The Phillies have agreed to a deal with former Braves prospect Abrahan Gutierrez, according to Ben Badler of Baseball America. The young catcher will receive a $550K bonus.
Gutierrez was among the recent international signees who were stripped from the Braves as punishment for rules violations. He’s the third of the bunch to sign today, with Kevin Maitan joining the Angels and Yefri del Rosario signing on with the Royals.
With the move, the Phillies have added a player that was considered one of the better catching prospects from the 2016-17 July 2 class. The 18-year-old Venezuelan received a $3.53MM bonus from Atlanta; he’ll keep those funds while also earning his new payout to head to Philadelphia.
Gutierrez has not yet had much time at all to show his skills at the professional level, but he did appear in 35 Gulf Coast League games in 2017. Over 141 plate appearances, Gutierrez slashed .264/.319/.357. That’s not an impressive output, of course, but for a player of his age and experience the focus at this stage remains on skills and development.
Getting a top 30 organizational prospect for just money is never a bad move
If I remember correctly MLB had him at #30 in the Braves system?
The #30 ranking is misleading. This was his ranking as a 16-year-old in the Instructional League, and in (what used to be) the #1 farm system in baseball. He definitely projects well with the glove and bat, and has a lot of promise.
As a Braves fan who follows their system closely, he’s the guy I’m most upset about losing, not Maitan.
Makes sense. This is especially true with regards to Acuna who went from a high teens I their top 30 last year to a consensus top 5 prospect this year and apparently #2 overall in 2018.
I’d put Acuna #1 next year, but thats besides the point lol
Gutierrez hit reasonably well for a 17 year old in rookie ball. The Phillies have little catching depth below the Major League level. So it’ll be nice to have someone ready in 4-5 years.
Over ohtani?
Do some reading, he only wants to meet with 7 teams
And someone was complaining about klentak missing out on the kids today lol
Man, this stinks. Losing Gutierrez is bad, but losing him to a division rival just makes it so much worse.
Don’t cheat
Gm tainted your team
Get past it and try again
Not the fans’ fault.
Trout is watching EVERY move the Phillies make since he’ll be on their 2021 Opening Day roster.
Interesting… I’m gonna mark this just because I’m curious if you’re the real Sundown Devil
Yup
Remember when coppy said that the braves will run the international market, now the fans have to suffer for his poor decisions. This is a joke, as a braves fan, coppy may have got what he deserved, but braves country will suffer the consequences too which is not fair to the fans
The reason the Braves got all these guys is they circumvented the rules. They made under the table payments that would’ve put them in the penalty if MLB had known. If they were restricted to $300k the way they should’ve been, the Braves would’ve had none of these guys. So what are you losing?
Losing 3 years of international talent. If the Braves went over in ’15, then ’16 and ’17 would’ve been penalty years. But they lose ’18-’20 on top of that. That’s the real punishment.
is this the Braves country that shows up for playoff games or the Braves country thaat doesn’t 🙂
Good luck to him as a Phillie.
Isn’t 550K all of the Phillies bonus pool money for this year?
League ruled that teams can draw funds from next year’s international allocation to sign the orphaned Braves prospects.