THE WORLD'S LARGEST AND MOST COMPREHENSIVE SCOUTING ORGANIZATION
| 2,473 MLB PLAYERS | 15,806 MLB DRAFT SELECTIONS
2,473 MLB PLAYERS | 15,806 MLB DRAFT SELECTIONS
Sign in Create Account
Sign in Create Account
Draft  | Story | 11/12/2012

Puerto Rico and the Draft

David Rawnsley
Photo: Perfect Game

Perfect Game will be running a series of articles and blogs leading up to the first-ever Perfect Game Caribbean Showcase, to be held Nov. 16-18 at Roberto Clemente Stadium in Carolina, P.R. The accompanying story deals with Puerto Rico’s impact on the baseball draft through the years.


Until 1989, young baseball players from the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico fell under the same rules for entering the professional baseball ranks that their peers in the Dominican Republic, Venezuela and other Latin American countries still enjoy today. It was an open market, with major-league teams free to develop and sign players as aggressively as their organizational desires and resources dictated.

The mid- to late-1980s produced arguably the finest group of talent ever to come from Puerto Rico, or any other locale for that matter. Following is a partial list of Puerto Rican players who signed professionally in the years right before the draft rules were changed:

OF Bernie Williams (1985)
OF/1B Orlando Merced (1985)
2B Roberto Alomar (1985)
2B Carlos Baerga (1985)
SS Jose Valentin (1986)
OF Juan Gonzalez (1986)
C Javy Lopez (1987)
SS Jose Hernandez (1987)
1B/C Carlos Delgado (1988)
C Pudge Rodriguez (1988)
C Jorge Posada (signed in 1990 out of a U.S. junior college, but eligible out of a Puerto Rico high school in 1988)
IF Will Cordero

All those players were viewed as significant prospects at the time they signed, and not surprisingly went on to enjoy productive major-league careers. Most signed for bonuses consistent with their talent, and with signing bonuses to all first-year players rising at an alarming rate at the time, Major League Baseball unilaterally decided to incorporate Puerto Ricans into the draft eligibility pool, right alongside high-school and college players from the United States. They have been classified the same way ever since.

Major League Baseball was never forthright about its reasons for including Puerto Ricans in the draft, but the underlying reasons were myriad, and generally ran along the lines of controlling costs and giving teams equal access to talent.

More than 20 years later, you’d have a better chance of finding a snowman on a street corner in San Juan than finding anyone in Puerto Rico that feels this change has been a benefit to baseball on the island.

The New York Times covered the history and perceived effect of the change in draft rules in a January, 2012 article that is required reading if one wishes to understand the subject in greater depth.

The inescapable fact is that, over a 20-plus year span beginning 1989, when outfielder Ed Larregui was selected in the seventh round by the Chicago Cubs to become the first Puerto Rican drafted, the island has become a relative desert for producing legitimate major-league talent.

A list of the top Puerto Rican players who have entered professional baseball since 1989 would include the likes of:

OF Carlos Beltran (2nd round, 1995, Royals)
C Yadier Molina (4th round, 2000, Cardinals)
RHP Javy Vasquez (4th round, 1994, Expos)
OF Alex Rios (1st round, 1999, Blue Jays)
3B Edwin Encarnacion (9th round, 2000, Rangers)
2B Jose Vidro (3rd round, 1992, Expos)
OF Angel Pagan (4th round, 1999, Mets)

Good to very good players, all of them. But hardly in the class of Alomar, Williams, Rodriguez, Gonzalez, etc., the motherlode of talent produced in just four short years preceding the draft’s adoption.

Looking between the lines, there are two areas that further highlight the decline in Puerto Rican talent entering professional baseball over the last generation.

First, the talent flow was virtually shut off in the early- to mid-2000s. Since 2002, there have only been three players entering the draft from Puerto Rico that have played in the major leagues--catcher Martin Maldonado, lefthander Xavier Cedeno and righthander Luis Atilano. By comparison, such domestic baseball hotbeds as Iowa (8), Connecticut (8) and Utah (6), all with smaller populations and inherent weather disadvantages, have produced at least twice as many future big leaguers in the same time span.

As cited in the Times article, there were only 20 Puerto Ricans on 2012 Opening-Day major-league rosters.

Second, Puerto Rico historically has rarely produced quality pitchers, for whatever reason. Vazquez, with 163 wins and a career 42.7 WAR (Wins Above Replacement), is easily the most-successful pitcher Puerto Rico has ever produced. He retired following the 2011 season, but is contemplating a comeback in 2013. His competition is not especially stiff as 1984 Cy Young Award winner Willie Hernandez and Juan Pizarro, who toiled mostly in the 1950s, rank second and third, respectively with 131 and 105 wins.

Excluding Vazquez, a fifth-round pick of the Montreal Expos in 1994, there have been only 11 Puerto Rican pitchers drafted since 1989 that have played in the big leagues, and their 4.3 combined WAR is roughly 10 percent of Vazquez’ score alone. Essentially, Vazquez and lefthander Pedro Feliciano are the only sustainable big-league pitchers that Puerto Rico has produced in more than two decades.

Veteran Puerto Rican scout Frankie Thon (Astros, Rangers), the brother of former all-star Dickie Thon, once explained to me that the reason why there were so few Puerto Rican pitching prospects developed is that they have the opposite mindset from a young Dominican pitcher at a comparable age.

“In the Dominican, young pitchers just think about throwing fastballs and throwing hard, because they know if they throw hard enough they will get signed,” Thon once related to me. “That incentive doesn’t apply here. Young pitchers in Puerto Rico throw way, way too many curve balls from a young age trying to be competitive without proper instruction. They never develop the arm strength to become professional prospects.”

From my own personal experience since 1989, which coincidently was my first draft working in the baseball industry, there have been several years when there wasn’t a single draft-eligible Puerto Rican pitching prospect that touched even 90 mph.

The Tide May Be Turning

While the baseball talent coming out of Puerto Rico in the first two decades after the draft was implemented has slowed noticeably, there are signs that the tide may be turning.

In both the 2011 and 2012 drafts, the talent coming out of Puerto Rico has been exceptional, and there are early indications that the 2013 draft class has a chance to be equally outstanding—both in terms of high-end talent and depth of prospects. That’s more talent than has come out of Puerto Rico in at least two decades.

The 2011 draft featured two of the more dynamic young talents currently in minor-league baseball, Francisco Lindor (Indians) and Javier Baez (Cubs), both drafted among the first 10 picks. Some might argue that this was just a sign of the times, that both young men left Puerto Rico for Florida high schools as young teenagers and developed their skills in the U.S. But the fact remains that they are outstanding talents who were born and essentially raised on the island. Puerto Rico also produced a pair of second-round picks in the same draft in righthander Jorge Lopez and outfielder Gabriel Rosa, and had three other pitchers taken in the top 12 rounds.

This year’s draft was a landmark one, the best-ever for Puerto Rico, without question. Shortstop Carlos Correa became the first Puerto Rican ever selected with the first pick overall, shattering the former standard for highest Puerto Rican drafted, held by catcher Ramon Castro, the 17th pick overall by the Astros in 1994. Hard-throwing righthander J.O. Berrios also became the highest Puerto Rican pitcher ever selected, going 32nd overall to the Twins. He enjoyed a dominant professional debut.

Jesmuel Valentin, the son of former major leaguer Jose Valentin, also landed in the supplemental first round, going 51st overall to the Dodgers. Righthander Edwin Diaz was a third-round pick of the Mariners, and between he and Berrios gave Puerto Rico its first-ever pair of 95-mph prospects in one draft.

The 2013 class is headed by Perfect Game All-American shortstop Jan Hernandez. He is not in Correa’s distinct class, but looks very strong and could really emerge over the next week at the inaugural Perfect Game Caribbean Showcase.

While strictly speculation at this point, there are rumblings in the baseball industry that Puerto Rico’s status in the draft could be changing within the next year. As part of the 2011 Collective Bargaining Agreement between Major League Baseball and the MLB Players Association, there is a provision to implement an International/World-Wide Draft, possibly in 2014.

What the parameters of this draft will be are anyone’s guess at this point, but there is sentiment brewing behind the scenes to have Puerto Rico removed from the conventional draft that applies to the United States and Canada, and have it lumped with the likes of the Dominican Republic, Venezuela and the rest of the world in a new international draft structure.

Puerto Rico’s recent upsurge in the draft notwithstanding, such a change might be a significant boon for baseball on the island. There has been a notable increase in the number of baseball academies in Puerto Rico in recent years, highlighted by the MLB-supported Puerto Rican Baseball Academy/High School and the Carlos Beltran Baseball Academy.

These academies have no doubt impacted the recent surge in talent coming from Puerto Rico, but the overriding benefit of including Puerto Rico in a new international draft is it would give major-league organizations an incentive to invest in the development of young players on the island, such as occurs in the Dominican and Venezuela, which have prospered over the last 20 years unencumbered by the same draft legislation that has nearly crippled the flow of baseball talent in Puerto Rico.
Give us your feedback
Draft | Story | 6/4/2026

Pence Makes the Jump to 2027
Perfect Game Staff
Article Image
    667 Progress Way | Sanford, FL 32771 | 319-298-2923 www.perfectgame.org | facebook.com/perfectgameusa | @PerfectGameUSA     FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE   PERFECT GAME STANDOUT STRIKER PENCE RECLASSIFIES TO CLASS OF 2027, ACCELERATING PATH TO MLB DRAFT   Corona, California (Thursday, June 4, 2026) - Perfect Game, the world’s largest youth baseball and softball platform and scouting service, today announced that Perfect Game prospect Striker Pence, one of the most watched young prospects in amateur baseball, has officially reclassified from the Class of 2028 to the Class of 2027, making the 17-year-old eligible for the 2027 Major League Baseball Draft. Pence is currently the #2 ranked player on Perfect Game’s national rankings and the top-ranked right-handed pitcher. Pence, a 6-foot-6, 215-pound right-handed pitcher and left-handed hitting first...
Read More
General | Blog | 6/16/2026

Wolforth Throwing Mentorship: Article 66

Ron Wolforth
Article Image
  The Number That Just Killed MLB Expansion: 1,217   USA Today's Bob Nightengale dropped a bomb shell recently that the baseball world is still digesting. Major League Baseball wants to expand to 32 teams. Team executives are quietly opposing it and the reason has nothing to do with cities or money.   They cannot find enough healthy pitchers.   Between 2020 and 2024, professional baseball performed 1,026 Tommy John surgeries at the minor-league level alone. Another 191 at the Major League level. More than twelve hundred elbow reconstructions in five years on the best young pitchers in the world.   That is not bad luck. That is a system reporting a verdict on itself.   For fifteen years, the youth-baseball industry has chased one number: velocity significantly more than projectability and arm care.    Recruiters scout by it.    Social...
Read More
Tournaments | Story | 6/16/2026

PG Ascendant Classic Scout Notes

Perfect Game Staff
Article Image
‘27 MIF Kyler Claunch (KY) took home MVP honors in the #Ascendant26 @claunch_kyler Set the tone out of the leadoff spot for @CincySpikes & showed + bat-to-ball .538 AVG/.714 OBP | 7 H/7 RS | 6 BB | 5 SB @EKUBaseball is getting a guy. https://t.co/wGL9E0XmQ6 pic.twitter.com/kvZQwxEXup — Jordan Gates (@JGatesPG) June 14, 2026 Kyler Claunch (2027, Harrodsburg, Ky.) The Eastern Kentucky commit took home the MVP honors after an excellent performance throughout the weekend. Claunch tied for the lead in hits on the weekend with seven. Finished as the second top performer in batting but probably would have been higher if he wasn’t the leadoff hitter. Despite the low RBI’s, Claunch delivered a six-game sample size that included a .538 average and .714 on base. It’s a contact-oriented swing that showed plus ability when it came to bat-to-ball skills. Swiped five...
Read More
Tournaments | Story | 6/16/2026

UBC West Scout Notes: Days 3-4

Perfect Game Staff
Article Image
UBC West Scout Notes: Days 1-2 Lucca Bacigalupi (‘30,CA) helps himself out at the plate racking up 2 hits & 2 RBI including a HR. Have a day young man. #UBCWest https://t.co/z2wAGXgavZ pic.twitter.com/Ilh7kU8K10 — Perfect Game California (@California_PG) June 13, 2026 Lucca Bacigalupi, C/RHP, Petaluma, Calif. Alpha Prime (2030) Bacigalupi is a versatile two-way prospect who continues to stand out with his size, arm strength and offensive ability. On the mound, the right-hander threw three solid innings, allowing three hits while striking out three over 69 pitches. His fastball touched 83 mph with decent life and he mixed in a serviceable breaking ball that he threw for strikes. The delivery looks clean, repeatable, and athletic. The combination of mound presence and bat production makes him an intriguing follow in the 2030 class. Ethan Duffy (‘30,CA) posted 4 strong...
Read More
Tournaments | Story | 6/15/2026

Braves Scout Team Keep Winning In Hoover

Kinley Kitchens
Article Image
Through big wins and making their way into the championship bracket, the Atlanta Braves Scout Team has done exactly what every team hopes to do at a major Perfect Game event: keep winning.  Now undefeated and preparing for the semifinals, the Braves have established themselves as one of the top teams remaining in the 15U division. Dominant pitching performances, timely hitting, and a lineup full of contributors have powered the team through a strong weekend in Hoover.  The Braves opened the tournament with a statement performance behind right-hander Daylen Woods, who tossed a five-inning no-hitter while striking out six. Woods also helped his own cause offensively with three hits and two runs scored as the Atlanta Braves Scout Team rolled to victory. The momentum continued with a 10-3 win over Wow Factor Nation 15U, as Sam Ridley allowed just one hit across four innings while...
Read More
Tournaments | Championship | 6/15/2026

WC Ghost Claims Arizona All-State Title

Emily Hicks
Article Image
In a championship game that featured strong pitching and sharp defense from both sides, West Coast Ghost AZ 16U pulled away late to defeat Overfly 2028, 5-3, and claim the Arizona All-State Games title. “We had discipline at the plate, on the mound, out in the field; everyone just did their thing. It was good,” said Cash Carmichael The two teams traded runs throughout the 1st and 2nd innings, making it 3-2. Followed by a single run scored at the top of the 4th by Overfly 2028, it remained tied 3-3 for most of the game. Both defenses made key plays to limit scoring opportunities, turning potential rallies into outs and keeping the pressure high in every inning. With the game deadlocked heading into the bottom of the sixth, West Coast Ghost AZ finally broke through. Bottom of the 6th, J. Haizen Reidhead recorded a single, Oren Tucker walked, and Josiah Shim was hit by pitch....
Read More
Tournaments | Story | 6/15/2026

Coastal Region Scout Notes

Perfect Game Staff
Article Image
Wyatt Smitherman (2028, Durham NC) had a solid day at the plate for USA Prime Triangle 16u Stars in their matchup against the Charlotte Colts. The 5-foot-11, 160-pound shortstop has a tall athletic frame. The left handed batter displayed a mature approach at the plate. Attacks fastballs and drives them with authority. He has quick hands and gets the barrel through the zone. Uses his lower half to his advantage creating enough torque to generate his power he shown. Smitherman finished the day going 1-for-3 with a home run and 4 RBI. Zachary Days (2028, Charlotte NC) had a impressive day at the plate for the Charlotte Colts against USA Prime Coastal. The 6-foot-3, 170 pound center fielder has a tall athletic frame. Days bats from the left side with a short but powerful swing. Very disciplined during his AB’s and applies pressure on the defense. He shifts his weight to his lower half...
Read More
Tournaments | Championship | 6/15/2026

Weather Can't Delay Top Tier Victory

Alyssa Golden
Article Image
A seven-run first inning gave Top Tier Roos American Red 2027 all the momentum they needed Sunday morning, but the road to a Florida World Series championship was far from straightforward.  After jumping out to an early lead against WBC 17u, Top Tier endured a 3 ½-hour rain delay before returning to finish off a 9-1 victory at Lee Health Sports Complex.  The championship game, which began at 8 a.m. and did not conclude until nearly 1 p.m., ended in the bottom of the fifth inning under Perfect Game’s mercy-rule format. Top Tier’s dominant performance was powered by a complete-game effort from Christian Davis and an offense that erupted for seven runs in the first inning.  Not even hours of uncertainty and lightning delays could keep Top Tier from finishing what they started.  Davis started on the mound for Top Tier and remained the entire five...
Read More
Softball | Softball Tournament | 6/14/2026

PG Softball Super Regionals

Erica Beach
Article Image
PG Super Regionals Dripping Springs, Texas June 6-7, 2026     DRIPPING SPRINGS, TX- The weather was nice, the Longhorns JUST won a national championship, and Perfect Game brought it’s first softball event to Dripping Springs. It was a weekend packed with college coaches, quality softball, and a great softball atmosphere. Over the course of the six-game guarantee event, our scout saw some amazing athletes. Below she highlights some of the athletes who caught her eye.   Destiny Sidiropoulos (2028, Houston, TX) of the Impact Gold HTX 16U was an incredible spark plug at the top of their lineup all weekend. She is a true triple threat who has great speed on the basepaths. She can soft and power slap, drop a sneaky bunt, and hit away with pop. Her barrel control is next level, and she is fun to watch pick apart defenses. On defense, she is versatile and athletic. She gets...
Read More
Tournaments | Story | 6/13/2026

West Coast Summer Breakout Hopefuls

Joey Cohen
Article Image
With summer ball ramping up, the priority follow lists from our scouting staff start to take shape and every year a handful of intriguing names outside the national spotlight begin to separate. Digging deeper into the West region, there’s a group of prospects currently buried outside the Top 200 who carry real breakout and helium potential over the next few months. All 10 players featured here are coming off strong high school seasons and bring traits that evaluators tend to bet on whether it’s projectable/athletic bodies, strong secondary stuff, or flashes of impact tools. They may not be household names just yet, but the ingredients are there for significant jumps by the end of the summer circuit. Don’t be surprised if several of these names are firmly in the mix and climbing up early boards in a hurry before the fall rolls around. Two innings of work here from Jonah...
Read More
Tournaments | Story | 6/14/2026

UBC West Scout Notes: Days 1-2

Steve Fiorindo
Article Image
Nash McCarthy (2030, Camas, WA) was outstanding in his start on day two of the UBC West for NW Baum Bat, working six-innings allowing four-hits, no walks and struck out seven.  Standing at 6-foot, 170-pounds with athleticism and room to add.  Effortless mover down the bump with a low effort, up-tempo operation that produced a fastball that was up to 84.  He showed feel for the secondary offerings mixing in a firm breaking ball at 71-74 with 11-5 shape with depth.  Controlled the zone and the tempo throughout the outing, moving the ball around to all four-quadrants.  Projectable arm speed with advanced feel for the spin and strike zone.  Dylan D'Oyen (2030, Cerritos, CA) got the start for 5 Star 2030 in their opening game of the tournament and impressed over six innings of work.  Athletic mover down the mound with balance and repeats the delivery. ...
Read More
Loading more articles...
About Perfect Game :: Contact us :: Terms of Use :: Privacy Policy :: Testimonials :: Job Opportunities
Copyright 1994-2026 by Perfect Game. All rights reserved. No portion of this information may be reprinted or reproduced without the written consent of Perfect Game.