Everything to know about Phillies' 2020 Draft

June 12th, 2020

PHILADELPHIA -- The Phillies made their fourth and final pick in the 2020 MLB Draft on Thursday night. Their work continued from there.

The Phillies not only need to sign the four players they selected in an abbreviated five-round Draft, but they also want to sign their favorite undrafted free agents, too. Here is a look back at the Phillies’ Draft, which they dedicated to Will Brunson, a scout and former big league left-hander who died in November from a heart attack. He was 49.

Now what?
Now the Phillies just have to sign everybody.

“We probably wouldn't have taken them if we didn't have belief that we were going to get a deal done with all these guys,” Phillies amateur scouting director Brian Barber said. “We feel confident there right now.”

The Phillies have $5,444,200 in their signing bonus pool. The first-round allotment for Mick Abel is $3.89 million. Casey Martin’s is $689,300, Carson Ragsdale’s is $497,500 and Baron Radcliff’s is $371,600.

The signing deadline this year is Aug. 1.

If a club exceeds its assigned pool, it faces a penalty. Teams that outspend their allotment by 0-5 percent pay a 75 percent tax on the overage. At higher thresholds, clubs lose future picks: a first-rounder and a 75 percent tax for surpassing their pool by more than 5 and up to 10 percent; a first- and a second-rounder and a 100 percent tax for more than 10 and up to 15 percent; and two first-rounders and a 100 percent tax for more than 15 percent.

In eight years with these rules, teams have exceeded their allotment a total of 149 times but never by more than 5 percent. Twenty-one of the 30 teams outspent their pool last year.

Trend wrap
The Phillies kept their formula simple throughout the Draft. They took the highest-ranked player on their board whenever it came time to pick.

“You just have to be fluid during the Draft at what’s happening,” Barber said. “The Casey Martin pick, if it wasn’t him, it could have very well been a high school player that we backed up Mick Abel with. We had presented scenarios for a Draft that would have ended up being four high school kids and we would have been OK with that.”

First-round fact
Phillies fans loved the fact that Bryce Harper reached out to Abel with a FaceTime call on Wednesday night. In case anybody was wondering, it was Harper’s idea.

“Right after we made the pick with Mick, we were yelling at each other down the hall and [general manager] Matt Klentak let me know that Bryce actually reached out to him and let him know that he wanted to speak with Mick,” Barber said. “I wish I could take credit for that, but I can't. That was all Bryce that he reached out, and he did it with all four of the players that we selected. I thought it was just an unbelievable thing for him to take the time and the effort to reach out to these guys and just congratulate them.

"I talked to each of them and yeah, it was pretty exciting to have somebody at Bryce Harper's level reach out to these guys. It continued throughout the night. I saw something last night on Twitter as I got back to the hotel at 1 a.m. that Bryce had retweeted one of Baron's home runs that he hit for 470 feet. Just unbelievably cool. How I would've taken that is, I mean, being an 18- to 21-year-old and being reached out to by one of the most famous baseball players in the world, it would be really, really cool. That's what I would think.”

Day 2 name to watch
The Phillies couldn’t believe their luck that they landed Martin in the third round. He projected to be a late first-round or compensatory first-round pick, but he fell either because some teams questioned his hit tool or maybe because they had signability concerns. The Phillies have neither. They think they have a potential star on their hands.

NDFA strategy
Teams can sign undrafted free agents for a maximum of $20,000 beginning at 9 a.m. ET on Sunday.

“We’ve been working really, really hard at this,” Barber said. “Nobody really knows exactly how it’s going to work out because it’s brand new to us. We’ve been super aggressive in our accumulating information, reaching out to the players, getting a list together, and I don’t know how it’s going to work out. I really don’t. I don’t know how many people are going to be willing to sign, want to sign, but we’re going to be aggressive and try to go after those players.”

The last word
“The one thing that really sticks out to me right now is just how many good players are still out there and didn't have the opportunity to be selected. It's tough to look at those quality players and just realize as of right now they might not have that opportunity. I hope we get back to a point in the Draft where it's more rounds and the opportunity to select more players.” -- Barber