White Sox Agree to Terms with First Round Pick Jake Burger
The White Sox inked a deal with first round pick Jake Burger. The 11th overall pick will take home a reported $3.7 million signing bonus.
The Chicago White Sox have agreed to terms with their 2017 first round draft pick Jake Burger. The third baseman will sign for a $3.7 million signing bonus. The slot value for the 11th overall pick was just under $4.2 million. Jim Callis of MLB.com tweeted news of the deal. The Missouri State product was the best power hitter in the 2017 MLB draft according to Callis.
Burger has been compared to Hunter Pence, but hopefully turns out better. Pence is good but probably not the superstar the White Sox envisioned with this pick. What they most likely envision is Burger becoming their third baseman of the future. He’s going to need some time to develop in the minors but maybe we could see him in the majors in 2019.
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White Sox amateur scouting director Nick Hostetler and company definitely recognized the need at third base and also the need of a power bat. So they killed two birds with one stone in drafting Burger. He definitely fills the position and need for more power. The biggest thing will be how he develops.
The White Sox have done a great job rebuilding their roster but now it’s time for them to develop. And that will fall on the shoulders of Chris Getz. The White Sox hired Getz in October as the new director of player development. In his role, he directly oversees the minor league system. So the development of someone like Burger falls into his lap.
Remember until recently with Tim Anderson, this organization has not had much success developing position players. Gordon Beckham was a can’t miss prospect. However, we can argue he never lived up to his potential.
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Drafting players is always difficult because you never know how they are going to develop. But the market of a good organization is their ability to develop their talent. That is something the White Sox need to continue doing. Otherwise all this talent will mean nothing if they don’t turn into future contributors at the major league level.