New Basic Agreement Affects Minors
Major League Baseball and the Players Assocation announced yesterday a new labor agreement through 2011.
Included in the agreement are some major changes to how the amateur draft and player development will work.
Alan Schwarz of Baseball America provides an in-depth analysis of the changes. Among the provisions:
- Teams that fail to sign a first-round pick no longer receive an extra pick after the first round as compensation, but instead a virtually identical pick the following year; for example, a team that fails to sign the No. 5 pick one year will receive the No. 6 pick the next, rather than one in the 30s or 40s.
- A uniform signing date of Aug. 15 for all players (other than college seniors), replacing the deadline of the moment a player literally attends his first four-year college class. This also eliminates the junior-college, draft-and-follow rule in which players who attended two-year schools could sign with their drafting club until one week before the following draft.
- The major league portion of the Rule 5 draft will be affected by giving teams one extra year to protect players from it. Rather than teams being allowed three years (for players signed at age 19 or older) or four years (for players 18 and younger) before leaving them off the 40-man roster subjects them to the Rule 5 draft, those periods have been lengthened to four and five.
Read the Baseball America article for details.
FutureAngels.com 
Seems like the teams are making it so drafted players can’t drag out negotiations for the best deal they can make. Each June, teams draft approximately 30-40 players, and now have only 2 months to sign all these players. This seems like it is intended to tell the players ‘take it or leave it’, ‘there is time to negotiate’. And if the player says ” See Ya!”, then the team will just get to pick again next year with no penalty. I predict signing bonuses and contracts for drafted players will be reduced drastically.