The first weekend of college baseball is officially in the books, MLB Spring Training is underway, and draft season has quietly begun. That makes this the perfect time to roll out the first installment of our 2026 MLB Mock Draft.

This is version 1.0 — a snapshot of where things stand right now. There’s a long way to go between today and draft night in July. We’ll revisit this board at multiple checkpoints throughout the spring and summer as breakout performances, injury news, draft-eligible sophomores, and shifting industry intel reshape the landscape. For now, this is the early read on Round 1 — and there’s already plenty to unpack.

Here’s who I have for the local clubs:

1. Chicago White Sox: SS Roch Cholowsky, UCLA

Roch Cholowsky’s sophomore season with the Bruins was as good as it gets, slashing .353/.480/.710 with 23 home runs and 74 RBI. We’ve heard Cholowsky called the best overall shortstop prospect since Troy Tulowitzki and the most slam-dunk No. 1 overall selection since Adley Rutschman. While time will tell on the Tulo comp, the latter seems like a good bet. Justin Lebron and Grady Emerson will get plenty of discussion, but as of today, there’s little doubt in my mind that Roch will be rocking a White Sox cap on draft day.

23. Chicago Cubs: 3B Gavin Grahovac, Texas A&M

The Cubs have taken college players with 12 of their last 13 first-round selections, with Ed Howard being the lone exception to that trend in 2020. Grahovac hit a school freshman record 23 home runs as a true freshman in 2024, but missed almost all of last season due to a torn labrum suffered while sliding headfirst.

Grahovac played first base for the Aggies on opening weekend and hit his first home run of the season and a pair of doubles. He has ridiculous gap-to-gap power, but his strikeout rate is something to watch this season, striking out 29 percent of the time in his first two seasons. It’s early, but Grahovac struck out just once through his first 16 plate appearances this season.

You can check out the other 38 picks from the first round here:

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