9:51am: MLB.com’s Jim Callis tweets that Solometo’s bonus is $2.8MM, so he took home a bit more than $800K over slot.
9:44am: The Pirates announced this morning that they’ve signed left-hander Anthony Solometo, who was their second-round pick in the 2021 amateur draft. The team unsurprisingly didn’t include bonus details, but Solometo’s No. 37 slot comes with a $1.999MM value.
Solometo, 18, was ranked as one of the top high school arms in this year’s draft but slipped to the second round. As such, signing Solometo away from his commitment to North Carolina may require the Bucs to go over that $2MM slot value. They’ll have the resources to do just that after top pick Henry Davis’ signing bonus checked in roughly $1.9MM under slot, however.
Heading into the draft Solometo was ranked 17th on MLB.com’s list of draft prospects, 20th at The Athletic, 28th at Baseball America, 34th at FanGraphs and 35th at ESPN. He earns praise for a fastball that’s reached 94-95 mph — though it currently sits lower than that — and a slider that grades out as a potential plus offering as well. MLB.com and FanGraphs note that Solometo’s delivery draws comparisons to that of Madison Bumgarner.
Solometo was the second of four highly touted players the Pirates secured at the top of their draft class. While Davis was at least a moderate surprise with the top overall pick — he was expected to go somewhere in the top five or so picks regardless — that selection might’ve helped the Bucs save enough to go over slot on their next three picks. Each of Solometo, Lonnie White Jr. and Bubba Chandler were high school players with first- or second-round potential, and Pittsburgh has drawn a good bit of praise for maneuvering to land that trio and Davis with the team’s top four selections.
great signing great pirates draft the rebuild is starting to look good
From the video I’ve seen on Solometo, his delivery is more Dontrelle Willis than Bumgarner.
weird, from what i saw its almost dead on to MadBum
???
It’s actually exactly like Bumgarner.
Go down to the comparison video. There was a ton of comparison videos and they have exactly the same arm angle and everything.
bucsdugout.com/2021/7/15/22579207/what-we-learned-…
Not a big fan of high school kids, but they got Davis and if one of the four HS pan out, it’s a good draft.
true, i am not a big fan of HS arms as your high number 1 pick,. look at the astros and cubs, rebuilt through the drasft with impact bats (Bryant, correa, springer, bregman, schwarber….) now if you can get impact bats like Pittsburgh has (Henry/Gonzalez) then put pitchers inj behind him…. then you have the makings of a truly good farm system
Great news, but have they signed 13th round pick, Owen Sharts?
That situation is probably a bit more fluid
O Solometo
Sta nfronte a te
Bravo!
Those have to be the ugliest unis ever.
Are you referring to the ASG unis?
Agree….ugly but just like the Vanderbilt road uni.
Now let’s see if they can sign (have enough sheckles for) Bubba Chandler, 3rd round mega-athlete. Allowing that it’s all a bit of a crapshoot, if they can sign Chandler also, it could very well be a franchise building draft.
Actually might be if just 2 of the 3 work out (likely). Either way, pretty nice job for the Bucs.
Bubba Chandler has already said he’s signing. A deal is lined up, and I believe he is in Pittsburgh for a physical and then to sign today or tomorrow. Of the big guys, the only question mark is Lonnie White Jr.
if they get Whit Jr signed its instantly (on paper) the best draft of the last how many years for the bucs…. definitly better than anything NH did…. or how many 1st round pics of cole tucker, tony sanchez, connor joe were there
DEFINITELY better than anything NH did?
This must be a good draft if it’s definitely better than Gerrit Cole, Josh Bell, Tyler Glasnow and Trea Turner (yeah, look it up) in 2011.
Turner didn’t sign, he doesn’t count
turner doesnt count as he didnt sign, and if the players dont pan out for the Bucs, it kind of dampens the trade value…. now all the good work NH did with that draft…. he kind of shot him self in the foot with with the trading Cole and Glasnow…. literally the return on the pirates right now for both of them is Colin Moran and whatever the return on Musgrove turns out to me (althought BC did that not NH)…. how insanely awful is that….. i mean yes there were other pieces but they were pretty terrible…. overall… NH got lucky with some stuff as the bucs had that 3 year window, but overall he was very below average on a good number of things….
Turner was picked in the 20th round and didnt sign, why is he even mentioned?
The original statement referenced the draft, not the signings, and the 20th round is part of the draft. Mostly.
On paper, this draft is just as good as Bell, Jacoby Jones, and others in that year. I think that year they drafted Mark Appeal who decline to sign and went back to college. Or was that Gerrit Cole year? After that the MLB cracked down on large slot spending like the Pirates did with NH for 3 years straight. NH did alright in the drafts and only traded badly with Archer. That is what set the organization behind 4-5 years
4-5 years after Archer left Pittsburgh.
Chandler has previously stated that he plans on signing but planning isn’t the same as doing it. He will.
Was he in jail or something? That uni…
Cherington is doing such a good job on this rebuild, Nutting is going to let him do the next two, as well.
Nuttings gonna stop him now.
kermit…… youve been with miss piggy too long…. messing up your reasoning to post crap
Good year so far for Pitt, and Detroit as well, imo.
sign white and it will be a good draft
but that’s all it is until they produce at the major league level, a paper championship
Pirates 14 round pick B.Bishop was the 94th ranked prospect and said he now wants to get his pro career started, instead of waiting 3 years to become Draft Eligible again. He said he wanted 500K, Pirates offered him 300K. Said they will meet in the middle. But he dropped b/c of signability too.
Hes super athlete, lefty swing with loft. Has ridiculous ball speeds coming off his bat. He’s gonna be good. They stole him as well.
youtu.be/gx73SN5CUqA
!!!
Time will tell about the draft. Looks good
I was hoping the Phillies took Solometo. I live like 5 minutes from Bishop Eustace Prep where he went to school. Saw a couple games where he was on the hill. Kid is absolutely legit at this point. Hope he does well for himself in the bigs. Pirates got a real solid arm.