Are We Headed to a New Era in the MLB Draft?

By Benjamin Chase

On August 1st, the Major League Baseball draft deadline passed with all of the first-round picks signing. However, four selections in the first 10 rounds of the draft did not sign, the most that have not signed in the “slotted” portion of the draft since 2018.

Draft Slot Changes

To give some background to the current draft setup, many changes were made coming into the 2012 draft the could be an article all their own. We’ll focus completely on the slotting system that was implemented, however.

Beginning with the 2012 draft, the first 10 rounds of the draft had a monetary bonus “slot” assigned to each pick. A team would have a bonus pool equal to the total of the assigned bonuses for their picks in the first 10 rounds. Teams could sign players beginning in the 11th round for a bonus amount up to $150,000, but any bonus beyond that amount will need to come out of the overall bonus pool.

This has led to “underslot” deals in the back half of the first 10 rounds, usually meaning most guys you see selected in rounds 6-10 will be signed for a fraction of their draft bonus amount.

In 2024, the first overall selection had a bonus pool amount of $10,570,600. That number drops quickly through the first round, with the 39th selection, the final pick before the start of round two, valued at $2,395,000. The 10th round bonus slots began with $186,400 for the 286th pick and ending at $178,800 at the 315th pick to end the round.

The 2023 draft for Major League Baseball at Lumen Field in Seattle, Washington, held during the All-Star Game Weekend.Photo bySounderBruce

College Money Making a Change

Major League Baseball has seemingly looked at college baseball as a weaker sibling - or even a distant cousin that’s barely related, instead of the development pipeline that it certainly could and should be, for a long time. The money was simply not there to truly attract the best of the best to go to college rather than begin a pro career.

That has all changed.

The flood of name/image/likeness (NIL) money that has come into big-time college sports has already had a drastic effect, as most college players drafted in the first round the past two years have multiple colleges in their backgrounds, not because of any issue with playing time or coaching, but simply because the money that a player could be offered was larger at one school over another.

One area that affects baseball is scholarships. Baseball previously had to share 11.7 total scholarships among the entire roster for a college program, meaning most players playing college baseball were NOT on full-ride scholarships.

According to a recent article by Yahoo Sports, that will drastically change, beginning in the 2025-2026 academic year, with schools now able to offer 34 full-ride scholarships. J.J. Cooper of Baseball America addressed how this could have a very negative impact on mid-sized and smaller colleges in a recent article.

The effect on the draft could potentially be felt from the early rounds to the third day. Additional available scholarships should certainly offer many of the 11th through 20th round high school selections a true decision when considering their futures - a signing bonus of a few hundred thousand dollars or a free education with the chance to make NIL money while facing a step up in competition and potentially earning into a bigger draft payday later?

Certainly, this will put more power in the hands of players, something many who advocate for no draft at all and pure player free agency will enjoy immensely. For now, it’s a very large unknown that the draft is heading into.

Benjamin Chase is one of the editors for IBWAA’s Here’s the Pitch. He is a reporter for a South Dakota newspaper and also has multiple baseball writing and podcasting gigs, including his own Medium page, Chasing Baseball Greatness, and the Pallazzo Podcast prospect show. He can be found on most social media platforms under @biggentleben.