Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
March 06, 2009
International Draft

Craig Calcaterra notes the Latin American signing scandals are leading to a call for an international draft:

And there certainly are problems down there and in other countries not subject to the draft. It's worth noting, however, that apart from addressing the kickbacks and other unseemliness, the powers that be in baseball have another, less-noble incentive to institute a draft, and that's to scale back the bonuses Dominican free agents have been getting in recent years. There's no escaping the fact that an international draft would work to lower salaries. And maybe that's worth doing if it does other good things. But in light of this obvious effect, you'd think that the writer would have asked someone from the union for a quote or two.

Eliminating the draft altogether would also lower prices, both for US and Latin players. Big bonuses go to the foreign free agents because of the supply of truly great players is small. Make them compete with US players, and they lose their leverage. Getting rid of the draft also prevents teams from losing out when a drafted player doesn't sign. A team's ability to walk away from a player if he's being difficult and go for another player of similar talents would benefit clubs that don't want to pay over slot.

As for the big market teams getting all the good players; they already do. MLB has tried for the last 60 years to limit the big teams, but they always find a way to game the rules. Maybe it's time to drop the rules and see what happens.

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Posted by David Pinto at 08:12 AM | Draft | TrackBack (0)
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