On Wednesday the Cincinnati Reds picked up an additional pick in the 2017 Major League Baseball Draft. The team picked up a competitive balance Round A pick, which will directly follow the 1st round. As a small market team they will either get a Round A (following the 1st round) or a Round B (following the second round) pick each year. The rounds will alternate, so in 2018 the Reds will get the Round B selection.

We don’t know yet which picks will be assigned to which of the teams that landed in the Round A portion. We will have to wait until later on in January to find that part out .There are six teams total, but obviously you’d like to be drafting before the others. It will be the second straight year that the Reds have landed such a pick.

Hopefully they can put it to use as well as they did in 2016 when they landed Taylor Trammell with the pick. The additional money added to the draft bonus pool helps, as will having the 2nd overall pick in the draft. While the #2 pick slot value will go down, the overall money for the Top 10 rounds should stay the same (though inflation will likely increase it), which could give the Reds more value on their newly acquired pick than last year.

Another aspect of this, is how these picks are tied to the international bonus pooling system. If a team gets a Round A selection, they get a middle-tiered international bonus pool amount. If a team gets a Round B selection, they get the top-tiered international bonus pool amount.

Since the Reds landed a comp A round pick, their bonus pool for the 2017 international signing period will be $5.25M. Of course, they are not allowed to spend more than $300,000 on any single player, so it’s highly unlikely they come close to spending all of that, and will likely look to move some of their space in a trade or two. That money, however, can’t be traded until July 2nd when the signing period begins.