The off-season focus is generally on player moves, designed to give each team a better chance to compete in future years. This off-season we not only have the player moves to focus on, but we also have the Collective Bargaining Agreement discussions between Major League Baseball and the Player’s Union. Ken Rosenthal has an update on the CBA negotiations, which can be found at Fox Sports. The big items that impact the Pirates:
-Major League Baseball wants to strike a deal during the upcoming World Series, although Rosenthal mentions there’s a 50/50 chance of this happening. He also adds that both sides are more motivated to meet the target of the start of free agency, which begins five days after the World Series ends.
-A big issue has been hard slotting in the draft, with the owners, specifically Bud Selig, wanting to implement this. Obviously hard slotting will hurt a team like the Pirates, who go to the extreme with over-slot deals. The Pirates spent more on the draft in the last four years than any other team, due to the lack of hard slotting, and adding a slotting system will hurt their chances to stockpile talent through the draft. It will prevent them from adding guys like Josh Bell for $5 M in the second round, as well as spending $1.2 M on ninth rounder Clay Holmes.
Rosenthal mentions that the two sides are far apart on the issue, but mentions that the two sides could come closer together. I’m not sure if that means the players accepting hard slotting, or the owners giving up on that idea. Personally, it seems to me that Selig cares more about the PR benefits of announcing a deal during the World Series. That could be a benefit, as it provides less time to discuss the hard slotting issue.
-The deal is expected to include a one game wild card round, adding a fifth playoff team in each league. It’s also expected to include two 15-team leagues, with the Houston Astros being the most likely team to move from the NL to the AL. That can’t happen until the new Astros’ owner is approved.
-There is also the chance that the new deal could include a provision for a World wide draft within a year. It’s hard to say how this could affect the Pirates. In one hand, the current system benefits them, as they can sign guys like Luis Heredia as the top bidder (had there been a draft, Heredia could have gone to the Washington Nationals in 2010, as they would have had the first pick). On the other side of that, it really levels the inefficiency of the Japanese market. It would allow rebuilding teams the opportunity to get guys like Yu Darvish or Daisuke Matsuzaka, rather than seeing them go to big market teams like the Red Sox and Yankees.
Ideally, for the Pirates, the deal won’t include hard slotting. If small market teams have any shot to compete, it’s through home grown talent. The best way to get that home grown talent is through the draft, and teams can increase the amount of talent by going over-slot on hard to sign prep players, and hoping that they develop in to first round caliber talents while in the farm system, rather than while they’re in college.
Tim started Pirates Prospects in 2009 from his home in Virginia, which was 40 minutes from where Pedro Alvarez made his pro debut in Lynchburg. That year, the Lynchburg Hillcats won the Carolina League championship, and Pirates Prospects was born from Tim's reporting along the way. The site has grown over the years to include many more writers, and Tim has gone on to become a credentialed MLB reporter, producing Pirates Prospects each year, and will publish his 11th Prospect Guide this offseason. He has also served as the Pittsburgh Pirates correspondent for Baseball America since 2019. Behind the scenes, Tim is an avid music lover, and most of the money he gets paid to run this site goes to vinyl records.
Would there be a seperate world wide draft or one big draft including HS, NCAA, and world? Also, the hard slotting is a joke. Why put a limit on what the Pirates can spend on a draft, when the Yankees/Red Sox have no limits on their roster?
Exactly. In one of the few areas where the small markets can compete and find value, Selig wants to shut them down. He wants to shut them down to protect owner profit, even if it means further hurting teams like the Pirates on the field.
I don’t think we will see an international draft. I don’t think its even logistically feasible. The Leo Nunez incident shows how difficult it will be to implement. What happens when one team drafts Leo Nunez and another drafts Juan Carlos Oviedo? Who gets the one player with two names. What happens to teams that have developed academies for LA players? Do those teams get first right to draft those kids?
Honestly, leave the international player system alone. Its another area where smart executives can take advantage of the system.
If Selig wanted to make the game more fair or competitive, he wouldn’t go after hard slotting. There are only two reasons for Selig to go after the hard slotting process. The first and possibly the only reason is to keep costs down (with the by product improving owner profit). The other reason is to use it as a wedge or as leverage for some other issue.
I think its the former rather than the latter. Selig cares mostly about owner profitability.
Most of those ideas are dumb. I hate the idea that the relevance of divisions would be squashed by this, I hate the idea of an international draft, I don’t think it will work, and I hate the idea of a hard slotting system. On the other hand, if there is a hard-slotting system, the upside will be that college baseball will be much more entertaining with all the talent that will be going there in lieu of going pro out of high school. That’s a guarantee, and there will be even more from the U.S. going the college route if there’s an international draft.
Any talk about restructuring the compensation pick definitions? I haven’t seen much, but it’s not as high profile as the above.