The Reds wasted no time getting their day-one pitching pull under contract. Cincinnati took Nebraska righty Ty Horn with the No. 94 overall pick and now he's officially signed, ink dry, ready to start climbing the minor league ladder.
Jim Callis broke down the signing bonus and Horn's pitch mix as the deal became official.
Per Callis, Horn inked for $647,500 against a slot value of $833,800 at pick 94 -- a discount for the Reds, which usually means the club is spreading extra bonus pool money elsewhere in the draft class. That's the unglamorous but important part of every July for a front office: not just who you pick, but how you shuffle the money around to get everyone signed.
The stuff is what makes Horn interesting. Callis flagged a fastball, slider and changeup that can all grade as solid-or-better when he's on, with the heater sitting in the 90s and reportedly touching as high as 98 mph. Horn spent this past season working out of Nebraska's bullpen after a rockier run as a starter, and evaluators generally like how his stuff plays up in shorter stints -- classic profile for a guy who could move fast as a reliever if everything clicks.
He wraps up a strong run for Nebraska's pitching pipeline, which has now produced multiple third-round arms in recent drafts. For the Reds, it's another lottery ticket added to a farm system that's been quietly retooling -- not a headline-grabbing college performer, but exactly the kind of mid-round arm with a real fastball-slider-changeup foundation that turns into a big-league bullpen piece if the development staff gets it right.
Now it's off to the complex leagues, where the radar guns will confirm whether that 98 shows up consistently or was a one-time blip. Nothing dramatic happens for Horn this summer -- just innings, reports, and the slow grind that either validates a third-round bet or quietly fades him into org-depth territory.