Report: MLBPA rejects MLB's proposal for revamped 2020 draft

Major League Baseball's proposal for a revised and shortened 2020 draft has been rejected by the MLB Players Association, sources told Ken Rosenthal and Evan Drellich of The Athletic.

Because of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, the league proposed shortening the draft from 40 rounds to 10. While the MLBPA previously accepted the shortened draft, there were other restrictions included in the proposal that the union found unacceptable, according to Rosenthal and Drellich.

MLB's plan called for picks in the first five rounds to maintain their slot values as in a normal 40-round draft. However, slot values in Rounds 6 through 10 would have been set at 50% of Rounds 1 through 5, according to Rosenthal and Drellich, and would have also had a hard cap on signing bonuses at each pick's slot value.

Additionally, the league proposed limiting how much money could be given to undrafted free agents, Rosenthal and Drellich report. Under their proposal, each team would have only been allowed to sign a maximum of five undrafted free agents to a $20,000 bonus, the highest allowable amount an undrafted player can receive. Teams could then sign as many undrafted players as they liked to bonuses of $5,000 or lower.

The 2020 MLB Draft is still scheduled to be held virtually June 10. It was supposed to take place in Omaha, Nebraska, but was moved online due to COVID-19.