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The MLB Draft Lottery is tonight, which means non-playoff baseball teams get to see where they'll be picking. With potential future All-Stars and franchise cornerstones ready to be picked, every team is itching to get a good selection. How is that process gone about?
The MLB Draft Lottery gives every single team a chance at a top six selection. Furthermore, just because a team finished last in the MLB in one season doesn't mean they'll end up with the first overall pick.
However, they do increase the odds for those teams. For example, the Oakland Athletics, Kansas City Royals and Colorado Rockies have the best odds of getting the best pick at an 18.3% chance.
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Following them with a 14.3% chance is the Chicago White Sox. Just behind them is the St. Louis Cardinals with the fifth-best odds of securing the top pick. This is very much like the NBA Draft Lottery, where last year's order was not at all how the worst teams finished. Dead-last Detroit Pistons ended up selecting fifth overall. The top six picks in MLB could be random.
Randy Flores, the Cardinals'assistant GM/director of scouting, said this on the recent adoption of the lottery via MLB:
“It was a move to try to correct some of the extreme advantages of losing a lot of games, and trying to disincentivize that type of behavior is good. Now, if a team with 0.5% of a chance gets the first pick, I bet people are going to be up in arms. But until we cross that bridge, it’s a system that is a step in the right direction, for sure.”
This is the issue the NBA often runs into, but they've been successful in theoretically curbing tanking, and the MLB would like to follow suit. Giving every team a chance at one of the top six picks is how they aim to do it.
What teams are in the MLB Draft Lottery?
Just like the NBA, the MLB Draft Lottery is comprised of non-playoff teams. If a squad missed the playoffs, even by a paper-thin margin like the Seattle Mariners, they have a chance to get a top six selection.
That means teams like the New York Mets, New York Yankees, Boston Red Sox, Los Angeles Angels, Chicago Cubs and more could end up with far better picks than their record would ordinarily allow.
