The Curse of Signability

Now that baseball's draft is on TV and being exposed to the light of public attention, they need to do something about the agent/signability issue.

By all accounts, Seton Hall Prep High (West Orange, N.J.) righty Rick Porcello was the top high school pitcher in the draft. According to St. Louis Cardinals vice president Jeff Luhnow, who runs the team's draft and farm system, the 6-foot-5 hard-throwing Porcello is one of the top high school pitchers over the past several years.

"We know that he has special talent," he told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

ESPN's Keith Law: "He has the potential to be a front-of-the-rotation pitcher with a few minor tweaks needed in his delivery so he can maximize his stuff. His calling card is a mid-90s fastball with good, late tailing action."

He was Baseball America's fourth best prospect in the draft — at any position.

By contrast, the Cardinals are starting Brad Thompson and Todd Wellemeyer right now. Anthony Reyes was demoted back to the minors and Adam Wainwright is having some serious consistency issues as a starter. Seems like a top-of-the-rotation flame-thrower might be a good thing to have in the pipeline, even if it took three or four years for him to contribute in St. Louis.

But when the Cards had the chance at the "special talent" at pick 18, they passed, instead choosing solid-if-unspectacular shortstop Peter Kozma from Oklahoma. Why? Because Porcello is a Scott Boras client and, in the words of Luhnow, "Porcello is tough to sign."

A bunch of other teams thought the same thing. Porcello didn't go until pick 27 to Detroit. The best high school pitcher, No. 4 at any position, fell to 27, the 16th pitcher overall and fifth high school pitcher selected.

Can you imagine if that scenario played out in this year's NBA draft? What if Seattle, picking second, passed up Kevin Durant because his agent, Aaron Goodwin, was going to want some crazy amount of money? Can you imagine how livid you would be as a Sonics fan?

I'm all for baseball taking its draft mainstream. Through the Rick Ankiel Update of the Day on my blog, I've started to get more and more into minor league baseball. I'm getting into the total organization instead of just the majors. And, once that happens, the draft becomes an integral part of being a fan. It's the lifeblood of the organization, and you want to think your team is going after the best talent available to build as strong an organization as possible.

But that's not the case right now. In the current state, signability can be a deal breaker just like an injury history or bad character. "He can throw 99 mph. Great. Who's his agent?"

It's easy to scapegoat owners as being cheap, especially here in St. Louis where you would hope the suits would kick in a couple extra million to land one of the best pitching prospects in years. But it's not entirely ownership's fault. The blame lies as much with the system itself as it does with the participants involved.

Baseball needs a hard slotting system — not just the "recommendations" currently in use. They need to get the draft to the point where talent trumps signability. Teams shouldn't be worried about, in essence, "drafting" agents. You get paid based on where you were drafted, just like the NBA and, to a certain extent, the NFL.

Unfortunately, guys like Boras aren't going to go along with the hard slot system. And why would they? Even though Porcello dropped to 27, he's still probably going to get a lot more (bonus reportedly in the neighborhood of $10 million) than Kozma at 18 (probably more in the $4-5 million range, if that). Boras is doing what agents are supposed to do — put money in his clients' pockets. And he's good at it. You can't begrudge the guy his success.

But if baseball really wants to regain its role as "America's Pastime," agents have to stop being the draft headliners.

The draft should be about the players, their potential and the hope/devastation the fans of each franchise feel with every selection. The signing bonus talk should be relegated to the background, something to be dealt with later. Sure JaMarcus Russell might hold out, but that's okay. Raiders fans know he'll sign eventually. It doesn't take away from the excitement of knowing your team took the best guy out there.

Can Cardinals fans say the same thing?

No disrespect to Kozma, who seems like a swell guy and a solid prospect at a need position, but the answer is no.

Seth Doria is a freelance writer, columnist and blogger in St. Louis. For more news, notes and commentary, go to the The Left Calf.

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