Major League Baseball draft

The Major League Baseball draft (officially the Rule 4 Draft; also known as the first-year player draft or amateur draft) is the primary mechanism by which Major League Baseball (MLB) assigns amateur baseball players from high schools, colleges, and other amateur baseball clubs to its teams. The draft order is determined by a lottery system, starting in 2023, where teams that did not make the postseason in the previous year participate in a lottery process to determine the first six picks. The team with the worst record has the best odds of receiving the first pick. Prior to 2023, the draft order was based on the previous season's standings, with the worst team selecting first.

The first amateur draft was held in 1965. Unlike most sports drafts, the MLB draft is held mid-season, taking place in July since 2021. Another distinguishing feature of the draft compared to those of other North American major professional sports leagues is its sheer size: currently, the draft lasts for 20 rounds (600+ selections), in addition to compensatory picks introduced in 2021; until 2019, it lasted up to 40 rounds (1,200+ selections), and until 2011, it lasted up to 50 rounds (1,500+ selections). In contrast, the NFL draft lasts seven rounds (260 selections), the NHL entry draft lasts seven rounds (224 selections), the MLS SuperDraft lasts three rounds (87 selections), the CFL draft lasts eight rounds (72 selections), and the NBA draft is only two rounds (60 selections).

On March 26, 2020, MLB and the Major League Baseball Players Association (MLBPA) reached a deal that included the option to shorten that year's draft to five rounds, and halve the 2021 draft to 20 rounds. On March 10, 2022, after agreeing on a new collective bargaining agreement, it was decided that the first-round order would be based on a lottery participated by 18 non-postseason teams to determine the first six picks, starting with the 2023 draft. The remaining first-round picks and subsequent rounds are determined by the previous season's win-loss records for the first 18 selections in each round, followed by playoff finishes.

Major League Baseball has used a draft to assign minor league players to teams since 1921. In 1936, the National Football League held the first amateur draft in professional sports. A decade later, the National Basketball Association instituted a similar method of player distribution. However, the player draft was controversial. Congressman Emanuel Celler questioned the legality of drafts during a series of hearings on the business practice of professional sports leagues in the 1950s. Successful clubs saw the draft as anti-competitive. Yankees executive Johnny Johnson equated it with communism. At the same time, Pulitzer Prize-winning sports columnist Arthur Daley compared the system to a "slave market."

Prior to the implementation of the first-year player draft, amateurs were free to sign with any Major League team that offered them a contract. As a result, wealthier teams such as the New York Yankees and St. Louis Cardinals were able to stockpile young talent, while poorer clubs were left to sign less desirable prospects.

In 1947, Major League Baseball implemented the bonus rule, a restriction aimed at reducing player salaries, as well as keeping wealthier teams from monopolizing the player market. In its most restrictive form, it forbade any team which gave an amateur a signing bonus of more than $4,000 from assigning that player to a minor league affiliate for two seasons. If the player was removed from the major league roster, he became a free agent. The controversial rule was repealed twice, only to be re-instituted.

The bonus rule was largely ineffective. There were accusations that teams were signing players to smaller bonuses, only to supplement them with under-the-table payments. In one famous incident, the Kansas City Athletics signed Clete Boyer, kept him on their roster for two years, then traded him to the Yankees just as he became eligible to be sent to the minor leagues. Other clubs accused the Yankees of using the Athletics as a de facto farm team, and the A's later admitted to signing Boyer on their behalf. By 1964, the total amount of money paid in signing bonuses to amateur players was greater than the amount spent on major league salaries; it was the bidding war that year for Rick Reichardt, who signed with the California Angels for the then outrageous bonus of $200,000, (about $1.8 million today) that finally led to the implementation of the draft.

Major League clubs voted on the draft during the 1964 Winter Meetings. Four teams—the New York Yankees, St. Louis Cardinals, Los Angeles Dodgers, and New York Mets—attempted to defeat the proposal, but they failed to convince a majority of teams, and in the end only the Cardinals voted against it.