Betting on the Major League Baseball draft is a much different beast than putting a wager on who goes No. 1 in the NBA, NFL or NHL.
Unlike the latter leagues, where the consensus best prospect tends to be the top pick more often than not, MLB’s bonus pool complicates what would otherwise be pretty straightforward calculus for general managers.
The Athletic’s Melissa Lockard has one of the best explanations for how this works and why it matters:
In 2012, MLB rolled out a hard cap for draft bonuses as they pertained to the top-10 rounds in the draft. From then on, teams were given a draft bonus pool allotment that was the total of the slot values for all of their top-10 round picks. Teams can divide that bonus pool among those top-10 round picks however they choose to….
Since the advent of the bonus pool system, teams have gotten clever about how they approach their top-10 round selections. If a team believes it can select a first-round talent in a later round, it may select a player with its first-round pick who is willing to sign for under slot value to save money for the later pick.
That last section is absolutely crucial. And it’s why Druw Jones, the consensus best player in this year’s class, may not hear his name called when the Baltimore Orioles step up to the podium with the first pick on Sunday.