Draft season is mostly a numbers game, but every year there's a pick that makes scouts sit up because the tools just don't add up to a sixth-rounder. Alex Weingartner is that guy for the White Sox. A New Jersey prep product out of St. Augustine Prep, Weingartner was arguably the best pure athlete in this year's class, and Chicago just made sure he never sees a college classroom.
6th-rder Alex Weingartner signs w/@WhiteSox for $1.4 million (slot 166 = $413,900). New Jersey HS OF, one of best prep athletes in @MLBDraft, big raw power from the right side, 6.24 seconds in the 60, 94-96 mph on the mound. @PennStateBASE recruit.
The number itself tells the story. Slot value for pick 166 was $413,900, per Callis, and the White Sox blew right past it to lock Weingartner up at $1.4 million. That's not a team nickel-and-diming a late-round dart throw — that's an organization buying out a kid who had real alternatives and real leverage.
And Weingartner had leverage because he's genuinely rare. He ran a 6.24-second 60-yard dash at the Prep Baseball Report Super 60 back in February, a showcase-record time that instantly made him one of the most talked-about names in the 2026 class. On top of the speed, he was clocked up to 94-96 mph off the mound as a two-way arm, giving teams the option to develop him as a pitcher, a corner outfielder, or both before settling in.
That two-way profile is exactly why the price tag matters. Weingartner had a Penn State commitment on the table, and elite two-way prep athletes with power arms and track-level speed are notoriously hard to pry out of college if a team lowballs them. By going nearly $1 million over slot, the White Sox took the college option completely off the table rather than risk a long, drawn-out negotiation or losing him to campus.
For a rebuilding White Sox org that's leaned hard into upside bets over the last few draft cycles, landing a prep athlete with this kind of ceiling in the sixth round is the sort of value swing that can make or break a draft class years down the line. Now it's just about player development turning track-and-field speed and a mid-90s fastball into an actual big-league outfielder.