International signing rundown

by Brett Perryman on Oct 17, 2008 5:40 PM CDT Comment 22 comments

One more summary of the Rangers' international efforts - and probably the most comprehensive one so far - comes from Baseball America's Ben Badler, as he reviewed the ALWest (and Michael Inoa).

Badler profiles the seven teenagers on whom the Rangers spent at least $100,000. I think that my favorite is still Edwin Escobar:

Escobar is a 6-foot-2 lefthander with an 86-90 mph fastball that has touched 92 mph. A relative of Angels righthander Kelvin Escobar and Brewers shortstop Alcides Esocbar, Edwin saw some time at the Rangers' instructional league this year and showed feel for the breaking ball. His body is more mature than most Latin American pitchers his age, and he needs to continue to work on his changeup.

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is there a breakdown

of the signing bonuses for these players?

by Goyogringo on Oct 17, 2008 6:11 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs

heres what i found online

Rangers: RHP Tae-Kyeong Ahn, South Korea – $800,000 bonus
Rangers: OF Esdras Abreu, Dominican Republic (a.k.a. Ezdra Abreu) – $550,000 bonus
Rangers: LHP Vicente Escobar, Venezuela (a.k.a. Edwin Escobar) – $350,000 bonus
Rangers: SS Oduble Herrera, Venezuela – 160,000 bonus
Rangers: LHP Wilmer Batista, Dominican Republic
Rangers: OF Hector Martinez, Dominican Republic
Rangers: OF Francisco Lugo, Mexico
Rangers: OF Teodoro Martinez, Venezuela
Rangers: SS Santiago Chirino, Venezuela
Rangers: 3B Carlos Torres, Venezuela – Miguel Cabrera’s cousin
Rangers: 2B Luis Villegas, Venezuela
Rangers: 3B Carlos Oropesa, Venezuela
Rangers: C Oswaldo Pirela

"I don’t know of a single thing Obama’s done except talk and write." - Newt Gingrich
"I'm more happy to be a Dallas Cowboy than when I got my first bike" - Roy Williams (WR)

by knockoutking on Oct 17, 2008 6:16 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

whoa

Ahn with an 800k bonus. He didn’t sound too impressive based on the evals from FI. Perez signed for 550k I think. I guess they decided to use the Inoa spare change…

by Goyogringo on Oct 17, 2008 8:03 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

According to the Rangers

they paid significantly less than the originally reported 800K.

By 2028, Mark Teixeira will be in the HOF.
-The Outlaw

by Gdawg on Oct 17, 2008 9:22 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

that is what I read as well

I’m thinking 200-400 maybe…

by Goyogringo on Oct 17, 2008 9:37 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

I think they are high on him, but he still wasn’t getting anything near a 1 million bonus. I really do like that they are starting to sign players from over there. Franchises are investing more and more in LA and willing to spend more money to sign talent there. The next bargains are going to start coming from the far east.

By 2028, Mark Teixeira will be in the HOF.
-The Outlaw

by Gdawg on Oct 17, 2008 9:48 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

Maybe a breakdown on age of players for those of us who don't pay money to read this site.

The bloggerformelyknownasBigBaddBubbaJ

by NYTXFAN on Oct 17, 2008 6:37 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs

Most of the DR/Venezuelan kids were 16. Ahn was 18, I believe.

by Brett Perryman on Oct 17, 2008 7:08 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

I loves me some Esdras Abreu and Oduble Herrera.

Just awesome, awesome names.

The 40 Trumps All!!!

by thedirkatron on Oct 17, 2008 6:46 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs

Oduble

That’s the one that caught me, memories of Oddibe.

G G G E-flat_______ F F F D__________....

by t ball on Oct 17, 2008 9:26 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

Oduble

is almost dOuble.

by shroomer on Oct 17, 2008 10:18 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

Ohdebull

ohdebing, ohdebang, ohdeboom.

G G G E-flat_______ F F F D__________....

by t ball on Oct 18, 2008 12:36 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

Ohdehumanity

by shroomer on Oct 18, 2008 1:28 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

shocking

His body is more mature than most Latin American pitchers his age…

Aren’t most LA players more mature than their stated age?

by Back Door Yakker on Oct 17, 2008 7:16 PM CDT reply actions 1 recs

I saw some BA stuff on him

after the signing and took it to mean he was a little portly. Anyone reports on him from FI?

by Goyogringo on Oct 17, 2008 8:04 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

Oduble

quite a name, indeed. I’ve met Obdulias, Absalios, Saturninos. But never have I met an Oduble.

by chrisR on Oct 17, 2008 7:39 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs

FWIW

I posted a few additional notes from Badler’s article over here. BTiA just switched over to an entirely new platform and the kinks are still being worked out (basically, the archives/pictures/pages are all gone, so we have to restore all that and plenty of other stuff), so anybody that can actually access that page and let me know they were able to would be greatly appreciated.

Ahn got $275K.

Baseball Time in Arlington

by Joey Matschulat on Oct 17, 2008 11:05 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs

The new look on BTiA looks pretty slick

Although the new text is a little bland, which (right now at least) makes it just a tad harder for my eyes to pick up.

As far as getting there, the old link, which I have in my bookmarks (http://mvn.com/mlb/rangers//) just takes me to what looks like a search result page for the term “Texas Rangers” on MVN. There’s a link to BTiA on the “picks” bar though, and that takes me directly to your new front page (which has apparently changed to http://mvn.com/baseballtimeinarlington/ – I’ll have to update my bookmarks with the new link).

A Lonestar in California

"M’s fans are such weenies." - Zywica

by lonestarJon on Oct 17, 2008 11:39 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

Indeed

A lot of kinks yet to work out…thanks for chiming in, Jon. A lot of behind-the-scenes work is left to be done (we’ll probably be going through more than 18 months of archives to make sure everything made it through okay, and then there’s the business of trying to restore the lost pictures and editing the front page so that posts don’t show up in condensed form), so I doubt I’ll personally have anything substantial published before Monday, but that’s neither here nor there.

We agree that the text color is too light and that’s something we’re moving to address ASAP.

On a brighter note, Jason will have an interview published in the morning with Miggy De Los Santos, so there’s something for all the Macumba fans to sink their teeth into.

Baseball Time in Arlington

by Joey Matschulat on Oct 17, 2008 11:56 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs