USF baseball's commitment list just got even shorter. Right after Rock Shoulders jumped for the big leagues, star pitcher and USF commit Jose Fernandez signed a contract with the Florida Marlins right as his signing deadline was approaching. The 14th overall pick signed for 1 year and $2 million, about 25 percent more than the MLB's recomended rookie annual contract. There is no room for moral victories here, but the addition of the two players' commitments last year could show some signs of life in Lelo Prado's otherwise dismal past few years. Hopefully the future will mean some of these top recruits will end up sticking around to play a few years with the Bulls.
Glad to see Lelo aiming high, but he's been burned by this type of recruiting attrition every year he's been here. The name of the game is building enough depth to be competitive enough to win that Big East, and Lelo has been woefully inadequate in that regard, IMHO.
ReplyDelete100% correct. He needs to get better at recruiting and developing players that are not high on MLB lists but are still productive members of a team. Fernandez was going to sign, no question about it. Losing out on shoulders hurts as well.
ReplyDeleteTeams like Florida and South Carolina and Texas and TCU don't seem to have trouble holding onto playersou out of high school. Lelo doesn't even get the most out of the players he has though.
ReplyDeleteGood point as well about his players. Prado is a decent coach, has decent players, but they seem to underperform most of the time, both on offense and the pitching staff (except Quackenbush). He seems to recruit a bunch of utility players, lead off hitters and the offense just doesn't have enough power and can't get the job done. Probably going to be the same this season.
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