Jose Luis Arias Revisited: Age-Gate Alive And Well

I’ve been sitting on this for awhile for no particular reason and figured that the time between the first two games of the Caribbean series was as good as any to post it.

A couple of my first posts at GlobalBaseball were about watching the training sessions of one of the top unsigned Dominican pitching prospects, Jose Luis Arias. Arias was one of three Dominican clients represented by Scott Boras the 2006 international signing period, along with Carlos Triunfel and Angel Villalona (San Francisco ultimately did not negotiate Villalona’s bonus with Boras, leading to accusations of subversion out of the Boras camp). At the time, the 6′8″ righthander had auditioned for several clubs, and his trainers were talking about offers in the neighborhood of $500,000. At one point when I was there in August, Arias was thought to be within a day or two of signing a contract with the Yankees.

Recently I realized I never heard how Arias’ negotiations ended up, so I asked around and found out that he was busted for falsifying documents. The Yankees came through with a $350,000 offer pending a final tryout, which Arias wanted to accept immediately without further negotiation. His eagerness to sign prompted an investigation which revealed that the player everyone thought was 19-year-old Jose Luis Arias was actually a 21-year old named Arismendy Arias, who used his younger brother’s papers to elevate his prospect status.

The 21-year-old Arismendy still has a great pitchers’ frame and 2 intriguing pitches, so he could potentially attract enough interest to sign. However, his trainers have dumped him, and he’s no longer represented by Boras. Also, his fingerprints are still registered under the name Jose Luis Arias on official papers, so now that he’s been outed, he will have to clear that up on before looking for takers, so the odds aren’t in his favor.

While this particular player was caught, there are rumors about age swirling around several of the top Latin American signings from this year. Despite its relative lack of coverage, we know that age falsification is certainly still going on. Given the unreliability of government documents and the reluctance of teams, agents, and players to publicly out offenders, we’ll probably never know to what extent.

Revisiting International Bonuses

1/25/2007

This year has seen an unprecedented amount of coverage of the international signing market. In many ways this is a very good thing. Amateur prospects had close to zero leverage 15 years ago in negotiating with major league teams. Around that time, agents began figuring out that there was money to be made representing top talent in Latin America and Australia, and the market for international free agents went up. Now that publications like Baseball America and ESPNDeportes have began publicizing names of Latin American players before they’re signed, the market will only increase, much to the chagrin of fans who love to whine about how much money baseball players make. To me, however, anything that helps even out the huge disparity between the domestic market for amateur talent and the international market is a positive step. There are still huge problems involved in the current system of which I can’t begin to even scratch the surface at this point, but the influx of agents and media are both positive steps in the right direction.

Baseball America started keeping a list tracking who signed for what during the first few months of the signing period, but stopped updating it (which the author of this blog would NEVER do…<cough>). So, I thought I’d fill in the blanks with all the information I know.

Yankees Shell Out $200k

Nope, not one of the Boras guys. We’ll probably have to wait a week or two for one of those signings to come down.

The Yankees signed Dominican infielder Damian Taveras yesterday to a $200,000 bonus.

Yankees officials praised Taveras’s discipline, intelligence, and hitting ability. Latin-American supervisor Victor Mata compared his body type to Jorge Posada, but said that the team will try to develop him at short, second, and third. He looks to have been signed primarily for his bat, as Yankees’ regional scout Jose Luna praised his swing but said he needed to work a bit on his glove and his footwork.

Link

Also in today’s Listin Diario, a piece about the Nationals’ desire to be “The Kings of the Carribbean” as far as recruiting Dominican prospects goes.

With the huge advantage in both cash and name recognition New York and Boston enjoy down here…good luck. Spending close to half a million more than the next highest bid for Esmailyn Gonzalez makes more sense in this context.

International Rumor-Mongering: Boras gets busy

*Thanks to everyone who submitted questions for the Serra interview. It went incredibly well, and I’ll have the report written up in the next couple of days.

*I got the chance to see one of Scott Boras’s Dominican clients in action a couple of times over the last week. RHP Jose Luis Arias is a legit 6′8″. His fastball sits in the 91-93 range and tops out at 95, and he reportedly has a slider in the 89-90mph range. I know, I’m skeptical too, and didn’t have the benefit of watching the gun while he was warming up, but that’s what I’ve been told. I won’t say which team is involved, but a signing may be close.

Arias is an interesting case, not because of his size or his stuff, but because of his age. At 19, Arias is a rare top talent who wasn’t considered noteworthy enough to sign the past few years. Apparently when he was first eligible, he was sitting in the low 70s with his fastball and didn’t generate any interest. He’s been fine-tuning his stuff over the past few years, and looks to be due for a big payday.

*I haven’t gotten confirmation from the Rangers’ camp on this yet, but I’ve heard they were one of the other teams heavily involved in the bidding war for Esmailyn Gonzalez.

*The Brewers will be trying out several top names in the next week, including the two Boras position prospects, Triunfel and Villalona.

*The Cubs have made 2 low-dollar signings, and aren’t in the hunt for any of the top money guys left. The two signings, whose names I don’t have, were given bonuses of $25,000 and $35,000. 6′5″ Venezuelan RHP Larry Suarez was the Cubs’ big addition this summer, and while they’ll probably sign 8-12 more, they’ll all be in the $15-75,000 range.  Suarez, 16, is reportedly sitting at 88-92 with his fastball.  Definitely one to watch.