Archive for the 'Dayan Viciedo' Category
Sunday, November 23rd, 2008
White Sox Land Cuban Defector Dayan Viciedo
The Chicago White Sox continued to corner the market on talented young Cubans, agreeing with 19-year-old Dayan Viciedo to a record-setting contract Thursday night.
Viciedo’s four-year, $11 million major-league deal guarantees him more money than anyone signed out of the June draft or any player under 21 signed as an international free agent. Mark Prior’s $10.5 million bonus set the record for a college player, Detroit’s Rick Porcello received a $7.28 million major-league deal out of high school two years ago and Oakland gave 16-year-old Dominican Michel Inoa $4.25 million this year.
One year after signing another Cuban defector, Alexei Ramirez, to a four-year deal and watching him finish second in the American League Rookie of the Year voting last season, the White Sox promised Viciedo a shot at their third-base job despite him never taking a professional at-bat outside his home country.
“He’ll have to earn it, and I expect him to give a good fight for that position,” said Jaime Torres, Viciedo’s agent. “If I were a betting man, I’d be that he’s there.”
Chicago’s willingness to put Viciedo in an open competition pushed them past three other teams, Torres said, one of which was offering more than $11 million. Viciedo’s familiarity with Ramirez, as well as the presence of Cuban Jose Contreras, helped sway him toward the White Sox.
Swells of interest overwhelmed Viciedo’s initial showcase last week, when more than 100 scouts gathered in the Dominican Republic to watch him hit, run and throw. The next day, another workout drew 75 people, and Torres figured it would translate into a contract bigger than the $11 million.
“I honestly think this young man is worth a lot more,” he said.
Torres was right about Ramirez, who signed for $4.75 million, an extremely affordable amount for the White Sox the next three seasons.
Viciedo, who turned professional at 15, hit .337 and made the All-Star team in Cuba as a 16-year-old. Scouts at his workout raved about his power bat, though they expressed concerns about his conditioning and wondered whether his weight would balloon.
Torres said he expects another of his Cuban clients, 20-year-old center fielder Felix Perez, to sign within the next two weeks. A left-handed-hitting center fielder, Perez was lightly regarded when playing for Isla de Juventud in Cuba but impressed scouts with his five-tool potential while working out alongside Viciedo last week. He has eight teams vying for him, Torres said.
“There is serious interest,” Torres said, indicating Perez, too, could receive a major-league contract. “Some clubs that originally thought they’d have a shot at him have been surprised.”
Wednesday, November 12th, 2008
Viciedo is a Delightful Defector
At the gate for American flight 1901 on Sunday night, Jaime Torres looked around and saw a dozen familiar faces. All were headed from Miami to the Dominican Republic for the same reason.
To see the kid Torres believes will be the next great Cuban player.
From the time Dayan Viciedo hit his teenage years, hyperbole has surrounded him, so excuse Torres, his agent, for engaging in a little more. Such embroidery weaves itself into the tale of the 19-year-old third baseman, who joined Cuba’s professional league at 15, made the All-Star team at 16 and was designated heir to Omar Linares, the greatest Cuban ballplayer of the last 25 years.
“I saw Linares at his peak, and it’s a shame that a player of his caliber didn’t have the opportunity to play in the U.S.,” Torres said. “When I first heard about Dayan and the comparisons to Linares, I wanted to know if it was true.”
Linares never left the island, neither the riches nor adulation of Major League Baseball enough to tempt him. Few of Cuba’s best players do defect, leaving so many overhyped – Andy Morales and Adrian Hernandez and Maels Rodriguez and Alay Soler – that the busts nearly outweigh the successes.
Though brothers Livan and Orlando Hernandez have thrived in the major leagues, and Jose Contreras won a championship, and Alexei Ramirez and Yunel Escobar look like All-Stars in the offing, post-Revolution Cuba hasn’t produced a single superstar in more than 40 years, with Hall of Famer Tony Perez, Luis Tiant and Tony Oliva all leaving around the time Fidel Castro overthrew Fulgencio Batista.
Whether Viciedo can fulfill such expectations elicits an array of opinions from talent evaluators. One National League scout based in the Dominican said Viciedo “has star written all over him.” An American League scout, attending Torres’ workout Wednesday in the Dominican town of Boca Chica, said: “Out of shape. But it looks like he can hit.” And an NL scouting director couldn’t get over Viciedo’s burgeoning belly – he’s gone from around 200 pounds as a 16-year-old to more than 230 – and said: “What’s he going to look like when he’s 21? And 25?”
Either way, Viciedo piqued enough curiosity that nearly every major league team sent a representative to see workouts Wednesday at the Chicago White Sox’s complex and Thursday at the New York Yankees’.
Once MLB declared last Friday that Viciedo would become a free agent – a determination made because he had established residency in the Dominican Republic and was not subject to the amateur draft, further muddying already murky rules on how Cuban amateurism is handled – Torres’ plan nearly six months in the making was ready to go.
Viciedo defected with his family in May after one previous unsuccessful attempt, starting a tortuous journey, first to Mexico, then to the United States, where he trained in Miami with Torres, and ultimately to the Dominican Republic, where he hoped to inspire a bidding war.
Already, Torres said, teams have offered Viciedo a major-league contract, which includes a spot on the 40-man roster. Torres said he expects his client to compete for a starting job in spring training, whether at his natural position or in the outfield.
What sort of contract teams will offer Viciedo is unclear, though there are a number of starting points. The contemporary to whom he is most often compared, San Francisco Giants prospect and Dominican product Angel Villalona, signed at 16 for $2.1 million two years ago. The last Cuban defector to score a big-league contract, Ramirez, also a Torres client, got a four-year, $4.75 million deal. And the richest went to Contreras, who received $32 million over four years.
One general manager speculated Viciedo’s contract will exceed Ramirez’s in total value and could approach eight figures, though one scout said it’s unlikely because it would be overpaying Viciedo during his pre-arbitration years.
“It’s not only the most money,” Torres said. “It’s the best opportunity. His preference is third base. Clubs want him for right field. And that option is open. If the contract is enticing enough, he’d play right field.”
Wherever Viciedo ends up, eyes will follow, wondering who he’s going to be. Which, actually, is the beauty of his youth. Viciedo can control whether he balloons like Livan Hernandez or sheds weight like Felix Hernandez, whether he is just “easygoing” as the Latin scout put it or “might be lazy” as another said, whether he regressed after hitting .337 as a 16-year-old or, like Torres said, “sometimes his mind was drifting, looking out to Florida.”
Perhaps the changing face of Cuba, with Fidel Castro perpetually ailing, will affect the United States’ policy toward the country and free its baseball players to arrive in a grand wave. The idea of a Cuban superstar would seem so trivial, what with the smokescreen of who’s really best – who Cuba keeps off its national team for fear of defection – finally lifted.
Until then, though, Viciedo is another in a long line of hyped before harrumphed. Maybe just once the hyperbole will turn out to be the truth.
Thursday, June 12th, 2008
Cuban Baseball Player Dayan Viciedo Defects
Cuban baseball’s brightest star, Dayán Viciedo, has escaped from Cuba and is now in Miami, following the footsteps of talented island colleagues who have found their way into the major leagues
Viciedo, a 19-year-old third baseman, is considered as big a star in Cuba as Omár Linares, the most well-rounded player to emerge from the Cuban leagues since 1959 and a player highly coveted by major league scouts during the 1980s.
“At first I didn’t like to be compared to Linares because he is almost a legend,” Viciedo said. “Later, I felt proud. As a third baseman I have two idols: Linares from the Cuban National Series and Alex Rodriguez from the major leagues.”
LEFT CUBA IN MAY
Viciedo left Cuba on a boat bound for Mexico on May 20, accompanied by his family. Several days later he crossed the border from Mexico and traveled to Miami to reunite with friends and relatives.
“Most Cuban ball players dream of playing in the major leagues,” he said. “This is an aspiration that comes with risks, but I was willing to take them in order to try out. Inside, you have the desire to know if you have a place among the best in the world, if you belong to the elite.”
According to a person within the Cuban Baseball Federation, the authorities there already knew of Viciedo’s escape to Mexico. His name was not included in the list of 43 players chosen to represent Cuba at the Beijing Olympics this summer.
Born March 10, 1989, in the town of Remedios, in the central Cuba province of Villa Clara, Viciedo is regarded as the best Cuban baseball player in the past eight years after Kendry Morales, who defected in 2004 and now plays in the Los Angeles Angels’ system.
“Dayán is going to spark a lot of talk in the majors,” said his agent, Puerto Rican lawyer Jaime Torres.
“He has arrived with youth, he is very versatile and his conditioning is exceptional. We will soon see him wearing the uniform of a major league team.”
Torres added that Viciedo reminds him of Boston Red Sox star Manny Ramirez.
VERSATILE PLAYER
Standing 6-2 and weighing 202 pounds, Viciedo is known as a powerful batter and a versatile defender, capable of playing shortstop, third base and outfield, and he even can pitch. His fastball has been clocked at more than 90 mph, but he said his pitching days are over.
Since age 9, he has played for Cuban national teams in all categories, and at 15 he started playing in the Cuban national championship. He is the first Cuban to play for three national teams at the same time — 15-16 year-olds, juveniles and majors.
In January 2006 he became the youngest player to participate in the All-Stars game and was selected that same year for the World Baseball Classic held in the United States.
“He is a young man with tremendous talent, but had lately become unmotivated and made little effort,” said the Cuban Baseball Federation person in Cuba, who asked for anonymity to avoid government reprisals.
Viciedo said that during the last year his mind has been on his plans to defect from Cuba.
“There is still very good baseball in Cuba, and there are several youths with promise and a lot of talent that are moving up,” he said. “But in general the level has dropped . . . the decline has been abysmal.”