The White Sox announced today that they have signed their first-round draft pick, southpaw Garrett Crochet. He will receive a $4,547,500 signing bonus.
That payday precisely matches the slot value allocated to the eleventh overall selection. The Chicago organization is still working on agreements with fifth-rounder Bailey Horn and second-rounder Jared Kelley, the latter of whom is expected to sign for well north of his slot value.
Crochet is valued for his big left arm. He pumps upper-nineties heat and controls it reasonably well. While his slider and change will both require fine-tuning, there’s said to be some real hope that he could round into a high-grade big-league starter.
If everything doesn’t quite come together? In that case, it still seems reasonable to anticipate that Crochet will be a compelling power arm from the bullpen, perhaps in the sort of multi-inning role he occupied at times at the University of Tennessee.
Most draft pundits (Fangraphs, MLB.com, Baseball America, ESPN.com) graded Crochet as a mid-first round talent. Keith Law of The Athletic acknowledged the upside, but obviously was swayed more by the concerns in grading Crochet as his 39th overall prospect.
Photo courtesy of University of Tennessee athletics department.
Good, he didn’t go over slot value.
They must think they have a deal in place with Kelley as well. They already signed their third and fourth round picks for about $1.25M under slot combined and if that weren’t enough over slot money to land Kelley then they would still be bargaining with Crochet instead of signing him right at slot value.
Yeah, Kelley looks like a gem. This guy seems like more of an expensive bullpen arm, but hopefully they develop him into more.
I was on pins and NEEDLES hoping they would sign him….
Totally – glad they were able to stitch together a deal.
They’ve sewn up a good core. Maybe they can help weave a long string of titles
Like the Os of the late 60s and 70s, held together by a dream of a manager. Earl something
The majority of the core is gone after 5 years. Theyll be too expensive when they want 150-200 million dollar deals for the small market sox
This thread has me in stitches.
Don’t mess with the needle or a spoon
And a trip to the moon
Well it’ll take me away, lord they’re going to bury you boy
Don’t mess with the needle, I know, I know, I know, I know, I know
Hi Todd,
Can you please fix the gap between “bonus” and “that”?
Thanks!
The White Sox announced today that they have signed their first-round draft pick, southpaw Garrett Crochet. He will receive a $4,547,500 signing bonus.
That payday precisely matches the slot value allocated to the eleventh overall selection. The Chicago organization is still working on agreements with fifth-rounder Bailey Horn and second-rounder Jared Kelley, the latter of whom is expected to sign for well north of his slot value.
Not sure why I put Todd as your first name, LOL. I should’ve said Hi Jeff not Todd.
Bored?
i like crochet – its a fun way to consume time
You’ve commented more on this blog than people I’ve affected
Good signing. Can’t have too much good pitching. It will be the key element in the Sox’ near term success-which could happen even this year.
Bob’s your uncle. When he makes his big money, I bet he’s no Scrooge.
Looking at his college stats and the Sox recent history in drafting college arms…not very optimistic
Chris Sale and Carlos Rodon say hi.
I expected him to sign for a bit under slot since he wasn’t generally rated as the 11th best player in the draft and because the ChiSox could use more money to spend on Kelley. I thought they’d both come in around $4 million, give or take, but with this $4.5M+ deal for Crochet, they’re going to have to go under $3.5 million for Kelley.
@Oddvark
I really hope Kelley would take a $3MM offer. I would hope a kid coming out of HS isn’t that greedy to where he would stick his nose up at $3MM. Especially since it’s possible the college season gets cancelled in ’21 if the COVID-19 spike over the Winter is that severe.
I’m assuming they had pretty much agreed on what it would take to sign him when they drafted him, so I don’t think Kelley is going to hold out for more than the White Sox have in their bonus pool (or that the Sox would agree to the deal with Crochet if they needed more money to sign Kelley).
I just thought Crochet would accept a bit less than slot value and that Kelley would require the slot value of a mid-teens pick.
Just in time. A stitch in time saves nine!