Trying to collate the expected 2022 J2 class: Expected to sign: 1B/OF Luis Baez $1.25M IF Alberto Hernandez $900k-$1M OF Kenni Gomez $650k-$900k RHP Carlos Espinosa $450k-$650k Astros listed as interested: OF/LHP Oscar Colas C Maikel Minoso 2B Cesar Prieto
Signing period for IFAs is January 15th. For the Astros, it is the following who have been linked for a while in the BA Top 50. 27. Luis Baez 47. Kenny Gomez 50. Alberto Hernandez
Does it say who they expect to sign Cesar Prieto? I am really high on him. I think Gomez, Baez, and Hernandez would slot into the 20-40 range on Houston’s prospect list, but I would put Prieto in the 13-20 range.
Kind of an underwhelming class compared to how it looked like it might go a few months ago. Gomez seems to carry defensive risk to me just looking at his body type but the ceiling is certainly there. I actually like Hernandez a little more.
Per BA, here's there latest on guys Astros likely get: Houston Astros ($5,179,700) Luis Baez, OF, Dominican Republic Kenny Gomez, OF, Cuba Alberto Hernandez, SS, Cuba Rafael Ramirez, 3B, Dominican Republic
Hopefully there’s either an unexpected significant signee or Houston has saved back a significant portion of their pool for later use. If those are the only headliners and account for the bulk of Houston’s $5.179M that would be a pretty big disappointment.
The bonuses reported for Houston’s top 3 international signees today only sum up to ~$2.5M, which would leave them ~$2.7M remaining under the pool total. Even they deployed a shotgun approach of several $200k-$500k bonuses across 2nd and 3rd tier signees, they should still have room for at least 1 significant signing later on if one were to become available.
Luis Baez got $1.3M so that brings the total closer to the max. Bonus amounts I’ve seen: Baez $1.3M Hernandez $950k Gomez $775k Espinosa $480k So those 4 account for ~$3.6M of Houston’s ~$5.2M pool. The remaining ~$1.6M is likely to be spread over the remainder of the already announced signees.
I don't know whether it's intentional or not, but the Astros haven't really invested in the traditional IFA market. Baez was eligible to sign last year, and the other top bonuses were Cubans, who seemingly become available at random times. Combined with last year going all in on Leon, and you almost start to wonder if the Astros thought there would be an international draft by now...
