The Chicago White Sox must get an impact player with the No. 10 pick in the first round of this year's draft if this franchise ever hopes to get back to being competitive.
It would not hurt getting a couple of more promising players throughout the draft, too.
Now, the franchise knows how much they can spend on their upcoming draft class.
MLB Pipeline's Jim Callis released the figures for all 30 teams, and the White Sox will have $12.169 million to work with.
MLB released Draft slots & bonus pools tonight. They're up 4.8 percent from a year ago. The Nationals' No. 1 overall pick is valued at a record $11,075,900, while the Mariners have the largest pool at $17,074,400. Pools are below, should have a story up at @MLBPipeline in a bit. pic.twitter.com/fzyqcbv3Ew
— Jim Callis (@jimcallisMLB) April 24, 2025
Before you start thinking ownership never spends, so why should you care? Spending on the draft is something owner Jerry Reinsdorf has never had a problem with, at least lately.
Last year, the White Sox went over their bonus pool allotment, which teams can do. There is just a tax to be paid depending on how far a team goes over.
The Sox pick No. 10 in this year's draft despite having the worst record in 2024. The new MLB Draft Lottery rules prevented the White Sox from picking in the top nine since the 101 losses in 2023 put the Sox in the top five in last year's draft. Since the Sox are a revenue-paying team, they cannot pick in the top nine in consecutive seasons.
The White Sox will have $6,238,400 allotted to use on that pick. However, they can go over that number, but it would just take away from the total bonus pool to use on the rest of the draft class.
The strategy then comes down to a decision of taking the best player available at No. 10, knowing it will cost more, or maybe a player not as talented but who will sign for less, and then spread the money out.
The #WhiteSox pick at #10 overall is valued at $6,238,400. Opportunity to borrow money from later and overslot on someone or go under and spread the funds around. https://t.co/IL9bQ5U7D7
— James Fox (@JamesFox917) April 24, 2025
Sometimes the spread the wealth strategy works in that a team still gets a talented player in the first round, but then can use the extra money on a second or third-round pick who was leaning toward college, but now has a more financial incentive to turn pro.
With NIL money playing a bigger competitive role in pushing top high school talent projected to go outside of the first round to go to college, overslotting in the second and third rounds is needed to get those high upside players to sign.
The Sox had five picks in the first 150 picks of last year's draft (covering the first through fifth rounds) and overslotted on all but one of those picks.
The franchise ended up signing 19 of their 20 picks, with only their 20th pick not signing. The team took a shot at Myles Bailey, who was considered one of the best first base prospects in high school. Had the club had a bulk of their pool left over, the thought was maybe they could overslot him to skip school.
Each team plays the bonus pool game differently. The key is developing these players into big-leaguers, and the White Sox have struggled with that lately.
The White Sox will have the first pick of rounds two through 20 and have five picks among the first 150 picks in the draft.