ST. LOUIS -- It's nearing crunch time for the Cardinals' scouting department, which has five weeks remaining before new scouting director Randy Flores leads the club through the 2016 MLB Draft. The three-day event will begin on June 9 and feature 40 round of picks.
The Cardinals and Padres are the only clubs that will be making three first-round selections this year. St. Louis' first pick will be at No. 23. The club was also awarded the 33rd and 34th overall selections because of the departures of John Lackey and Jason Heyward over the winter. Combined, those three first-round picks account for $6.0125 million of the Cardinals' $9.1433 million bonus pool.
That bonus pool was determined by summing the assigned dollar value given to each of the team's picks in the first 10 rounds. Any players selected in those rounds counts against the total, as well as any later signee who agrees to a bonus in excess of $100,000. Teams face various penalties -- including fines and the loss of future picks -- for exceeding their spending pool.
• Order of picks for 2016 Draft
Day one of the MLB Draft will include the first 77 overall selections. The Cardinals, in addition to their trio of first-round picks, will also make the 70th overall selection that day. Because they posted MLB's best record in 2015, the Cardinals receive the last pick in each subsequent round.
Rounds 3-10 will be held on June 10 and followed by rounds 11-40 a day later. The Cardinals have not yet announced who they will send to Secaucus, N.J., to serve as their on-site representative for the event's first day.
Flores is the third different scouting director to head the Cardinals' Draft efforts in the last three years. Dan Kantrovitz served as scouting director until leaving for a position with Oakland after the 2014 season. Chris Correa was promoted as his replacement but was fired months later for hacking into the Astros' baseball database. General manager John Mozeliak replaced him with Flores, a former Cardinals pitcher who had been involved in coaching, scouting, broadcasting and private business since his career ended.