In the example used, the first pick* went to the team with the combination of 11-8-10-2. That happened to be the Pittsburgh Pirates, which was then one of the three teams with the highest number of combinations assigned to them\u2014165, or 16.5%.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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*The actual lottery takes place before the broadcast lottery, and the actual lottery starts with the first pick as opposed to the broadcast starting with the sixth pick. <\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
More drawings are then held to determine the rest of the lottery picks\u2014again, that\u2019s picks No. 2 through No. 6. If a combination gets drawn that\u2019s assigned to the Rockies, Nationals, or Angels, that drawing is void and another one starts.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Back to the Royals. The team\u2019s 2024 season threw them a lifeline by removing from the lottery process. In 2023, the Royals picked eighth (Blake Mitchell). The following year, they picked sixth (Jac Caglianone). Thus, they were ineligible to pick in the lottery last year\u2014but their good record kept them out of that conversation. No penalty for winning. As such, the team\u2019s true first-round pick last year came in at No. 23 (Sean Gamble). They also landed a comp pick. You can determine for yourself whether that constitutes a real first-rounder or something entirely different than a first- or second-rounder.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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As stated, the draft lottery takes place Tuesday, December 9, the second-to-last (penultimate!) day of the Winter Meetings. The draft, however, doesn\u2019t take place until July\u2014the Saturday before the All-Star Game, to be exact. To be exacter, that\u2019s July 11th.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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As for who the Royals could land\u2014well, they\u2019ll have a much better idea about that tomorrow night, and even better idea in July. But here are a few of the names projected to go at the top of next year\u2019s draft.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Roch Cholowsky<\/em><\/strong>, SS, UCLA\u2014That\u2019s also one hell of a name.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
Justin Lebron<\/em><\/strong>, SS, Alabama<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
Drew Burress<\/em><\/strong>, OF, Georgia Tech<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
Jacob Lombard<\/em><\/strong>, SS, Gulliver Prep (FL)\u2014committed to Miami (FL)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
Cameron Flukey<\/em><\/strong>, RHP, Coastal Carolina<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
Here are some names for the 15-20 range.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Maddox Maloney<\/em><\/strong>, SS, Oregon<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
Tyler Spangler<\/em><\/strong>, SS\/3B, De La Salle (CA)\u2014no relation to Egon (who, alas, doesn\u2019t spell his last name with an \u201ca\u201d)\u2014committed to Stanford<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
Kevin Roberts Jr.<\/em><\/strong>, OF\/RHP, Jackson Prep. (MS)\u2014committed to Florida<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
Gabe Gaeckle<\/em><\/strong>, RHP, Arkansas<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
Brady Harris<\/em><\/strong>, OF, Trinity Christian Academy (FL)\u2014committed to Florida<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
One last thing. The Royals probably won\u2019t land the top pick, but I just wanted to share what teams previously did as well as their odds to do so. It may not be all peaches and roses, but a chance remains. Looking at you, 2024.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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2025\u2014Washington Nationals, 10.2%<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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2024\u2014Cleveland Guardians, 2.0%<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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2023\u2014Pittsburgh Pirates, 16.5%<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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The MLB draft lottery will be held at 4:30 CT on Tuesday and will air on MLB Network.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.royalsreview.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For the Royals, aside from free agency, the biggest part of the offseason occurs on December 9, which is the penultimate day for the Winter Meetings in blustery Orlando. On that day, the league will hold its draft lottery. Since the Royals missed the playoffs this year, they\u2019re right back in it. Specifically, the Royals, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2192129,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[386045],"class_list":["post-2192128","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-royalty","tag-royals-trade-rumors-hot-stove"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/The-Royals-2026-draft-lottery-primer.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2192128","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2192128"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2192128\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2192130,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2192128\/revisions\/2192130"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2192129"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2192128"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2192128"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2192128"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}