<img alt="2024 MLB Draft Photo Shoot" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/l_HeGmZUDU75t5miLUmvpH0EwDA=/0x2:8192x5463/1310x873/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/73465628/2161494821.0.jpg">
Photo by Rob Tringali/MLB Photos via Getty Images
The Braves have a few more prep talents to try to sign away from commitments than normal The three days of the 2024 MLB Draft are in the books, and it is safe to say no one saw this coming for the Atlanta Braves. The Braves managed to have the top high school pitcher in the country, Cam Caminiti, slide down to the 24th pick and now the big question comes with how much it takes to sign him away from his LSU commitment. All indications are that he, and the top 10 picks for the Braves, are locks to sign but we’ve seen things go wrong at the last second. Caminiti is expected to take an over slot bonus and eat up more than half of the pool by himself, and he is not the only one we could be looking at over slot bonuses for.
The Braves overall have a limited pool of just $7,765,000 this season and will also have to pry away top three round picks Carter Holton and Luke Sinnard from their final years of college eligibility. The last two major names in regards to their actual pool allotment are Nick Montgomery and Ethan Bagwell. Both are the prep picks the Braves took in the fifth and sixth round picks and both are expected to land with over-slot bonuses. Montgomery is a player that we are all excited about, a catcher out of California with big raw power who we’re hopeful to see excel in a system that has produced three significant catcher talents (Shea Langeliers, William Contreras, and Drake Baldwin) over the past few seasons. Bagwell is a pitcher out of an Illinois high school who has major arm talent but will be a significant developmental prospect for a Braves organization who has had some success with guys in that vein like AJ Smith-Shawver and Spencer Schwellenbach.
Update since I forgot to mention it: The signing deadline is Thursday, August 1st at 5:00 pm ET.
The Braves may also have some tough signs out of the last ten rounds, though that will have less of a bearing on the draft overall as if those picks go unsigned they don’t affect the total pool. So how this works for those unaware, is that in the top 10 rounds each pick is alloted a bonus that counts towards a team’s overall pool. This total pool number is used to sign all picks, but for the past 10 rounds each pick can sign for up to $150,000 without impacting that money. Any amount under $150,000 isn’t savings, but any amount over will count against the pool total. The main picks to look at in this regard are 12th round pitcher Cayman Goode, 15th round outfielder Owen Carey, and 20th round outfielder Eric Hartman. All three need to be signed away from D-1 commitments and may be tough signs, and there is a better chance than most years that the Braves will come away from this draft without signing all of their picks. 14th round shortstop Colby Jones also could be a factor here, as he is a junior college player with a Division I commitment. They could also face some trouble with the three juniors in the later rounds, who could go back to school like 12th rounder Brady Day did last season, though typically these 11th to 20th round juniors will sign and not open themselves up to being senior signs the next years. Senior signs in those last day two picks often get five or even four figure bonuses as they lack the signing leverage of being able to go back to college, leaving that $150k day three cap as a pretty enticing deal.
Now that bonus pool is not a hard cap on spending. Technically, if a team wanted to they could pretty much spend as much as they want if they were willing to accept the punishments that come with that. The most important number to know for the signing bonuses is the 5% overage, noted in the table, which is the point at which the Braves will not exceed. Any money spent between 100% and 105% will be subject to a 75% luxury tax against those bonus numbers, but above 5% and the Braves would then be sacrificing a future first round draft pick which is not worth the benefit of signing players to them. Any player from the first ten rounds who does not sign will have their slot value removed from the total bonus pool, thus teams typically have all of those picks lined up to sign prior to even drafting them.
Another thing you may notice is that a lot of the numbers will say something like “$1,297,500”. Each pick comes with a $2,500 contigency bonus, and while some teams will give this to the players others like the Braves will deduct it from the bonus to save some money in the pool. The final rule that comes into play is the minimum signing bonus. Players who attend the draft combine and submit to a pre-draft medical evaluation (must be given a minimum of 75% of their slot value. Each of the Braves first six picks were at the combine, though this rule may only come into play for Herick Hernandez as he is the only one who could in any way be looking at an under slot signing bonus. Then again, I said the same thing for Drue Hackenberg last season and he went well over slot on his bonus, so we can often be very wrong on our bonus predictions.
Now, let’s say worst-case scenario happens and the Braves can’t work out terms with Caminiti. Be it a medical red flag, a change of heart, or agent shenanigans, what would that mean for the Braves? If a player in the top two rounds of the draft (so Caminiti, Holton) not sign, and was offered at least 40% of the slot value by the drafting team, the drafting team would receive a pick of the same round, one spot later in the subsequent draft. The Braves did not sign Carter Stewart (medicals) with the 8th overall pick in 2018, and thus they were given the 9th overall pick in 2019. Should a third round pick not sign, the team receives a compensation pick after the end of the third round.
<img alt="2024 MLB Draft Photo Shoot" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/l_HeGmZUDU75t5miLUmvpH0EwDA=/0x2:8192x5463/1310x873/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/73465628/2161494821.0.jpg">
Photo by Rob Tringali/MLB Photos via Getty Images
The Braves have a few more prep talents to try to sign away from commitments than normal The three days of the 2024 MLB Draft are in the books, and it is safe to say no one saw this coming for the Atlanta Braves. The Braves managed to have the top high school pitcher in the country, Cam Caminiti, slide down to the 24th pick and now the big question comes with how much it takes to sign him away from his LSU commitment. All indications are that he, and the top 10 picks for the Braves, are locks to sign but we’ve seen things go wrong at the last second. Caminiti is expected to take an over slot bonus and eat up more than half of the pool by himself, and he is not the only one we could be looking at over slot bonuses for.
The Braves overall have a limited pool of just $7,765,000 this season and will also have to pry away top three round picks Carter Holton and Luke Sinnard from their final years of college eligibility. The last two major names in regards to their actual pool allotment are Nick Montgomery and Ethan Bagwell. Both are the prep picks the Braves took in the fifth and sixth round picks and both are expected to land with over-slot bonuses. Montgomery is a player that we are all excited about, a catcher out of California with big raw power who we’re hopeful to see excel in a system that has produced three significant catcher talents (Shea Langeliers, William Contreras, and Drake Baldwin) over the past few seasons. Bagwell is a pitcher out of an Illinois high school who has major arm talent but will be a significant developmental prospect for a Braves organization who has had some success with guys in that vein like AJ Smith-Shawver and Spencer Schwellenbach.
Update since I forgot to mention it: The signing deadline is Thursday, August 1st at 5:00 pm ET.
The Braves may also have some tough signs out of the last ten rounds, though that will have less of a bearing on the draft overall as if those picks go unsigned they don’t affect the total pool. So how this works for those unaware, is that in the top 10 rounds each pick is alloted a bonus that counts towards a team’s overall pool. This total pool number is used to sign all picks, but for the past 10 rounds each pick can sign for up to $150,000 without impacting that money. Any amount under $150,000 isn’t savings, but any amount over will count against the pool total. The main picks to look at in this regard are 12th round pitcher Cayman Goode, 15th round outfielder Owen Carey, and 20th round outfielder Eric Hartman. All three need to be signed away from D-1 commitments and may be tough signs, and there is a better chance than most years that the Braves will come away from this draft without signing all of their picks. 14th round shortstop Colby Jones also could be a factor here, as he is a junior college player with a Division I commitment. They could also face some trouble with the three juniors in the later rounds, who could go back to school like 12th rounder Brady Day did last season, though typically these 11th to 20th round juniors will sign and not open themselves up to being senior signs the next years. Senior signs in those last day two picks often get five or even four figure bonuses as they lack the signing leverage of being able to go back to college, leaving that $150k day three cap as a pretty enticing deal.
Now that bonus pool is not a hard cap on spending. Technically, if a team wanted to they could pretty much spend as much as they want if they were willing to accept the punishments that come with that. The most important number to know for the signing bonuses is the 5% overage, noted in the table, which is the point at which the Braves will not exceed. Any money spent between 100% and 105% will be subject to a 75% luxury tax against those bonus numbers, but above 5% and the Braves would then be sacrificing a future first round draft pick which is not worth the benefit of signing players to them. Any player from the first ten rounds who does not sign will have their slot value removed from the total bonus pool, thus teams typically have all of those picks lined up to sign prior to even drafting them.
Another thing you may notice is that a lot of the numbers will say something like “$1,297,500”. Each pick comes with a $2,500 contigency bonus, and while some teams will give this to the players others like the Braves will deduct it from the bonus to save some money in the pool. The final rule that comes into play is the minimum signing bonus. Players who attend the draft combine and submit to a pre-draft medical evaluation (must be given a minimum of 75% of their slot value. Each of the Braves first six picks were at the combine, though this rule may only come into play for Herick Hernandez as he is the only one who could in any way be looking at an under slot signing bonus. Then again, I said the same thing for Drue Hackenberg last season and he went well over slot on his bonus, so we can often be very wrong on our bonus predictions.
Now, let’s say worst-case scenario happens and the Braves can’t work out terms with Caminiti. Be it a medical red flag, a change of heart, or agent shenanigans, what would that mean for the Braves? If a player in the top two rounds of the draft (so Caminiti, Holton) not sign, and was offered at least 40% of the slot value by the drafting team, the drafting team would receive a pick of the same round, one spot later in the subsequent draft. The Braves did not sign Carter Stewart (medicals) with the 8th overall pick in 2018, and thus they were given the 9th overall pick in 2019. Should a third round pick not sign, the team receives a compensation pick after the end of the third round.
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