By the deadline, the Detroit Tigers had signed their entire 2024 MLB Draft class. But it took a little strategy to make that happen.
Baseball America recently wrote about how each team’s draft bonus pool is used. Each team is given a bonus pool based on various factors.
The Tigers’ bonus pool was $11.921 million and they spent $12.512 million, which is allowed as long as they don’t spend more than 5% over the bonus pool. The Tigers were right at the 5% limit.
Every pick, especially in the first 10 rounds, has a slot value that indicates what that draft pick should get. Teams can pay the slot value, below or above.
Detroit pursued a strategy that Baseball America is called “spend early, save late” because the Tigers gave more to their early picks to ensure they signed them.
The Tigers selected outfielder Bryce Rainer in the first round, who had a slot value of $5.712 million. Detroit gave him $85,000 more.
Detroit did the same with another prep pick, pitcher Ethan Schiefelbein. He was the Tigers’ competitive compensatory pick between the second and third rounds. In fact, Detroit paid him far more than the slot – $1.80 million on a slot value of $1.09 million.
In total, the Tigers had to raise $643,000 more with the college players they selected on the second day of the draft.
The Tigers’ next six players all came from four-year colleges. Detroit got them all to sign below-slot contracts and saved $679,000 of its bonus money?
Why? Major league teams, like other professional leagues, want to catch players when they’re younger. That’s why teams sometimes overpay for high school players. It’s also why teams can put pressure on college players who have been in college for four years when they’re no longer eligible.
For this reason, the Tigers again selected Zach Swanson, a pitcher from Toutle Lake High School in Washington, above their slot in the ninth round.
This was a case of Detroit landing a high-profile prospect. Swanson was ranked 178th by MLB Pipeline and the Tigers’ selection was 266th overall. So to convince Swanson to start his professional career instead of college, Detroit spent $527,000 more than his slot value of $195,100.
From then on, the Tigers had to save money on the remaining picks to ensure they did not exceed the allowable bonus pool.
That’s the balancing act for every MLB team and the Tigers have done a good job of signing their class.
