WAR than Hamels from the 2002 draft.

Arbuckle on Hamels: “The guy I would have to tip my hat to on that one is [team physician] Dr. [Michael] Ciccotti because that spring there were clubs who were out on him entirely because they thought he was too high of a medical risk. But Dr. Ciccotti knew the doctor in San Diego that had worked on Cole’s arm and they talked. Dr. Ciccotti said he had no reservations about Cole’s health.”

Comment: The Phillies did not have a pick in the first two rounds, but Bourn ended up with the fifth-best career WAR among players taken in the first four rounds. The Phillies used him to acquire Brad Lidge from Houston before the 2008 season.

Comment: Gio Gonzalez was the best player taken after Golson in the first round. Happ’s 22.3 career WAR was the best among players taken in the third round and the Phillies used him to acquire Roy Oswalt in 2010.

Comment: San Diego took Chase Headley one pick after Archbishop Carroll’s Costanzo. Outman was part of the deal that brought the Phillies Joe Blanton in 2008.

Comment: Another draft in which the players did not pan out, but the Phillies used Drabek in the 2009 deal to acquire Roy Halladay, Cardenas in the deal to get Blanton and Jason Donald in the 2009 deal to get Cliff Lee.

Comment: Rick Porcello was taken eight picks after Savery and Josh Donaldson was taken 11 picks after d’Arnaud, who is just starting to turn into a good player with the Atlanta Braves. The Phillies used d’Arnaud to help them get Halladay.

Comment: The Phillies' final draft with Arbuckle still in the fold is a fascinating one. Hewitt and Collier were the only first-round selections during his tenure that failed to make it to the big leagues. St. Louis took Lance Lynn after both of them and Colorado took Charlie Blackmon 21 picks after Gose in the second round. On the positive side, the Phillies used Gose in the 2010 deal for Roy Oswalt, Worley was the true fifth ace in 2011 and the Phillies used Cosart in the deal that brought them Hunter Pence in 2011.