A's to Choose 25th in 2014 Major League Baseball First-Year Draft

OAKLAND, Calif.--The Oakland Athletics will select 25th in the first round of Major League Baseball's 2014 First-Year Draft, which will be held in Studio 42 at MLB Network in Secaucus, N.J. Thursday, June 5, starting at 4 p.m. PDT with first-day coverage provided by both MLB Network and MLB.com.

The A's, who have claimed the American League West Division championship the past two seasons, will choose two players during the first day of the 2014 Draft and possess four of the top 132 picks overall. Besides the 25th choice, Oakland will also exercise the 65th selection in the second round.

  For the sixth straight year, the 2014 Draft will span three days. MLB Network and MLB.com will provide live pick-by-pick coverage during the first round, Competitive Balance Round A, second round and Competitive Balance Round B on day one. The intervals between selections will last four-and-a-half minutes during the first round and one minute during the Competitive Balance Round A, the second round and Competitive Balance Round B. The Draft will resume at 10:05 a.m. PDT on both Friday, June 7 and Saturday, June 8 via conference call from MLB headquarters in New York City. Friday will cover rounds three through 10 with one minute between selections, while Saturday will cover rounds 11 through 40 with picks made without delays.

The A's also have the 101st selection in the third round and 132nd pick in the fourth round. Former catcher and long-time team broadcaster Ray Fosse will represent the Athletics at the draft, which coincides with Oakland playing a three-game series at Yankee Stadium June 3-5 in the Bronx.

Competitive Balance rounds, which were agreed upon as a part of the 2012-2016 Basic Agreement between MLB and the Major League Baseball Players Association, give clubs with the lowest revenues and in the smallest markets the opportunity to obtain additional draft picks through a lottery, which was held last July at MLB Network.   The A's were not among the lottery winners for this year's draft.

Beginning the second day, MLB.com will offer exclusive live programming of the draft's final days, including a live pick-by-pick stream, expert commentary and the DraftCaster, a live interactive application that includes a searchable database of every draft-eligible player supplemented by statistics, scouting reports and video highlights.

Last year, the A's chose outfielder Billy McKinney of Plano West Senior High School in Plano, Tex. in the first round of the draft, the 24th overall pick. Since 1997, Oakland has selected only three high school player in the first round (Jeremy Bonderman, 2001, and Addison Russell, 2012).