Detroit Tigers offseason preview: MLB Draft Lottery

The MLB Draft Lottery takes place Tuesday night, and the Detroit Tigers currently hold the sixth pick in next year's draft

For the first time ever, Major League Baseball will hold a lottery to determine the order of the top of the draft. The Detroit Tigers, currently holding the sixth pick, could rise, fall, or stay put depending on how the ping pong balls fall.

The Draft Lottery will be held Tuesday night at 8:30 p.m. ET and will air on MLB Network. It was worked into the CBA during last year's lockout as an anti-tanking measure, where much like draft lotteries in other sports, the teams with the worst records still have the highest chance at landing the first overall pick, but it's not guarenteed.

All 18 teams that didn't make the playoffs in 2022 will participate in the draft, and thus all have a chance to get the first overall pick. The first six spots in the first round are determined, which means the team with the worst record—the Washington Nationals—could pick as low as seventh.

The odds range for the top six teams are a follows. The rest of the odds can be found here.

1. Nationals (55-107), 16.5%
2. A’s (60-102), 16.5
3. Pirates (62-100), 16.5
4. Reds (62-100), 13.2
5. Royals (65-97), 10.0
6. Tigers (66-96), 7.5

As you can see, the Detroit Tigers have a 7.5% chance of landing the first pick in the draft. The top three teams all have the same odds, which is also an anti-tanking measure. The rest of the draft after the lottery picks will go in reverse order of the teams' 2022 winning percentage.

It's still very early, but the consenus best prospect of the 2023 draft class appears to be LSU OF Dylan Crews. That seems to be the prize that everyone is hoping for. He would obviously be a great addition to the Tigers farm system.

Getting the No.1 pick would be huge for this organization. But needless to say, the odds are most definiely not in their favor. In fact, they have a better chance at falling further than the sixth pick than getting the top pick. That's how these draft lotteries work. It's a crapshoot.

It's really unfortuate that MLB went in this direction, but it is what it is. I'm not saying tanking wasn't a problem—it definitely was (and still is). There's just got to be a better way to combat it than a draft lottery.

Tangent aside, there's more about the draft lottery in the link above. We'll have an article the next day about where the Tigers ended up if you can't watch it live. If they stay put, I'd call that a win.