Via Jim Street of MLB.com, the Mariners have signed RHP Josh Fields,  their 2008 first round pick. Fields was a senior and ran out of college eligibility, which is why the August 15th deadline didn’t apply to him. So why do Yankees fans care? Because as Lane Meyer of NoMaas explains, Fields’ signing eliminates the compensation pick Seattle would have received if he didn’t sign, so now the Red Sox pick one spot ahead of the Yanks instead of one spot behind them. You can see the updated pick order at our 2009 Draft Order Tracker. Oh well, such is life.

Baseball America has started digging through the aftermath of the 2008 Draft, and handed out some hardware. Unfortunately this article is subsciber only, but I’ll tell you this much: Pat Venditte has one of the best pro debuts of any college player, Jeremy Bleich had one of the draft’s best secondary pitches, and Garrison Lassiter was one of the best late round picks. Sadly both Gerrit Cole & Scott Bittle were two of the best players who got away, but that should come as no surprise. All-in-all, the Yanks spent just over $5M on the draft this year, down nearly $3M from last year. Had Cole and/or Bittle signed, they would have spent north of $8M this year.

So says an anonymous source of Tyler Kepner’s. I don’t buy it, both Mike Moustakas and Josh Vitters pulled the same stuff last year. If Cole does go to UCLA, the Yanks will get pick #28A in next year’s draft, which for all intents and purposes is pick #29. We’ll see what happens tomorrow.

Frequent RAB commentor Eric Sanlnocencio spoke with Baseball America’s Jim Callis in the latest edition of Baseball Digest Daily’s podcast. The conversation starts around the 19:00 minute mark, and Callis drops some knowledge on some of the top unsigned players, of course touching on Gerrit Cole. The signing deadline is this coming Friday. Check it out.

MLB.com draft guru Jonathan Mayo has posted a small update on the status of the 11 first round picks that remain unsigned, four of which are represented by Boras. He notes that both Gerrit Cole (1st round) and Jeremy Bleich (sandwich round) are expected to sign with the Yanks, however second rounder Scott Bittle is not. A routine physical showed significant wear and tear on the righty’s throwing shoulder about a month ago, leading to an breakdown in contract negotiations. If Bittle doesn’t sign, the Yanks will receive a compensation pick following the second round of next year’s draft. Bleich is the only unsigned sandwich pick now that the Giants locked up Conor Gillaspie.

Update (1:20pm): Pending Pinstripes had a chance to sit down and chat with the recently signed Brett Marshall. Check it out. (can you tell the kid just got out of high school, or what?)

Via Ken Davidoff, the Yanks have signed their seventh round pick, California prep catcher Kyle Higashioka, to a deal worth approximately $400,000. Rated the 77th best prospect in the state by Baseball America, they describe him as a superb defensive catcher with interesting power potential. The deal is roughly $250,000 overslot, and buys him out of a commitment to Cal. Austin Romine, Jesus Montero & Higashioka are an eviably trio of lower level catching prospects. (h/t to Patrick)

Via The Clarion Ledger comes word that contract negotiations between the Yankees and second round pick Scott Bittle have reached an impasse after a physical showed “wear and tear” on his throwing shoulder. No surprise here, Bittle and his agent say he’s fine. The 75th overall pick threw 70.2 innings as Ole Miss’s closer this season, which is right in line with the typical workload of a top college reliever. If the Yanks don’t come to terms with Bittle, they’ll receive a compensation pick after the second round next year as per MLB’s latest draft rule change. Obviously you’d rather have the player now instead of the pick later.

Just for a historical note, the Padres discovered that Tim Stauffer had a fatigued shoulder after signing him to a $2.6M deal as the 4th overall pick of the 2003 draft. Stauffer’s bonus was adjusted down to $750,000, and he’s gone on to have an unspectacular career thus far. He’s currently coming back from Tommy John surgery.

The Roanoke Times has the news. I wrote up O’Brien on draft day, so you can find more info about him here. If he wasn’t a 5′-11″ righthander, O’Brien would be considered a much sexier prospect. He passed on a 98% scholarship to Winthrop, so I suspect his signing bonus is rather large, probably in the $300,000 to $500,000 range, although that’s nothing more than a guess. A solid addition to the farm system. (h/t to Pending Pinstripes)

Update: Lane Meyer points out that O’Brien is also a Type 1 diabetic. Teams tend to be concerned about a player’s ability to hold up over a long season if he’s a diabetic, and I can’t say I really blame them. Current Yankee farmhand Bradley Suttle is also a Type 1 diabetic.

I missed this one while I was out of town at the end of last week. Tim Beckham, the first overall pick in this year’s draft, agreed to a record $6.15M deal, bringing in $50,000 more than The Justin Upton did in 2005. I’m surprised the deal was announced so soon, but Jim Callis doesn’t think the signing will inflate the bonuses for the remaining unsigned players. Last year Rick Porcello received a $3.58M bonus as part of a four-year ML contract that could be worth $11.1M with incentives, the largest deal ever given out to a high school pitcher. Boras will likely milk the Yanks’ teet dry for Gerrit Cole, but I doubt he’ll get a Porcello-esque deal, even if Beckham’s deal causes inflation. I do expect Cole to get more than the $2.1M given to Jarrod Parker recieved as the 9th overall pick, which was the second largest bonus given to a HS pitcher last year.