Image credit: © Steven Branscombe-Imagn Images
Last week, MLB proposed a number of fairly radical changes to the existing amateur player acquisition structure. Marc Normandin covered the labor implications of such here at BP earlier this week, but I want to focus more on the practical ones for the draft: what forcing high school players to go to college for two years would actually do to the developmental arcs of the players who currently sign out of high school, the key underpinning of the new proposal as reported by ESPN.
The primary group of players being drafted under MLB’s proposed system in 2026 would be players born between September 1, 2005 and September 1, 2006; you would need to be 20 by September 1 to be eligible. But in addition to that, you would also need to be two years out of high school; in practice this would move a few of the most overaged players drafted under the current system as preps back a year. For example, 2025 real draftee and top global pitching prospect Seth Hernandez, by age, would have been eligible for this draft structure this year, but he would have been pushed back by 2027 because of the high school graduation rule. The concept of absolute age eligibility that currently exists? That goes poof. Basically, this would be the 2024 real preps and the future 2027 college picks; the biggest beneficiaries would be the top 2027 college eligibles like Brendan Lawson and Dax Whitney (although Whitney is currently hurt, so maybe not).
