White Sox Sign No. 1 Overall Pick Roch Cholowsky to Record-Breaking Bonus
Roch Cholowsky just signed for a record $10.35 million bonus, which still saved the Chicago White Sox more than $1 million to spend elsewhere in their 2026 draft class.
Video Transcript
The Chicago White Sox just made history with the signing bonus that they gave to first overall pick Rock Cholowski.
It's official, Cholowski is a member of the White Sox organization.
He has signed to a record ten point three five million dollar signing bonus, shattering the previous record held by Chase Burns and Charlie Condon back in twenty twenty-four at nine point three million dollars.
Now, regardless of who the White Sox drafted first overall, this year's pick was always going to break that record.
That doesn't really come as a surprise.
But what does kind of come as a surprise, I think to some White Sox fans here, is that even with the record, Cholowski's bonus saved the White Sox a million dollars to use on the rest of their draft class.
The slot value was a million dollars higher than that ten point three five million dollar number.
So while the White Sox had over twenty million to use on this twenty twenty-six draft class, Cholowski actually gave them an extra one million dollars to use on players like Cole Prosek, Landon Tomey, Kyle Casteel, the high school guys that the White Sox got, that were-- they had high on their draft board.
So what's next now for Cholowski?
According to the interview that he did with CHSN on the broadcast over the weekend, he's going to fly to Charlotte on Wednesday for a four-day camp with the White Sox, at the Charlotte Knights facility.
After that, it's back to Arizona, some workouts, and he's hoping an assignment shortly thereafter.
He's wasting no time and wants to, get playing as quickly as possible.
So my estimation is that Cholowski's gonna start in High A Winston-Salem, and I think he could be suited up for the Dash by the end of July.
I don't think that's outrageous.
I think that's one of the reasons the White Sox took him first overall, because he's going to move through the minor leagues quickly, because he is close to the big leagues, because you can put him right in in High A and expect him to hold his own.
So it shouldn't be too much longer now.
Rock Cholowski has officially signed before he's in minor league games and making some noise for the White Sox.
