6/29/2013: Arlington, VA – The 2013 PEBA Amateur Draft presented the league’s general managers with a new, and not altogether welcome, challenge.  For the first time in PEBA history, players drafted in the first five rounds would be guaranteed signing bonuses.  Each pick of the draft’s first five rounds had a recommended signing bonus for that draft slot, but players and teams are free to negotiate whatever signing bonus they can agree to.  Players that are not signed by August 6^th either head off to college or sit out a year and hope to be drafted again the next season.

With the draft now in the rear view mirror, it’s clear that signability and team finances played a rather large role in how the draft unfolded.  Players like catcher Lorenzo Amador were at the top of many pre-draft rankings lists in terms of talent, but fell lower in the draft than their talent might indicate because of contract concerns.  Amador ended up being drafted 10^th; he signed with the Kalamazoo Badgers for nearly $6 million.  The Badgers are in the middle of the pack at this point in terms of signing their draftees.  They’ve signed some but still have a handful to go, including the first pick in the supplemental round, CL Emmett Bell, and their picks in rounds 2, 3 and 4.  However, the team has already spent $7.6 million on the three players they’ve come to terms with.  Having also held the 14^th pick of the draft, they had two players to whom they knew they’d be committing a fair amount of cash.

With roughly two thirds of bonus-eligible draftees having signed with teams, the Badgers are the 3^rd-biggest draft spenders so far this year.  The team that’s immediately ahead of them is the Duluth Warriors, who arguably landed the most desired pitcher in Carlos Fernández.  Fernández was the 3^rd pitcher drafted and the 5^th pick overall, largely because he made it known that he was going to be a tough sign.  Not that Avery Carson or Jhong-shun Kong were poor choices ahead of him, but the fact is that they were expected to sign for quite a bit less (something Carson has already done).  The Warriors laid out $5.8 million to land Fernández and spent another $4 million on 2^nd round pick Robert Johnson and 5^th round pick Hoyt Gardner, putting the Warriors at over $10 million in draft bonuses with one player left to sign: 3^rd rounder Rudy Brown.

Probably the most surprising development among the draft signings so far lies in Yuma.  The Bulldozers went into the draft with 36 selections, more than enough to fill the Kivalina Bowheads roster, and they’ve already signed every single player.  They’ve plunked down $22.7 million on the 19 players they drafted in the first five rounds, including eight bonuses of more than $1 million.  The 1^st and 4^th picks of the draft, CF Arthur McKenzie and SS Mark Holmes, respectively, each got bonuses over $4 million.

Several teams are in the same boat as Yuma in having signed all of their players, but none of them had as many high-ticket draftees as the Bulldozers.  Manchester, New Orleans and San Antonio didn’t have any players who warranted bonuses, as they only had picks after the first five rounds of the draft and therefore had no expenses beyond draft preparation before getting their new prospects into their minor league system.  The Nutmeggers, however, are in a different situation.  Only the Longshoremen and Cyclones have signed a lower percentage of their bonus-eligible players, and no team has as many as unsigned players as Connecticut’s six.

What, then, is going on with Connecticut?  It appears that one of the things that new owner Paul Woodward has done is limit the spending of the front office.  The team committed before the draft to pay each player that was drafted the recommended slot bonus, but no more than that.  This is the reason that players like Amador and 1B Mike Harris were passed over at the 6^th pick.  It’s also apparent that Woodward was livid when he learned that outfielder Jim Griffin was drafted in the 3^rd round despite the team knowing he was looking for 1^st round bonus money.  To make matters worse, several players the team thought would be willing to sign for slot have raised their demands after learning they were drafted by Connecticut.  It’s easy to see how a new owner looking to put his house in order would not appreciate the unexpected expenses, and there’s no indication that Woodward approved of signing Griffin first.

Woodward ordered the trade of popular pitcher Cris Reyes, who’d been sent back to Providence after struggling in six starts this year, for cash to be used to pay for bonuses.  The delay in signing the rest of the team’s picks has led to some concern that the team signed Griffin and fellow 3^rd round pick Carlos Avillas before taking care of the four players that were drafted before them.  The thinking appears to be that signing these players above slot value while money still appears to be available will put Woodward in a position where he has to give slot money to the other players.  After saying publicly he would do so, it would be hard to tell the public that he refused because they had already signed lower draft picks.  At best, it appears to be a bit of posturing that Woodward is sure to dislike.  At worst, it’s a direct challenge of his authority.

The Nutmeggers should end up somewhere around the $7 million mark in total bonuses handed out if they’re able to sign everyone at approximately slot value.  That’s quite a bit more than Woodward was led to believe this draft might cost him.  If those picks don’t pan out, or if anyone fails to sign, this draft will be seen as a huge failure that is almost certainly going to cost someone their head, and it would be surprising if it didn’t start with the GM.

As of today, here’s what teams have spent on their draft:

Elg = Number of picks eligible for signing bonuses
%Sgn = Percentage of eligible picks that have signed

Samuel Platt covers the Nutmeggers for the Connecticut Post