Pittsburgh Pirates: Sign Big Time Draft Prospect Ogle

The Pittsburgh Pirates just wrapped up their 2016 MLB Draft on the 11th and they are now in the process of negotiating with their picks.

According to Baseball America the Pittsburgh Pirates have agreed to terms with multiple draft picks so far. Due to the amount of draft picks, as they, sign it will be broken into multiple articles as signings occur. Not all bonuses are reported right away, and they will not be written about here until those numbers are announced.

This might be the biggest signing so far for the Pirates draft class. The Pittsburgh Pirates have agreed to terms with Braeden Ogle according to Stephen Nesbitt of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Ogle was the Pirates fourth round pick, however they were lucky to grab him there. Ogle was rated by Baseball America as the #69 prospect in the draft, suggesting he could have been a high second round pick by some teams.

One thing that may have caused him to slide to the Pirates’ pick at 135 in the fourth round was his commitment to Florida. Florida saw five of their pitchers drafted in the top 4 rounds, including AJ Puk going number six overall, Dane Dunning going number 29 overall, and Logan Shore heading to Oakland at number 47 overall. This could have been quite enticing for Ogle as Florida is turning into a big time power in college baseball and obviously has an eye for talented pitchers.

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Instead, Ogle has decided to forego his commitment to the University of Florida and join the Pittsburgh Pirates organization. The prep player from northern Florida has signed to a bonus of 800,000 dollars according to Nesbitt. This is an over-slot deal. The #135 pick was assigned a slot value of 425,700 dollars. The signing of Ogle took 375,300 dollars away from the Pirates to use toward paying draftees over-slot (leaving just about 40,000 dollars for over-slot deals) . This was expected, as mentioned earlier Ogle had a strong commitment to a big program. I am pumped that the Pirates swayed him, Ogle is a big time talent to get in the fourth round, and has a dynamite arm for a left-handed pitcher. Here is the scouting report from draft day on him:

"“The Pirates get good value from 135th overall pick in the 6’2” and 180 pounds lefty. His fastball intriguing, he typically sits 91-93 miles per hour, but he has hit up to 96 miles per hour on the gun. His best secondary pitch is his curve-ball. He throws it hard and gets a solid spin rate on it. His change-up needs work, but he does have one that he has used. His biggest flaw is repeating his mechanics. The Pirates are used to dealing with raw, prep pitchers and should be able to work with him on his mechanics.”"

The fact the Ogle already has already hit 96 miles per hour on the gun suggests that he will be a power pitcher. The Pirates have refined many pitchers mechanics who were said to have issues when they were draft including Gerrit Cole, Tyler Glasnow, and Tony Watson. The Pirates have proven their ability to take mid-round draft picks who have a lot of talent but some flaws, and turn them into true prospects (see Tyler Glasnow, Nick Kingham, and Chad Kuhl). Ogle has all the potential in the world, this was seen by the Florida Gators and the Pittsburgh Pirates. The Bucs felt that he was worth going way over-slot on for a reason. Ogle will report the GCL, and likely will be a top 30 prospect already, even before throwing a game.

The Pittsburgh Pirates just wrapped up their 2016 MLB Draft on the 11th and they are now in the process of negotiating with their picks.

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