What Jackson Flora’s MLB Draft Bonus Deal Means for Giants Immediate Future

The San Francisco Giants have reportedly locked down their first-round pick Jackson Flora. Here is what that’s important.

UC Santa Barbara Gauchos right-handed pitcher Jackson Flora. | USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect

The San Francisco Giants weren’t going to let right-handed pitcher Jackson Flora get away. The question was how much they would pay to sign him?

The answer came late Saturday night, and it was a bit surprising. Even though Flora was a draft-eligible junior and had leverage to return to UC Santa Barbara, the Pleasanton, Calif., native agreed to a bonus deal worth $7.997 million, per MLB.com’s Jim Callis.

The kicker is that was more than $1 million below the slot value for the pick, which was nearly $9 million. Somehow, the Giants convinced the best pitcher in college baseball to take $1 million less than he was afforded. How does that impact the Giants as they try to get their rest of their picks signed?

The Impact of Jackson Flora’s Contract

San Francisco Giants president of baseball operations Buster Posey. | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

The Giants selected 21 players. Picks in the first 10 rounds come with slot bonuses already attached to the pick. Because the Giants received a compensatory pick between rounds one and two, they have three selections with a slot bonus of more than $1 million.

The others include compensatory pick and pitcher Carson Bolemon (No. 24 overall) and pitcher Kaden Waechter (No. 57 overall). In addition, the Giants need nearly $900,000 to sign third-round pick Peyton Bonds, the nephew of franchise legend Barry Bonds.

Those three players also have leverage. Bolemon and Waechter are prep players who can choose to go to college. Bonds is a draft-eligible junior who can go back to Rutgers. None of them have to sign a deal.

By saving money with Flora, San Francisco can use the excess to help convince players like those three that they should start their pro careers now. It’s a strategy many teams use. But it’s not always one that teams get a pitcher of Flora’s excellence to accept. Like the others, he had leverage. But, unlike the others, he had a proven collegiate track record that may allow him to hit the Majors sooner than most college pitchers.

Flora pitched all three seasons of his collegiate career with UC Santa Barbara. In his final campaign, he was named the College Baseball Hall of Fame pitcher of the year after he went 12-0 in 16 starts with a 1.06 ERA. He struck out 133 and walked 32 in 102 innings.

His 133 strikeouts set a single-season program record and his streak of 38.1 innings without allowing a run was the longest in program history. His ERA was the program’s best in its era as a Division I school, which started in 1970. His junior year also ended with him being named a consensus first-team all-American and the Big West Pitcher of the Year.

For his career he went 21-5 with a 2.49 ERA in 52 games (31 starts) with 259 strikeouts and 62 walks in 224 innings.