Pushing the draft back to July because of the coronavirus has been on the table since March, but it appears the event will take place in its typical month after all. Jon Heyman of MLB Network reports that the draft is still slated to occur June 10 – the date it was supposed to start in the first place – though it will be held virtually. Before the pandemic reared its ugly head, Omaha had been scheduled to host it from June 10-12.
[RELATED: Amateur Draft Pool Allocations]
The fact that the draft will happen virtually will be just one of the unusual aspects of this year’s event (notably, the National Football League just completed its own virtual draft last weekend). Normally 40 rounds, MLB’s draft will last just five or 10 this summer, as Craig Mish of SportsGrid tweets. Major League Baseball and the MLBPA signed off on a truncated version in the agreement they reached a month ago.
A shortened draft will obviously have a significant effect on a large number of amateur players. For instance, some high schoolers may now be more inclined to play college baseball next season, while certain college juniors who might have entered a normal draft could stay in school for another year and try their luck in 2021. There will also be a deeper pool than ever of undrafted talent.
As part of their deal, the league and the union limited undrafted players’ signing bonuses to a maximum of $20K. Meanwhile, drafted players’ up-front money will be capped at $100K in 2020, with the rest to be distributed in two equal installments from 2021-22.
Carlos Collazo said in a live chat the other day that the “industry” wants a 10-round draft (it could be cut as short as five rounds). Wasn’t clear to me whether he meant front offices, the commissioner and owners, high schools and colleges, or all three. So, I guess we’ll see.
Part of me wants this or even 5 rounds for selfish reasons.
But the question becomes does the NCAA allow these players to be eligible in 2021 if they pick to attend college
Players union is on fire right now.
Pretty sure the draft hasn’t been 40 rounds in some time.
There have been 40 rounds every year since 2012. Before that, there were 50 rounds.
Texas4 is correct, and before that, there were unlimited rounds, one year a team drafted over 100 players
62 I think
Kyle blanks
I stand corrected he was drafted in the 42nd round
Mike piazza was the 62nd
I thought piazza was 60
While the draft is 40 rounds teams typically sign 20-30. With all the international players there just aren’t enough roster spots for more. So they’ll take a lot of high school players between 20 and 40 knowing these kids will go off to college.
Man MLB should really be pushing this. NFL draft just had huge ratings and in a sports starved climate they have a real opportunity to bring the MLB draft into focus.
Understandably it’s not as closely followed as other sports… but why not push it now?
Get the top prospects prepared to be interviewed during a live broadcast of the draft. Start promoting the upcoming draft like crazy. A glimpse into the future for your favourite MLB team. Put together a bunch of highlight clips of the top guys and get a bunch of the MLB prospect guys sitting around talking about how “can’t miss” every draft pick is.
Even push the date up into May. Why not? There isn’t any games going on to further evaluate the prospects anyway.
Agreed, while NFL Draft will always have larger ratings than MLB Draft, this is a good time to tinker with the Draft and make it appeal to a larger demo (any demo, really, considering their ratings aren’t aired outside of their network and cable-TV). It’d be a great way to intro into the season and whet appetites, much like NFL just capitalized on.
I will never again sit through a 6th rd pick from the Indianapolis Colts and care more.
100% agree. ESPN is about to start airing Korean baseball, for crying out loud!! Everyone is starved for content, let alone live sports content – no one has it.
What better opportunity to market the game and its next generation of stars than by airing the draft in primetime for all to see?
Manfred doesn’t have a clue. It’s beyond disgraceful.
Baseball draftees can’t step right into the lineup like the NFL and NBA players can. It will never generate the same kind of ratings.
@bruce, you’re right, it won’t and at least partially for that reason. However, if there’s ever going to be a market for it, it’s this year when we have no other MLB content to air.
Agreed, no draft will match the NFL’s ratings, but doing their draft before live sports returns will bring higher ratings and interest to the draft. And if that happens, maybe there will be a louder outcry for MLB trying to cut 42 minor league teams
Add Trading Picks to Draft and that will make Teams more willing to Trade Minor Leagues. Also ESPN it to.
Why add ESPN? So some moron can sit at the table, announce it pretending to know baseball (and doesn’t) that is maybe better than the horrid Harold Reynolds?
MLB has already sold it’s sould to the networks and allowed extended commercial breaks between innings on networked games, post season games which sometimes end past midnight on the east coast.. Let’s NOT allow the buffoons at ESPN into the draft please.
Add ESPN because many fans are desperate for any kind of baseball programming. Also, teams need revenue and the proceeds from this could be split evenly among them. Drop in the bucket, perhaps, but making up any lost bit of revenue helps.
Espn is trash and should be removed from baseball
The junior college ranks will likely swell. High school kids who accept scholarships to D1 programs have to wait 3 years to re enter the draft. JuCo kids can go back the following year.
So, if they aren’t drafted in the top 10 rounds, they’ll head to a nearby JC and work out for a year, enjoy a little college lifestyle, then enter a more normal draft in 2021.
Unless the NCAA makes an exception.
True.
With a smaller draft (and larger pool next year), along with a presumed shortened season using most likely a realignment of teams – there’s never a better time for some franchises to tank for future picks. It’ll be a lot easier with presumably more to gain from it.
I wonder what the implications are on the international signings.
I disagree on tanking. The top picks will likely be about the same as they would have been, with a few possible kids going from virtually unknown to top 5-10 rounds. After that, though, I think it will be stocked with all the talent from this year that didn’t sign an undrafted contract as well as next year’s, which means the later rounds will be comparatively stacked. There will still be value in tanking, just not quite as much.
MIke Piazza was drafted in the 62nd round. When did the draft get whittled down to 40 rounds? Was it spontaneously done a couple of decades ago or gradual? 60 rounds to 40 to 10….. wow. When comparing this to the 80s/90s, that’s a lot of players left on the outside.
Teams are still going to have a regulated amount of money to spend. So instead of signing 10 players for 100K each (in rounds 6-15, e.g.), they get the same players for 20K each.
Who said these owners were dumb?
I imagine a bunch of the players would rather go back to school for another year. Seniors kind of got screwed, but juniors and high schoolers have options. I’d have to imagine the NCAA will make some sort of exception for draft eligibility next year because of what happened this year. I also don’t like that the Yankees could, at least in theory, get the top 10 undrafted guys to all sign with them. I’d rather they just lengthen the draft and limit the signing bonuses for those rounds.
The issue with high school players is the risk factor.
There are some players who teams believe in but you have issues because teams haven’t been able to fully scout these players.
For all 2020 Div 1 spring sports canceled to to Covid, the NCAA has granted another year of eligibility. So college seniors hoping to get drafted (past the first 5-10 rounds) will in theory have another chance next year. I don’t know what happens if they’ve completed their academics, but they will have one more year, spring 2021, of college ball if they want it.
I understand why it’s being cut a little, but does it really need to be pared down to as little as five rounds? Surely, teams have the top 15-20 rounds kind of mapped in terms of top prospects by now. They might opt for more college players with what they know, but can’t we do half a draft?
Also, I wonder who the $20K undrafted signing max benefits more: teams who are playoff bound most years or rebuilding teams who can offer an easier path to playing time? Probably doesn’t matter in the end too much, as most players who like their odds next year would just wait it out for an add’l signing bonus.
One last thought is with the draft being extra deep next year, tanking probably matters a little less. The order of getting top prospects will still matter, but beyond the first 5-10 rounds, there’s going to be a bunch of talent that didn’t get drafted this year and plays another year at college. It could be interesting because teams might reach on a guy in the earlier rounds, pay him below slot, just so they can sign more guys above slot later.
There is no good reason for it to be only 5 rounds.
The whole cap undrafted to 20k is ridiculous.
Teams should have been given an undrafted spending limit. Worst team gets most best team gets least. They can spend it how they see fit. They can blow it all on one player or negotiate with a couple players. Can’t trade $$$ and if you don’t use it you lose it.
Draft should also have been 10 rounds.
I say at least 15 rounds, preferably 20. Agree on everything else.
I wonder if the new $20k rule will give teams greater power in negotiating below-slot deals? A scout might say to a prospect “Our team will take you in the 5th round of the 5-round draft. Slot is $400k. We will give you $100k. If you refuse, and you are not taken in the first 5 rounds, you can only sign for $20k max. Up to you.”
You bet it will.
I don’t expect to see the draft go back to what it was. With the minor leagues contracting and the leverage less rounds will give the owners… I think a reduced draft is here to stay.
Probably not 5 rounds but maybe 15 or 20.
Also this year college players are gaining an extra year of eligibility because of the pandemic. So they still have some leverage.
Next year they won’t get that. A reduced draft and capped amount for unstaffed players would really put pressure on them to take less.
Such BS… Rich billionaire owners can’t pay kids their bonus as usual ? Crap
so what we will have is a shortened draft and less spots in the MiLB due to a purging of teams, it seems to me that one side effect that could be really cool with this is the rise of independent baseball
I think it will be a disaster!
Rich teams get the players over lesser teams that would have picked first.
Disparity is a huge problem in baseball.
Lower income teams have little chance of being relevant year after year.
This draft setup just makes in worse.
Teams can only pay undrafted players $20,000 each. Even the poorest teams can afford that. And rich teams cannot pay any more than that, so it’s a level playing field.
Detroit better take Torkelson. The guy is going to be a legend.
He seems to be a solid choice, but keep in mind that, as of right now, only three #1 overall picks have made it to the HOF (Griffey, Jr., Chipper Jones, and the undeserving Harold Baines). There are as many who never played an MLB game and 20 others (taken in 2008 or before) who never made an All-Star game. I think scouting has improved a little with advanced metrics, but even then, it’s awfully hard to predict accurately that someone will be a legend before they’ve even had a taste of the minors..
I’ve never read so much about the MLB draft across so many websites and cared so little..
The one thing over looked in all of these discussions is the fact D1 baseball only has 11.7 scholarships per program. Football and basketball are fully funded by the NCAA. There is no provision from the NCAA to increase the amount of scholarships for colleges for baseball. HS players that are not able to pay for school now have very few options for college. That is reason there has not been a realistic push for an all college baseball draft. An entire economic population of players would be left out in the cold. The draft should at least be 20 rounds. Everyone understands the loss of revenue incurred by teams. Most of the rookie leagues and short seasons are in areas that will be open shortly or soon enough they could play until October 1st.