Baseball Blogs Weigh In: Harper, A-Rod, Dice-K, A’s

On this date 45 years ago, in the final year before Major League Baseball instituted the amateur draft, Rick Reichardt was signed by the Los Angeles Angels for $200K. At the time, it was the largest signing bonus ever given to an amateur baseball player. Reichardt would only play 57 minor league games before making his big league debut later that year. He would go on to play 11 seasons with four franchises. With this year's draft class starting to sign their first contracts, let's take a look at what is being written in the Blogosphere…

• Jorge Says No! says MLB should consider moving the trade deadline since the introduction of the wild card leaves more teams in contention in July.
• Sully Baseball says it is hypocritical to criticize Bryce Harper for wanting to turn pro at age 16.
• River Ave. Blues suggests that if the Yankees could have one contract absorbed by MLB it would be Alex Rodriguez's.
• Around the Majors takes a look at Scott Boras' upcoming free agent class, which includes Eric Gagne, who has been converted back to a starter.
• MLB Notebook wonders who the A's can trade outside of Matt Holliday.
• Fire Brand of the American League looks at whether Daisuke Matsuzaka has been worth the contract he signed.

Cork Gaines writes for RaysIndex.com. If you have a suggestion for this feature, Cork can be reached here, and followed on Twitter here.