Jonathan Mayo had news about the Competitive Balance Lottery while answering inbox questions on Thursday. While the Lottery usually takes place a week or so after the draft signing deadline, in this excerpt from his answer about how the Lottery works, Mayo notes that it won’t this year and it may not look the same when/if it does take place:
“I was using past tense [on how the Lottery works] because the future of the Lottery is a bit up in the air, because the current Agreement will expire this year and a new one will have to be collectively bargained by Major League Baseball and the MLB Players Association. As part of those negotiations, it’s possible the format of the Lottery will change in 2017. As a result, both MLB and the MLBPA agreed to postpone the Lottery until Jan. 25, 2017, to give them time to adjust to any changes.”
So while we know the Pirates will get the 42nd overall pick as compensation for Nick Lodolo not signing, we won’t know until late January if they are going to get a second pick in that same draft range.
