Shi Davidi: New draft rules change Jays' philosophy

[polo007]

http://www.citytv.com/toronto/citynews/ ... philosophy

"Signability is going to become a lot more important," general manager Alex Anthopoulos conceded in an interview this week. "The last two years signability, I don’t want to say it wasn’t important, but we didn’t care, especially last year. We did not ask anybody for a price tag, we didn’t ask any players what it would take to sign them, we just relied on our scouts to do their work, grade out the talent, and we said we’re going to take the talent. …

"Now if we feel we’re not going to be able to sign the player, then it’s a very real component that we don’t select the player. I don’t see the benefit of a player not telling you the truth because the pick behind us offers less money than what we’re offering, so there’s no benefit to lie about a price tag."

That’s because each team’s bonus pool is based on the specific value assigned to each of its slots over the first 10 rounds, with the higher picks obviously getting a higher allocation.

Every spot a player drops lowers his bonus ceiling, which is why the expectation is that player advisers will be working hard to move their clients up in the draft, rather than trying to land them with a free-spending club lower down.

That approach led to an exploitation of draft spending inequities by a handful of teams, players and advisers, leading to early-round talents routinely sliding to richer clubs who ignored the slot recommendations and loaded up on them, while others sifted through thinning prospect fields.

Additionally, now that players chosen from the 11th round on won’t count against a team’s bonus pool unless they sign for more than $100,000, the teen-round gambles routinely seen in recent years should also be a thing of the past.

[satyr9]

Is it just me, or when Shi writes about what potential strategies will be used for the draft with the cap for 10 rounds, he's describing what would happen in an auction draft for fantasy without the actual auction, isn't he?

Maybe I'm wrong, but that's what it's starting to sound like to me.

[Deron05]

This sucks.

[hyper316]

no more exploiting inefficiencies in the system. now it's just scout the big talents and pick them early as possible so they can get big money. i think it's good and fair though.

what's the deal with international signings now?

[Parataxis]

no more exploiting inefficiencies in the system. now it's just scout the big talents and pick them early as possible so they can get big money. i think it's good and fair though.

what's the deal with international signings now?

There is no perfect system. There will always be new inefficiencies to exploit - the key is finding them before other teams do.

[Michael Bradley]

no more exploiting inefficiencies in the system. now it's just scout the big talents and pick them early as possible so they can get big money. i think it's good and fair though.

what's the deal with international signings now?

Exactly, it is a fair (or fairer) system now. As much as I enjoyed AA taking advantage of the old one, when it comes to the betterment of the game, the best amateur talent should be going to the worst teams, and this rule change should (in theory) accomplish that (i.e. no more Rick Porcello's dropping to the 20's).

Now it is a scouting game, and I am comfortable with that since the Jays employ a ton of scouts and haven't been too bad at identifying talent in the last two years with or without the extra funds (although more money certainly helps). The Jays will be fine.

[distracted]

The cap is based on all the picks you have right? So you can choose to sign less players for more money?

Still seems like there's wiggle room to me. Quality over Quantity.