What is the logic of the new Aug Sign deadline?

[geothite]

As part of that why eliminate Draft and Follow? ....

 

It seems to me that this is a way for the small market teams to use the draft efficiently and stockpile talent in their minor league systems.

[colbyjack]

The idea is to take negotiating power away from the hands of the players and their respective advisors and put more negotiating power into the hands of the teams. Time is the most powerful tool in negotiations, which is why we have seen so many players the past few years carry their negotiations into the following year, often a week before the next year's draft.

 

Losing the DFE process because of this does suck, but it will be interesting to see how it plays out this summer.

 

And not all teams used the DFE process as much as the Brewers. The past couple of years the Brewers have had one of the higher totals of DFEs signed. The Braves and Angels have also been active using the process, but it's not that is was one used by all small market teams. Considering that the Brewers just dropped close to $2 million on this year's DFE class, it's not even a process that you can say fits small market teams the best. The Yankees for instance have also had a great deal of success using the process (Andy Pettitte and Jorge Posada come to mind).