The Rays have a deal in place with first-round draft pick Matthew Liberatore, Jon Heyman of Fan Rag reports on Twitter. He’s slated to receive a $3.5MM bonus, per the report.
Liberatore was widely tabbed as a top-five talent, with MLB.com ranking him second on its board. But he lasted until the 16th pick on the day of the draft, leaving many to wonder just how that happened.
While the presumption seemed to be that the Rays had promised Liberatore an over-slot bonus, given that the club has a big war chest due to its compensation selections, that does not appear to have been the case. Liberatore will evidently come in right around the slot value of $3,603,500.
In any event, the Rays are surely thrilled to add a high-end southpaw prospect from their perch in the middle of the first round. Liberatore has at times shown top-shelf fastball velocity, but hasn’t maintained it. Otherwise, he’s a pitching coach’s dream, with an advanced pitch mix that he knows how to use and a big frame that could still support further development.
A steal at 16. I assumed like most everyone else, the reason he dropped was financial.
So I’m guessing he was bluffing about his signing bonus demands like Groome was two years ago?
Ended up biting him if he did; it cost him a few bucks by dropping 10 slots or so.
Rays k ow how to draft SP…good pick
Any relation to Adam?
Quote: “Liberatore was widely tabbed as a top-five talent, with MLB.com ranking him second on its board.”
MLB.com ranked Liberatore fourth.
m.mlb.com/prospects/2018?list=draft
The MLB.com link in the article leads to a Baseball America pay piece.
Apart from the nice signing bonus, Liberatore did the right thing. As an University of Arizona recruit he would have joined a coaching staff that’s struggling in the Pac-12 ever since they arrived in Tucson in 2016. Especially their pitching staff has turned into a bit of a mess due to incompetent coaching. Their collective conference ERA dropped from 3.52 with predecessor Andy Lopez’s players to 4.60 in 2017 to abysmal 5.28 in 2018. And 2019 is expected to be even worse, since the current roster has been poorly developed. Expected to miss the postseason for a second consecutive season, that Arizona coaching staff will be on the hot seat, with its pitching coaches possibly getting fired right away. Pitchers should avoid UA baseball until they hire some competent coaches.
Big question is where will he be traded to in 5 years?
It’s the Rays, so yes.