Thanks to the pandemic-shortened regular season, it was unclear before Monday how Major League Baseball would handle the 2021 amateur draft. It’s now known that the league plans on going the traditional route and determining the order according to teams’ 2020 records, per Alex Speier of the Boston Globe. Jeff Passan of ESPN previously reported that MLB was likely to take this path.
This news means the Pirates, who finished with the game’s worst mark at 19-41, will pick No. 1 overall for the first time since they selected Gerrit Cole in 2011. As of now, Vanderbilt right-handers Kumar Rocker and Jack Leiter are among the favorites to come off the board at the top of the draft, so either could wind up as the Pirates’ next prized prospect.
Here’s how the top five’s slated to look next summer:
- 1. Pirates
- 2. Rangers
- 3. Tigers
- 4. Red Sox
- 5. Orioles