{"id":762571,"date":"2026-07-14T15:08:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-14T15:08:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/762571\/"},"modified":"2026-07-14T15:08:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-14T15:08:09","slug":"chicago-white-sox-roch-cholowsky-agree-to-record-deal-report","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/762571\/","title":{"rendered":"Chicago White Sox, Roch Cholowsky agree to record deal: Report"},"content":{"rendered":"

Roch Cholowsky, the No. 1 pick in the MLB draft on Saturday, didn\u2019t waste any time squaring away his contract with the Chicago White Sox. The two sides have reportedly agreed on a record-setting signing bonus.<\/p>\n

The UCLA shortstop landed a $10.35 million bonus, according to MLB.com<\/a>, about $1 million less than the slot value for the pick, but $1.1 million more than the previous record. Cincinnati Reds pitcher Chase Burns and Colorado Rockies outfielder Charlie Condon, the second and third picks in the 2024 draft, respectively, each signed for a then-record $9.25 million<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Cholowsky was the White Sox\u2019s first No. 1 pick since 1977, when they selected Hall of Fame right fielder Harold Baines. On Sunday afternoon at Rate Field, Cholowsky tossed a ceremonial first pitch to Baines.<\/p>\n

Cholowsky visited Chicago in early June and met White Sox coaches, players, front office staff and owner Jerry Reinsdorf. He was on hand when Braden Montgomery hit a walk-off home run in his major-league debut. He said he called his agent the following morning and told him, \u201cThat\u2019s where I want to be.\u201d<\/p>\n

The 21-year-old could be there before long. The Athletic\u2019s draft expert Keith Law suggested<\/a> Cholowsky \u201cshould move quickly through the low minors.\u201d Cholowsky posted a .320\/.452\/.636 slash line during his junior year at UCLA, with 21 home runs in 60 games. Law, who ranked Cholowsky No. 1 on his pre-draft big board, described him as \u201ca polished shortstop with power and excellent instincts on both sides of the ball\u201d and wrote: \u201cBarring injury, I don\u2019t see a world where he\u2019s not at least an everyday MLB shortstop who hits 15-20 homers \u2014 his ceiling is 25-30 homers with a high OBP \u2014 and he\u2019ll play plus defense in any scenario.\u201d<\/p>\n

There were, however, mild concerns about Cholowsky\u2019s performance dipping during his junior year after a sophomore season in which he logged an 1.190 OPS. White Sox GM Chris Getz acknowledged as much and said the organization was comfortable with what they analyzed \u201cunder the hood.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cholowsky\u2019s father, Dan, was also a first-round pick, selected No. 39 by the St. Louis Cardinals in 1991. A versatile defender, Dan played every position on the diamond during eight minor-league seasons with the Cardinals, Chicago Cubs and Rockies. He now works as an area scout for the Reds.<\/p>\n

The day before the draft, the White Sox swung a trade for the No. 34 pick<\/a>, which boosted their bonus pool to a record sum of nearly $20.5 million. They used that pick to select high school shortstop Landon Thome, the son of Hall of Famer Jim Thome, who serves as a special assistant to Getz. The Thomes also linked up for a ceremonial first pitch Sunday.<\/p>\n

Teams have until 5 p.m. ET on July 27 to come to terms with their draftees.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the end of the day, we were most comfortable with Roch Cholowsky with our first pick,\u201d Getz said, \u201cregardless of what the signing bonus was going to be.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Roch Cholowsky, the No. 1 pick in the MLB draft on Saturday, didn\u2019t waste any time squaring away…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":762572,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[2318,363,99],"class_list":["post-762571","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-chicago-white-sox","tag-mlb","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/762571","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=762571"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/762571\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/762572"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=762571"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=762571"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=762571"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}