1 One-Year Snapshot
The 2008 numbers are just that, one year's worth. For example Oregon and Indiana each had 14 this year but 17 or 18 last year. Wyoming had no picks this year but 3 last year, and California went up from 260 to 288.

 2 Birth States
Not always the best indication of where a player is really from or why he was chosen. For example, as you'd expect, many of the top states by numerical count are in the sun belt, but not all. There has to be something in the programs in Illinois and Washington and Ohio that generate such relatively high numbers of draftees. Or else more of these kids move while growing up.

3 School Factor
Players chosen at younger ages tend to be more of a gamble than college players. For example, the remarkable results from Vanderbilt (16 picks in 2007 and 2008), clearly demonstrate that program's success, and you can expect more of those players to do well than those from a particular high school. Also, many of the foreign-born college-age players selected are scouted while playing at U.S. universities.

4 Countries
This may be the most misleading chart. Clearly the US is in the forefront, but the D.R. has surprisingly low numbers - considering the final percentage of MLB players who come from that island nation of 9 million. And even though there might be more Canadians playing currently in the MLB than, say, Japanese, everyone understands that players from Japan - and Venezuela, the D.R., Cuba, and elsewhere - take a very different route to the pros - they don't come from the draft, and they usually come almost MLB ready. The American (and Canadian) kids in the draft still have a lot of steps to climb.

2008 DRAFT RESULTS
By Country
US Total	1441
Canada	31
Puerto Rico	26
Dominican Republic	2
Australia	1
Netherlands	1
Venezuela	1
Virgin Islands (Brit)	1
Virgin Islands (US)	0