The Lineup Card

Everyone knows the MLB Draft is screwed up. If it wasn't bad enough before, it's even worse now with the informal slotting system that basically guarantees the rich teams will get the best players. That's probably not the reason Puerto Rico wants out of the draft, though. I'll let P.R.'s Secretary of Sport (cool name!) take it from here:

"The sudden establishment of the Draft, without previous notice nor trial period, did not allow Puerto Ricans to transform their development model to make it compatible with the new statutory reality," Bernier said in his proposal. "On the other hand, after 17 years of presence of the Draft in Puerto Rico, MLB has not been able to transform it into an international Draft. This has left Puerto Rico in a limbo state."

So what does Mr. David Bernier propose? A 10-year moratorium on the Draft on the island so that Puerto Rico can build up a better infrastructure. Bernier's point is well taken. MLB teams see less incentive in building up baseball on the island - think like the baseball academies many teams have in the Dominican Republic and now China and Taiwan - when there's no real advantage in acquiring talent.

Admittedly I'm no expert on the politics of international baseball, but there does seem to me to be a disadvantage to getting rid of the Draft. Namely, it guarantees no money to the players taken who would have been taken in the later rounds. Sure, this will get the better players in Puerto Rico even more money, but what about the guys fighting for their life in the baseball world.

That said, the demise of the Puerto Rican Winter League is sad and if baseball on the Island isn't on par with high school baseball in the states, maybe it's a good thing to take PR out of the entry draft. Anyone more knowledgable than me with an opinion on this?

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