We're less than a day away from the draft signing deadline, as teams have until 4 PM CST on Friday to sign their picks. Here's the latest on the status of some high-round picks who have yet to agree to terms, plus some signings…
- The Indians have signed fourth-round pick D'vone McClure, reports Jim Callis of Baseball America (via Twitter). McClure signed for a $750K bonus, more than double the recommended slot price of $314.7K.
- The Nationals can pay Lucas Giolito just under $2.813MM without going over the draft spending cap, writes Adam Kilgore of the Washington Post, citing calculations from Baseball America. MLB's recommended slot price for the 16th overall pick is $2.125MM. Kilgore outlines the situation surrounding Giolito, who the Nats say they will not sign to a contract that puts them over the spending cap and causes the team to incur a fine.
- "We are making progress. We’re waiting to hear their next proposal," Orioles scouting director Gary Rajsich tells Dan Connolly of the Baltimore Sun (Twitter link) about the club's negotiations with first-rounder Kevin Gausman. The fourth overall pick has a slot price of $4.2MM, which Gausman and his representatives are looking to "slightly" exceed, tweets Steve Melewski of MASNsports.com.
- The Mets are at a "standstill" with second-round pick Teddy Stankiewicz, reports Jim Callis of Baseball America (via Twitter). Callis hears that Stankiewicz is willing to sign for the recommended slot price for the 75th overall pick ($680.4K) but the Mets haven't offered that large of a bonus.
- The Giants have signed third-rounder Mac Williamson, tweets Baseball America's Nathan Robe. Williamson will receive a $390K bonus, which is under the $412.3K recommended price for the 115th overall pick.
- MLB.com's Jonathan Mayo outlines the rules of the newly-instituted Competitive Balance Lottery, which takes place on July 18 and will distribute six total bonus picks among low-revenue and small-market teams for the 2013 amateur draft.
So essentially, the CBL allows the status quo to continue. Small-market teams develop stars, hope desperately that they can win it all while the stars are still under team control, and then the big-market teams swoop in, offer them enormously lucrative free agent contracts, and suck them dry while the cycle repeats itself.
The only difference is now more small-market teams have a chance at developing young players into stars.
Yep, you nailed it.
Egads. I hate being right.
Actually isn’t this worse for the small market clubs as they can not use as much money to get the draftees signed?
I had thought the small market clubs strategy was to invest in the young player instead of paying a huge amount for 1 free agent pay half of the money but get 10 potentially great players.
Under this they are limited into how much they can spend on the potential stars. Right?
The new system has all kinds of flaws because guys that slip in the draft for money reasons get doubly-screwed, because the teams that actually draft them then can’t pay them. The Astros strategy was pretty brilliant for years where there’s no obviously huge #1 — take a lower pick, pay him way under the #1 slot, and then overdraft elsewhere.
Anyway, Giolito will sign. The money isn’t terrible. He’s not going to college.
i agree on Giolito. If his buddy Fried had opted to go to college, i would bet otherwise. but with Fried signed and going, he will sign
C’mon Mets! I really want to have a player in our system for awhile who can do the stanky leg.
What are they thinking anyway? It’s not like he’s asking to be paid overslot. You drafted him, pay him and get him in already. This isn’t rocket science people. Get it done already!!!
I wonder how much room to “slightly exceed” the slot the Orioles have without getting into the +5% territory, and I wonder if Gausman is willing to turn down over $4MM and take the chance of getting hurt.
In all honesty, Gausman looks like a younger version of Jason Hammel.
Now with that being said, I think Duquette looks bad in all this.
He said he was going to build through the draft and now it looks like that Duquette didn’t ask Gausman if he wanted to play for the Baltimore Orioles.
If Gausman goes back to LSU and goes into the draft in 2013.
He should be looking at who is going to draft him.
Twins
Astros
Mariners
Phillies
Cubs
Padres
Rockies
If I am the Orioles I would stop negotiating.
If I had been Duquette, I would have never drafted him in the 1st place.
This kid has cost time, money, and effort. He is thumbing his nose at us and the O’s can do nothing about it.
I could’ve sworn I saw somewhere where a Nationals Executive or Mike Rizzo was saying the Nationals would be willing to go over the limit enough to incur a fine, but not enough to lose a draft pick next year. Perhaps I’m mistaken.
Just for accuracy’s sake, the competitive balance lottery is actually to allocate 12 picks… six between the first and second rounds, and six more between the second and third.
Going to be a lot of action tonight and up until 5pm eastern tomorrow on picks. Not just the headliners, but teams who took some high upside people lower on down and have some wiggle room left deciding how high they want to go with them.
A few teams have -0- problems paying that fine for going 5% over the cap allowed them.. Boston and pretty sure Toronto are already over. More teams will follow. Got to get people the cheapest way possible and the draft is always the way to go.