Jan
26
Yanks close to signing Australian prospect
ByAccording to The Canberra Times, the Yanks and Australian teenager Kyle Perkins are close to agreeing to a seven year deal. Perkins is a 16-yr old catcher at Daramalan College, and was first spotted by the Yanks last year at an Under-18 event in Western Australia. He is expected to come to the States in 2010, when he finishes school. This post is not a joke.
(hat tip to Chad Jennings)
Update: Loyal reader Ricochet points out that this is only the second Austalian teenager the Yanks have signed this month. So … um …when does Spring Training start again?
The Yankees signed another Aussie 16 yr old OF Nathan Aron.
Here’s the link.
http://www.moorabbinkingstonle....._news.html
I sort of wonder why these Australian kids aren’t sent to one of the Dominican Republic baseball academies.
I say that because my brother-in-law has a young godson (yes, a godson – I write from Panama in Latin America, and these things are important here) who was signed by the Yankees and at least as of last year, was at a baseball academy in the Dominican….
Maybe they feel that an Australian kid would have an incredibly difficult time living in the DR simply because of the language barrier. The facilities and instruction in Australia could be very good for all we know. I don’t know specifically about baseball there, but SI has an article in its most recent edition about Australian college basketball players, which talks about the top-notch instruction at their athletic academies (which include several sports).
Perkins will be 18 when he comes to the US, and I’m sure the competition of the best of the best in Australia can’t be too much worse than the competition of a local HS here.
Or he just signed the contract with a provision for him to stay in his home country ’till he graduates, idk.
yeah, do any of the kids in the DR and Latin America go to school? I mean, not to be offensive, but alot of the countries where these kids come from are 3rd world countries where education either isn’t that good or isn’t that important. As opposed to Australia, an advanced industrialized country, where there are probably more focus on and better education, as well as more laws about minors signing contracts or some crap like that
No, not many go to school. Cano, Tabata, Mo, guys like that, they never went to any sort of high school. For alot of them it’s baseball or nothing, because there isn’t much to fall back on.
Damn. I would love to be a Yankees scout scouring the world for talent. Dream job.
do you guys know anything about this guy? I heard he got a big signing bonus? is he sick? is there any reason to be relatively excited about this kid?
no idea. but there IS reason to be excited that the yankees keep taking additional roads to bringing young talent into the organization. supplementing their draft strategy of paying over-slot and signing the top international FA’s, in the last year, they have signed players from China, signed a Cuban defector, and are now signing players from Australia.
it’s like a big pyramid. most of these guys won’t pan out, but the wider the base of the pyramid is, the more guys you’ll have left when you get closer to the top. or something like that.
Look at steve over here with the analogies. Impressive.
i think the positive consequences are two-fold. they sign a potential MLer, but also spread the game of baseball and the Yankee business. these kids get excited, as do their parents, their schools and communities. it’s all about building the Yankees popularity and making baseball a worldwide sport. good stuff.
plus he probably has a cool accent.
“that’s not a bat, THIS is a bat!”
ok, that was terrible.
AUSSIES SUCK
RED SOX AND DODGERS IN THE WORLD SERIES. DODGERS IN SIX