2014-15 International Free Agency Thread

[Guest]

I don't think it's directed at a single team or even just the big spending teams. As Truffle said, it's a crappy band aid (for something that might not even be that big a problem).

 

@BenBadler: @marcuszappia I don't seen these changes as targeting the Yankees. It's the industry as a whole.

 

This is about the Cubs:

 

@BenBadler: @RaisinMan101 Definitely bothered a lot of people. This wasn't targeted at them though.

[Banedon]

@dan_bernstein: I'm told #Cubs are steamed about this new #MLB rule limiting proprietary international scouting, feeling targeted. Won't say so publicly.

 

I kind of thought the same, then passed it off as too much homerism on my end. But this does hurt. But I guess it just means no prearranged deals. We'll still have the ability to go way over the limits if we want to and we've likely made plenty of inroads with next years class already. We just won't be hearing anything early, as Kiley eluded to a month ago.

 

This hurts, but thinking the Cubs are being targeted for no apparent reason is crybaby talk

 

Someone just called in and asked Dan who would be targeting the Cubs, and why? And Dan admitted he had no answer there, but just was stating how the Cubs feel.

[Sammy Sofa]

How could this possibly be "targeted" at the Cubs over other teams?

[Banedon]

How could this possibly be "targeted" at the Cubs over other teams?

 

I can understand the "feeling" of being targeted...UMFan pointed out all the rule changes that have impacted the Cubs long term plans, but I'm sure that's just an immediate reactionary thing.

[Sammy Sofa]

How could this possibly be "targeted" at the Cubs over other teams?

 

I can understand the "feeling" of being targeted...UMFan pointed out all the rule changes that have impacted the Cubs long term plans, but I'm sure that's just an immediate reactionary thing.

 

Sure, it "feels" like a lot of the stuff they've gone through in the last few years has been very "only the Cubs;" it's just surprising to see something like this so close to being an official comment.

[Guest]

@BenBadler: The rules aren't good, but MLB isn't targeting specific teams here RT @tim815 Seems to be a "Soak The Cubs" rule, based on the timing.

[UMFan83]

How could this possibly be "targeted" at the Cubs over other teams?

 

I can understand the "feeling" of being targeted...UMFan pointed out all the rule changes that have impacted the Cubs long term plans, but I'm sure that's just an immediate reactionary thing.

 

No Bud Selig didn't randomly decide he doesn't like the Cubs and wants to make it unfair for them. I should have said "targeting teams like the Cubs" because that is closer to what I meant. Seems like every time the Cubs find a way to gain a competitive edge, the rules change.

 

And yes it was a bit of an immediate reactionary thing.

[WrigleyField 22]

All these new rules feel targeted at the Cubs because we keep end up being the last to try and start exploiting them, but really it's because we waited too long.

[burnt out cubbie fan]

All these new rules feel targeted at the Cubs because we keep end up being the last to try and start exploiting them, but really it's because we waited too long.

This is not at all true, they feel targeted because they are one of the teams using these different angles to exploit the rules and the loopholes keep getting closed on them. They feel targeted because they have invested millions in the Dominican academy and next year was their next turn to blow their load on the international market. It's not like they just joined the game and it got shut on them, they were one of the teams that started the trend and were among the most heavily invested.

[jersey cubs fan]

All these new rules feel targeted at the Cubs because we keep end up being the last to try and start exploiting them, but really it's because we waited too long.

This is not at all true, they feel targeted because they are one of the teams using these different angles to exploit the rules and the loopholes keep getting closed on them. They feel targeted because they have invested millions in the Dominican academy and next year was their next turn to blow their load on the international market. It's not like they just joined the game and it got shut on them, they were one of the teams that started the trend and were among the most heavily invested.

 

Uhhhhh, no peg.

 

Many other teams have been doing this stuff long before the Cubs started. Ricketts was relatively quick to see the problems and invest, and Theo was aggressive going after these things once he was hired, but the Cubs were very much behind other teams.

[Cubswin11]

All these new rules feel targeted at the Cubs because we keep end up being the last to try and start exploiting them, but really it's because we waited too long.

This is not at all true, they feel targeted because they are one of the teams using these different angles to exploit the rules and the loopholes keep getting closed on them. They feel targeted because they have invested millions in the Dominican academy and next year was their next turn to blow their load on the international market. It's not like they just joined the game and it got shut on them, they were one of the teams that started the trend and were among the most heavily invested.

I doubt this will have a big effect on next years plan, as it was said in here, they've probably already done a good amount of their homework on next year already and know who to target and who to be talking to thru back channels and what not.

[Guest]

Yoan Moncada is the next Cuban defector star: http://www.baseballamerica.com/international/yoan-moncada-cuban-baseball-star/

 

He has to be signed under the IFA bonus pool restrictions, which means the Cubs can't go after him until 7/2/15. The Rays, Red Sox and Yankees are at an advantage in that they've blown past this year's limits and can sign him for whatever they want. On the flip side, they will be under the same restrictions the Cubs are currently on as of 7/2/15. The dates matter because his actual whereabouts are unknown and he still has to establish residency and become cleared by the US government. Hopefully all that takes 11 months and the Cubs can be eligible to sign him.

 

That player is 19-year-old Yoan Moncada (also spelled Johan Moncada), a 6-foot, 210-pound switch-hitting infielder who’s the best teenager to leave Cuba since Jorge Soler, a player with exciting tools and dominance of the Cuban junior leagues on par with what Yasiel Puig did at the same age.

 

Moncada’s whereabouts are unclear, but it doesn’t appear that he’s in Cuba. In June, MLB.com reported that Moncada left the island. Talk within the industry has persisted that Moncada is out, though his situation is particularly sketchy, even by Cuban standards, with even people deeply connected to the Cuban baseball player market uncertain of where he is or who is handling him. The commissioner’s office also said it hasn’t received any word from Moncada.

 

Yet when Cuba used a team of its top young talent to play the U.S. college national team in a friendship series last month, Moncada was absent, and he isn’t playing in the country’s 23U league. At this point, all signs point to Moncada being out of Cuba and on his way toward pursuing a contract with an MLB team.

 

How good is Moncada? He has more upside than Cuban outfielder Rusney Castillo, who just reached a $72.5 million deal with the Red Sox. He’s better than Cuban outfielder Yasmany Tomas, who’s in the Dominican Republic but is still likely several months away from free agency. If Moncada were eligible for the 2015 draft, he would be in the mix to be the No. 1 overall pick. Gourriel and Despaigne would be safer bets, but there’s no player in Cuba with Moncada’s combination of youth, tools and hitting ability.

[davell]

I put it in the transactions thread too. If he's this good, my guess is a bunch of teams would be more than willing to blow past their limits. If Aiken would have gotten 40 mill on the open market, I'd guess that's in the vicinity here as well. Except half is a penalty and he wouldn't see it. God, these rules suck.

[SouthSideRyan]

I put it in the transactions thread too. If he's this good, my guess is a bunch of teams would be more than willing to blow past their limits. If Aiken would have gotten 40 mill on the open market, I'd guess that's in the vicinity here as well. Except half is a penalty and he wouldn't see it. God, these rules suck.

 

Unless there's an Intl' draft the following year and nobody cares.

[davell]

I put it in the transactions thread too. If he's this good, my guess is a bunch of teams would be more than willing to blow past their limits. If Aiken would have gotten 40 mill on the open market, I'd guess that's in the vicinity here as well. Except half is a penalty and he wouldn't see it. God, these rules suck.

 

Unless there's an Intl' draft the following year and nobody cares.

 

If they switch to a draft prior to the end of the current CBA, I'm sure they'd take away picks.

[SouthSideRyan]

I put it in the transactions thread too. If he's this good, my guess is a bunch of teams would be more than willing to blow past their limits. If Aiken would have gotten 40 mill on the open market, I'd guess that's in the vicinity here as well. Except half is a penalty and he wouldn't see it. God, these rules suck.

 

Unless there's an Intl' draft the following year and nobody cares.

 

If they switch to a draft prior to the end of the current CBA, I'm sure they'd take away picks.

 

We're supposed to be good by then, bring it on.

[davell]

I put it in the transactions thread too. If he's this good, my guess is a bunch of teams would be more than willing to blow past their limits. If Aiken would have gotten 40 mill on the open market, I'd guess that's in the vicinity here as well. Except half is a penalty and he wouldn't see it. God, these rules suck.

 

Unless there's an Intl' draft the following year and nobody cares.

 

If they switch to a draft prior to the end of the current CBA, I'm sure they'd take away picks.

 

We're supposed to be good by then, bring it on.

 

Oh, Im fine with it. Same with regular draft picks at this point too.

[Fro]

We should just setup our baseball academy on Sosa's yacht in international waters.

[SouthSideRyan]

We should just setup our baseball academy on Sosa's yacht in international waters.

 

PTR would rather lose forever than have to associate with Sammy

[Guest]

Ben Badler[/url]"]Seven Reasons Why MLB’s New International Rules Are Backward

 

1. Less Opportunity To Evaluate

 

Bringing players into a Dominican academy is the primary way most teams prefer to evaluate Latin American players. Teams can put players through game situations, work with them on different drills and get to know them as people. It also provides convenience, especially for an inte rnational scouting director coming in from the United States, to have several players from across Latin America in the academy at one time, rather than have to travel across the island to look at players individually. Teams such as the Rangers, Pirates and some others consistently earn praise from trainers who like that scouts from those organizations come to their fields to see their players rather than just ask that the trainers send their players to them. Now, especially before January, other clubs will have to adopt that practice.

 

The issue, though, isn’t that scouts might have to travel to different places and have less job convenience. What bothers both teams and trainers is that it gives scouts fewer opportunities to evaluate players. Certainly, that seems to be part of the intention of the new rules. If scouts can’t make a proper evaluation of a player in September, that should cut back on their confidence to offer him $1 million at that point.

 

The problem is that teams are now going to have to make decisions based on less information and less certainty in an international arena that’s already filled with risk and uncertainty. Teams will draft 18-year-old high school players from the United States in June, but watching prospects at showcases and All-America games this summer is a critical part of the evaluation process. With college players, teams have three years of history, sometimes more if they were prep standouts. Taking away the academy component for teams until January reduces scouting history and reduces confidence in an evaluation, which is especially troubling in Latin America, where players don’t have a high school or a college team to help scouts to gauge their abilities.

 

2. Shots Fired At The DPL And IPL

3. Penalizes Younger Players

4. Double Standard For Americans Vs. Latinos

5. Condenses Schedule For Players

6. Less Opportunity To Develop

7. Who Benefits From These Rules?

 

This perhaps is the best question to ask about the new regulations. They certainly don’t seem to give the players any advantage. And the teams now have fewer opportunities to see players, so it doesn’t help them either. The only party these rules seem to help is the commissioner’s office, which could potentially gain greater influence and control over the showcasing of amateur talent in Latin America.

 

If MLB wants to curtail 14-year-olds being showcased at team facilities, there’s nothing wrong with that. While those showcases can attract more than 100 scouts, many of those scouts are there out of necessity given the overall aggression of the industry and would prefer to not have to make decisions on kids that age. The new rules will cut down on exposure for 14-year-olds, but it does so at the expense of the 16-year-old players who are eligible to sign on July 2, and creates an uneven playing field for kids who are in the same signing class.

 

After players turn 16, they are eligible to sign on the following July 2, or if they turn 16 by Aug. 30, they are eligible to sign on their birthday. What MLB could have done is say that, if a player is eligible to sign in 2015, the first date he is eligible to enter a team facility is Sept. 1. That would cut back on showcases for 14-year-olds, possibly reduce some of the early agreements that already are in place, and would make a kid who was born in September subject to the same rules as a player who was born in May. It would also put Latin American players on a similar evaluation timetable as their U.S. high school counterparts and allow leagues such as the DPL and IPL to continue to provide a platform for the coming year’s players.

 

What MLB did was invent new regulations that make players and teams worse off then they were before. Instead of telling kids who want to play baseball that they’re banned from a team academy that was built to help baseball players, MLB should focus on banning from the academy the trainers who sexually molest kids, give them steroids, help them falsify their ages and coordinate kickbacks with scouts. And when a team official breaks the rules, focus on penalizing that individual and his team, and bring transparency to the penalty the way there’s transparency for a player who’s suspended for taking steroids.

 

The Latin American landscape is a complex one in need of reforms, but many of the changes that would improve the arena aren’t difficult to understand or to implement. The newest rules are the wrong answer.

[davell]

Cubs signed an IF named Fidel Mejia for 250k.

[Guest]

@kileymcd: There's a legit July 2nd prospect for next year named Fidel Castro. I'm going to scout him in a few weeks. This is so exciting.

[TruffleShuffle]

lol

[Guest]

Maybe save some cap room for 2016-17 (if there isn't a draft by then)?instead of blowing evetything out in 2015-16? http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/instagraphs/the-next-elite-july-2nd-prospect/

 

I’m often asked way before July 2nd if that year’s international signing class of Latin 16-year-olds has a franchise type, once-a-decade player—Miguel Cabrera, Miguel Sano, Felix Hernandez, etc.—which is the question I often find myself asking scouts to open a discussion about the top players in the class. In short, there isn’t that player (yet) for next July 2nd, though I’ll get another look at many of the top players in the class next month. There are already rumors of a player in the upcoming class having a deal for $3 million, but multiple players get about that much every year, even with the new international pools in place, so that doesn’t automatically make him that super elite prospect.

 

However, there is a player for the 2016 July 2nd period, 22 months from now, that is drawing that kind of scouting attention. He’s 14 years old and he’s a Venezuelan shortstop named Kevin Maitan.

 

...

 

You hear almost every star player from a Latin country eventually used as a comparison for a raw teenager, but international scouts generally don’t invoke Miguel Cabrera. That’s the Bo Jackson-type talent you don’t use to compare to teenagers. Even Vladimir Guerrero gets comp’d sometimes, though with Vlady’s son being in this year’s July 2nd crop and having similar mannerisms, that at least makes some sense.

 

Maitan has been compared to Cabrera by most of the scouts I’ve asked about him. He’s unusually physically mature for his age and flashes all the tools you want to see to throw that Cabrera comp around: he can play shortstop pretty well now, he’s got more raw power than most kids a few years older than him, he has smooth actions in defense and at the plate and so on.

 

Obviously, it’s still ridiculously early in the process to anoint a 14-year-old the next big thing, but scouts have already starting doing it, with rumors Maitan has already been offered seven figures by multiple clubs.  I won’t name the clubs that have been tied to him for a few reasons, but it’s still unclear if that matters, because MLB could still be aiming to institute an international draft for 2016.  If that happens, it would add another big benefit to having the worst record in the 2015 season.

[Guest]

Yoan Moncada is the next Cuban defector star: http://www.baseballamerica.com/international/yoan-moncada-cuban-baseball-star/

 

Initial post on him was on 8/22, so where is Yoan Moncada?

 

Kiley McDaniel[/url]"]So, this sounds great. We have a guy that scouts say has talent like Yasiel Puig and he’s a switch-hitting teenage shortstop. Why haven’t I heard more about him yet? Shouldn’t he be the top story on MLB Trade Rumors every day with teams offering over $100 million?

 

There are two reasons this hasn’t happened yet. First, due to his lack of pro experience and his age, Moncada is subject to international bonus pools, along with the 16-year-old July 2nd prospects you hear about once a year. Secondly, it’s confirmed that Moncada isn’t in Cuba, but nobody knows exactly where he is (Mexico is a common guess).

 

If you followed Puig’s defection story, you know how shady things can get when human/drug traffickers see a way to make money. It’s assumed by people in the international baseball industry that Moncada is at some juncture in the same process that Puig was in and that Moncada will be “found” once the right people get paid, which could be any day or much longer. It may not be pretty, but this is what elite Cuban baseball players have to do to get paid these days.

 

...

 

I explain all of this because when Moncada becomes a free agent will dictate which teams can sign him. The Red Sox were another club that went over their pool this year, along with the Yankees. If Moncada is declared a free agent between now and July 2nd, 2015, then those two clubs have an advantage as they have huge revenues and have already gone over their pool amount and paid the penalty. To sign him, any team would go over their pool and pay the overage, but teams that are under their pool would want their year to go over their pool to also include a full crop of July 2nd players to make up for the two-year penalty.

 

Conversely, if Moncada becomes a free agent any time from July 2nd, 2015 to 2017, those two clubs have no chance to bid on him because of the two-year penalty. Then, a whole new group of clubs could coordinate their international spending to roll three years of July 2nd signings into one year and also plan to make a run at Moncada, getting the most bang for their buck/penalty. With an international draft looming, this could also be the last opportunity any team would have to acquire a player of consequence under the age of 25 in an open market.