It was designed that way from the beginning as Major League Baseball was fearful that the very premise of a draft might be challenged on legal grounds—even if baseball was the last of the four major team sports at the time to implement a draft. There was particular concern that baseball, by instituting a draft, might ultimately jeopardize its special standing within the judicial system—namely, its sacred anti-trust exemption status that bestowed favorable treatment on baseball in 1922.

A draft, it was reasoned, would restrict a player’s ability to shop his talent in an open marketplace, and MLB was afraid that the courts would interpret that as restraint of trade—especially since many of the drafted players would not be 18, or of legal age.

The NFL, which instituted a draft in 1936, had no such issues at the time as all players were of college age and had the option of signing with the NFL, the American Football League and even the Canadian Football League. Baseball players had no such options, and MLB’s way of addressing the issue was to conduct two drafts a year—and make all junior-college players eligible in every draft.

Even as issues surrounding the legality of the draft have long since died away and the draft rules that affect junior-college players have been modified through the years—notably the abolishment of the January draft in 1987, the corresponding implementation of the draft-and-follow rule and its subsequent abolishment 20 years later—the preferred status of junior-college players in the draft remains. They still remain eligible in every draft.

Though phasing out of the draft-and-follow rule has led to the drafting of fewer junior-college players (or high school players who were earmarked to attend junior college) in the last couple of years, the level of premium talent in the junior colleges remains high. We’re posting an overall list of the top 500 prospects for the 2009 draft this week elsewhere on the PG Crosschecker website, and it will be liberally sprinkled throughout with junior-college talent. We’re also providing a raw list of the top 50 junior college prospects.

As befitting the often wild-card nature of junior-college players, the list of top prospects is a mixed bag of four-year college transfers, players that were non-qualifiers out of high school, players that elected to go the junior-college route to keep their draft options open on an annual basis.

Okaloosa-Walton (Fla.) JC freshman righthander Daniel Webb is the nation’s top-ranked junior college player. Heavily scouted out of a Kentucky high school last spring, Webb slipped to the 12th round of the draft in June because of a concern that he was a near-lock to attend the University of Kentucky. Not only did the Arizona Diamondbacks not sign Webb, but it turned out that he didn’t have the grades to enroll at Kentucky anyway—and he subsequently enrolled in junior college. As the No. 41-ranked player on our master list of the top prospects for the 2009 draft, Webb projects as a supplemental first-rounder or early second-round pick.

Righthander Ryan Weber, the No. 2-ranked player on the accompanying list of the top 10 prospects in this year’s junior-college crop, has followed an almost-identical career path as Webb—to a point of being drafted in the same 12th round in June, just two picks apart. A premium University of Florida recruit, Webb had second thoughts about enrolling at a four-year school, where he wouldn’t have been eligible for the draft again until 2011, and instead is attending St. Petersburg JC, a national junior-college power located in his hometown.

The next three players on the list, Blinn (Texas) righthander Kendal Korbal, Central Arizona lefthander Kevin Gelinas and San Jacinto (Texas) righthander Jake Cowan, are all sophomores who transferred to junior colleges after spending their freshmen seasons at four-year schools. Korbal attended Arkansas, while Gelinas was at Pepperdine and Cowan at Virginia.

The performance of the players this fall could shake up the order by the time fall practice ends, but here’s how we see the top 10 junior-college prospects for the 2009 draft (all are pitchers, coincidentally):