Going, going gone: Braves' lost prospects' new teams

striker42 said:
I want the organizations caught circumventing the rules to be punished in proportion to their crime. Voiding these contracts is tantamount to millions of dollars in fines as the Braves are out the money and the prospects.

Also, I don't think it's right at all that a player can be a party to circumventing the rules, keep his signing bonus, and then go get a second one. I understand a lot of these players are young and have no power. I'm not saying take their original bonus away. On the contrary, make these guys live up to the contracts they signed. Those contracts are just assigned to a different team.
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I don't know exactly what to do, but I think you're right in that the players and their handlers knew exactly what was going on.
 
Southcack77 said:
To be clear, you think it is a bad idea that players are incentivized to report wrong doing.
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No, I think it's a bad idea to incentivize players (and their handlers) to be a party to rule breaking. Right now there's no punishment for a player being part of a scheme to circumvent rules. Instead, the players are getting a second payday.
 
Southcack77 said:
It's not a fine. The braves already paid the money some time ago. Those bonuses have nothing to do with their finances going forward because they are off the books. A fine would impact their ability to spend or profit.

You are essentially arguing that they should get the money they spent illegally back as a windfall. That's remarkably stupid.
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Was that really necessary? We get enough of that from certain others already. It's an opinion I disagree with too, but come on.

I certainly agree that the players have every right to keep their illegal bonuses, and we deserved to lose them for breaking the rules. That said, the $22,725,000 (including the 50% overage penalty) the organization lost in bonuses paid to Maitan, Gutierrez, Severino, Contreras, Pena, Soto, Del Rosario, Negret, Zuniga, Sucre, Mezquita, and Rojas, plus the loss of Bae and his bonus money was more than enough of a financial penalty - particularly for a mid-market team. In essence, that money could've paid for a full season of a Moustakas, Arrieta, Darvish-level player had the organization chosen to spend those resources that way instead.

MLB understandably wanted to send a message with the future penalties - and should have IMO - but probably should've been a little less heavy handed with them. Either a simple reduction in total bonus pool for a year (without a limit of how much could be spent per player), or a longer than two year period where they couldn't spend more than $300,000 on anyone (so it'd be harsher than just going over your cap in a particular year) would likely have been sufficient. Without an International Draft, mid and small-market teams are already operating at a huge disadvantage when it comes to signing these kids any way - what this did more or less assures that the Braves can't compete for the best international talent for a long time when you consider not being a player in those markets (even for a short period) makes you a non-entity when you DO attempt to sign some of that talent - think about how much of a disadvantage other teams have had when it comes to beating us when trying to sign players from Curacao because we've always been the biggest player there.

Of course that's nitpicking too - the Braves apparently realized arguing about these penalties wan't only frivolous, it would've been a waste of time. When you get stopped for drunk-driving, the penalty for the first-offense is essentially the same for everyone whether you blow .08 or .16 - it gets substantially worse when you thumb your nose at everyone and do it again and again.
 
clvclv said:
Was that really necessary? We get enough of that from certain others already. It's an opinion I disagree with too, but come on.

I certainly agree that the players have every right to keep their illegal bonuses, and we deserved to lose them for breaking the rules. That said, the $22,725,000 (including the 50% overage penalty) the organization lost in bonuses paid to Maitan, Gutierrez, Severino, Contreras, Pena, Soto, Del Rosario, Negret, Zuniga, Sucre, Mezquita, and Rojas, plus the loss of Bae and his bonus money was more than enough of a financial penalty - particularly for a mid-market team. In essence, that money could've paid for a full season of a Moustakas, Arrieta, Darvish-level player had the organization chosen to spend those resources that way instead.

MLB understandably wanted to send a message with the future penalties - and should have IMO - but probably should've been a little less heavy handed with them. Either a simple reduction in total bonus pool for a year (without a limit of how much could be spent per player), or a longer than two year period where they couldn't spend more than $300,000 on anyone (so it'd be harsher than just going over your cap in a particular year) would likely have been sufficient. Without an International Draft, mid and small-market teams are already operating at a huge disadvantage when it comes to signing these kids any way - what this did more or less assures that the Braves can't compete for the best international talent for a long time when you consider not being a player in those markets (even for a short period) makes you a non-entity when you DO attempt to sign some of that talent - think about how much of a disadvantage other teams have had when it comes to beating us when trying to sign players from Curacao because we've always been the biggest player there.

Of course that's nitpicking too - the Braves apparently realized arguing about these penalties wan't only frivolous, it would've been a waste of time. When you get stopped for drunk-driving, the penalty for the first-offense is essentially the same for everyone whether you blow .08 or .16 - it gets substantially worse when you thumb your nose at everyone and do it again and again.
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You are right. It was not necessary at all. I apologize to Striker.
 
Enscheff said:
I want to keep a running total of how much less they sign for now. It will be interesting to see just how badly the Braves overpaid for these guys while costing themselves access to the international market for the rest of this decade.
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The exact dollar amount means nothing. Many guys will get paid significantly less because there's no money left for a lot of teams or they're holding out for another guy right at the moment. The one guy you'll see that was a good sign of an overpay was Gutierrez, but everyone knew that when he was signed.
 
striker42 said:
The problem with this is that losing the prospects is essentially a fine out of proportion with what we did. Imagine going 5 MPH over the speed limit and getting fined $20,000. That's the level of what we're talking about here.

If you're dedicated to punishment though, MLB could always just pocket the money. Bottom line is that these players don't need to be rewarded for this.
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There is more to the punishment than could be put into press. This punishment was for actions well beyond anything that MLB had punished before, so the punishment was going to be beyond anything seen before.

The players had no idea the Braves should not have been able to offer them money. They very well might have signed for even more if they would have known at the time. Now they enter a market with limited assets due to the time of year that they are released. I wouldn't agree at all with hindering the players at all.

The Braves f'd up. They f'd up bad. This sucks, but it's part of what was earned by actions of the club.
 
Managuarantano's Volunteers said:
It’s a bad idea to incentivize players to do wrongdoing with the intent of reporting it later to get their contract voided. I think that’s the official position.
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I disagree.

The party in the best position to understand and comply with MLB's rules are the teams, not the prospects.

If MLB makes it clear that you will not get any benefit and be severely punished if you break the rules then the MLB teams may decide not to break the rules. In any event, it does create the incentive for teams complying with the rules to report wrongdoing rather than engage in it themselves, because they know there is actually some enforcement edge.

No one forces MLB teams to pay players under the table and the players are the least likely people in the whole arrangement to benefit.

I have no problem with them getting a second payday that lets the player get closer to getting their true value.
 
Report: Severino gets $2.5 million from Twins, considerably more than Maitan got.
 
rico43 said:
Report: Severino gets $2.5 million from Twins, considerably more than Maitan got.
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The Twins primary beat reporter put out a piece online last night that the Twins were the high bid on Maitan, but he chose to go to the Angels because of the depth the Twins have at SS. Not the same depth at 2B for Severino. Severino is the first of the ex-Braves to exceed his previous signing bonus and the second to receive 7 figures now.
 
Did these kids have agents at original signing? If so, that agent should not be able to represent them at new signing
 
Can't make up my mind if Contreras not signing is a hopeful one that the Braves might retain him.
 
rico43 said:
Can't make up my mind if Contreras not signing is a hopeful one that the Braves might retain him.
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Given his first year stats, I can see why he may not be on a lot of teams' radar. Had a miserable debut. Of course, he is young and throws hard.
 
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