Picking Rodon Will Come At A Price

Picking Rodon Will Come At A Price
http://www.baseballamerica.com/college/picking-rodon-will-come-at-a-price/

GREENSBORO, N.C.—Carlos Rodon jogged down the first-base line to the bullpen at NewBridge Bank Ballpark, and started throwing light warmup tosses. But after a few throws, the junior lefthander stopped, turned his cap backward to mimic his North Carolina State teammates’ rally caps and returned to the dugout.

Moments later, N.C. State lost to rival North Carolina in a play-in game at the Atlantic Coast Conference tournament, and Rodon likely saw his season end. After entering the year as the clear frontrunner to go No. 1 overall in the 2014 draft, Rodon came back to the pack during the season and wound up 6-7, 2.01, with 117 strikeouts and 31 walks in 98 2⁄3 innings.

If N.C. State’s season is over—as is expected—then Rodon’s body of work for the draft is complete. He ranks No. 3 on Baseball America’s draft prospects list, though his three-year track record could make him the No. 1 selection. But his body of work isn’t all the Astros will consider when they draft first overall. They have to determine what it will take to sign Rodon, and whether they want to pay it. While they have had the No. 1 pick the previous two years, the Astros have not paid the largest single bonus in either draft.

The current Collective Bargaining Agreement has produced what many scouts call the “capped draft” era. Scouts contacted for BA’s draft coverage seem to like the current draft rules. Most agree big league clubs are getting the top players they want, generally at their price. As one crosschecker put it: “For the most part, you can draft the guys you like and sign them. The high school guys benefit because they go in order generally.

“I think this draft, we’re still seeing that aftermath of us purging the high school ranks (in 2011). I think it’s really good overall; evaluations are more important now, and we’re finding kids that want to go out and play.”

Rodon almost went out as a 16th-rounder in 2011, the last year of the old system. He turned down more than $500,000 from the Brewers that year and clearly will sign for more in this draft. As for what it will take to sign him, he lets his adviser handle that decision for him, and he’s advised by Scott Boras Corp. Boras wouldn’t talk about Rodon specifically, but as one might expect, he’s not a huge fan of the capped-draft system.

Of course Boras has helped players sign record signing bonuses for nearly 30 years in the draft, such as Stephen Strasburg’s $15.1 million major league contract in 2009 that included a $7.5 million signing bonus. Rodon didn’t dominate his junior season like Strasburg did, but five years on, MLB’s revenues have grown from just under $7 billion to more than $8 billion, according to Forbes magazine. That 14 percent increase should be reflected in player salaries and draft signing bonuses, Boras argues, but it is not.

Capped Draft Era

Major league deals like Strasburg’s are no longer allowed for draft picks under the current CBA. Gerrit Cole signed for $8 million as the No. 1 overall pick in 2011, the record bonus for a player who signed with the team that drafted him.

Rodon could push for a bonus that size, and while he’s lefthanded, he’s similar in many ways to Cole: He’s physical, has proven durable, has plus stuff, though he doesn’t throw quite as hard, and he performed better as a sophomore than as a junior. But for the Astros to pay Rodon $8 million, they’d have to commit 60 percent of their roughly $13.4 million bonus pool to one player.

“The system in place is affecting major league teams to the point where they have to sacrifice the major league team for the sake of development and the draft,” Boras said. “If the industry has agreed it wants to have spending limits on the draft, fine. But I think the first round should be free of spending limits. If you want a draft to grow and attract interest like the NFL draft, then make sure every team has a first-round pick—you shouldn’t lose a first-round pick for signing a free agent.”

Boras also argued that pitchers who reach the major leagues quickly save clubs so much money that they otherwise would spend on free agents that they are worth the penalties teams would incur for spending more than 5 percent over their allotment, penalties that include forfeiture of the next year’s first-round pick. No team has incurred those penalties in the first two capped drafts.

Perhaps if Rodon had led the nation in strikeouts again and combined the draft’s best pitch, his top-line slider, with more consistent fastball velocity and command, he could have pushed Cole’s record and forced the Astros or Marlins (who pick second and have the largest bonus pool at nearly $14.2 million) to seriously exceeding their pool. But he hasn’t.

To paraphrase Donald Rumsfeld, Boras and his clients aren’t going into the draft with the system they want; they are going in with the system they have. Agents such as Boras have found loopholes before, because teams in the end need star talent. So far, the current draft rules have proven loophole-free, and while the 2014 draft is a solid one in terms of talent, it doesn’t appear to be one that will set any new financial precedents in the capped draft era.