Well, a little over six months later, the 2021 IFA period has officially begun. Teams can now sign IFAs during this period, which runs until December 15. And to no one's surprise, the Pedro León deal is done for $4 million. Tracker from Baseball America: Per the tracker, the Astros have also agreed to deals with Venezuelan OF Brayan Nolasco, Dominican OF Richel del Rosario, and Dominican IF Yamal Encarnación.
Likely only Pedro Leon. He will be one of Houstons top 3 prospects. It is unlikely any others will be in the Top 30.
This is a good place for it, though so it doesn't get overlooked as conversations in off-season can change quickly.
I think one of Click's strongest suits while with TB was his ability to scout and sign international players, that may have been one of the considerations in making the hire knowing he was going to start off with two skinny drafts.
Odd, Astros not favorites to sign any of the top 50 international prospects this year. I had seen them linked to several 7 figure signees, so I assume those are 2023 class?
Unless something has changed, the Astros are in hard on Oscar Colas. They also like Dyan George (a middle infielder from Cuba) and a number of pitchers from Venezuela and Cuba. I would wait and see what happens. There are some guys in the top 20-25 that are going to change their favorites, and some of the teams with multiple links to multiple guys at the top can be out bid by a team like the Astros if they choose to go that route. Couple that with pitching in this draft being extremely under valued and represented. So it is possible the Astros could end up with the third or fourth best pitcher in this draft and not even be in the commercial top 50. Click has said and shown he will push a lot of assets towards a single player in the international draft if they think they are special and I expect that to have not changed. It will come down to how good Click and the player development people thing these guys are Colas will play some and the Astros will be watching him closely to see how good he really is.... they had interest a year ago.
I am mostly surprised Alberto Hernandez and Luis Baez are not in the Top 50. I did miss that the Astros are the favorite to sign OF Kenny Gomez who is #42 on the mlb.com list.
Agreed, but keep in mind there is a LOT of projection in those lists, they are made up of old scouting and don't take into account what these guys are doing now. Some are bigger and faster. Some have developed more velocity or bat speed. Really we won't know what the "real" rankings are until we start seeing what these guys are getting for signing bonuses. For example these same publications had Pedro Leon anywhere from 6-15 in his class and then he signed for like $4,000,000 which was right at the top of the class.
I am sure the dudes from those publications (and a lot of MLB scouts) have a very difficult time getting any info on the Cubans.
Latest I see is a report that the White Sox were the favorites for him. MLB is usually accurate with their page, so I assume the fact that they don't say that means this is no longer the case?
I don’t know. What I can tell you is that if Click believes Colas is clearly an elite prospect, he isn’t afraid to drop a substantial portion of the draft pool to sign him, and likely out bid the White Sox. I also know a year ago the Astros were high on Colas, but perhaps they aren’t as high on him as the White Sox are.
