Via Jeff Passan: MLB is expected to announce they will not implement an international draft for the 2014 season later today. In fact, talks will be tabled until after the current Collective Bargaining Agreement expires in 2016. The owners have been pushing for a worldwide draft for years now in an effort to keep costs down, and at one point it seemed like one could be implemented as soon as this year. Thankfully, that won’t happen. This is good news for the Yankees despite their small international spending pool.
In other news, Ben Badler reports Mariano Rivera and Robinson Cano are two of more than 150 Latin American players to sign a petition against an international draft. Miguel Cabrera, Felix Hernandez, Yoenis Cespedes, Carlos Gonzalez, Yadier Molina, and Carlos Beltran are among the other signatures. Molina and Beltran stand out because they’re Puerto Rican, and Puerto Rico is already included in June’s annual draft. The petition was put together by four prominent agents for Latin American amateur players during Spring Training. It was then sent to the MLBPA, which must agree to an international draft.