FORT MYERS, Fla. -- The Red Sox have never had a No. 1 overall draft pick since the amateur draft was implemented in 1965. The highest they've picked was third, in 1967, when they took a high school pitcher from Idaho, Mike Garman, who won a grand total of two games in four seasons with Boston.
That illustrates both the significance and potential risk of the deal the Red Sox were on the verge of striking Monday for 19-year-old Cuban prodigy Yoan Moncada. The signing bonus for Moncada is a reported $31.5 million, shattering the record for an international amateur signing and almost four times the $8 million signing bonus the Pirates gave pitcher Gerrit Cole in 2011, the most money ever given to a drafted amateur.
If Moncada was eligible for the 2015 draft, numerous talent evaluators have said, he likely would have been the No. 1 player taken overall. His imminent signing thus represents a coup for the Sox, whose system is already teeming with highly regarded prospects (seven of Baseball America's top 100 prospects are with the Red Sox).
But because he is still a teenager, the Sox investment carries more risk than, say, the $72.5 million they gave last August to Cuban outfielder Rusney Castillo, who at 27 is in the prime of his career and has a much longer track record of success.
Moncada represents spectacular potential at a time when teams regard younger players as more valuable assets than ever. In outbidding the runner-up Yankees by as much as a reported $6 million, the Sox showed yet again they are willing to spend when they feel it makes the most sense to do so. Going the distance for Jon Lester last winter went against their better cost/reward judgment. That was not the case with Moncada.
The last time the Red Sox and Yankees went head-to-head on a Cuban player, Sox scout Louis Eljaua bought up all the rooms in the Nicaraguan hotel where the player (Jose Contreras) was staying in hopes of shutting the Yankees out. Contreras signed with the Yankees anyway, which inspired Larry Lucchino to utter his famous "Evil Empire" line about the Bombers (true) and then-Sox GM Theo Epstein to either kick a hotel door in or bust up a chair (urban legend).
Contreras fell short of projections, which may have left the Yankees a bit skittish in their pursuit of other players from the island, although a Yankees pitcher from Cuba who preceded Contreras, Orlando Hernandez (El Duque), more than lived up to his billing.
The Sox, meanwhile, have embarked on a little empire-building of their own, placing themselves in an enviable position of winning not only this season but for the foreseeable future. GM Ben Cherington addressed the team's short-term concerns with his signings of Castillo and the biggest free-agent bats on the market this winter, Hanley Ramirez and Pablo Sandoval. He also responded to Lester's departure by placing five veteran pitchers at John Farrell's disposal, along with four prospects (Henry Owens, Matt Barnes, Eduardo Rodriguez, Brian Johnson) who may be contributing as soon as this season.
The next wave of young Sox position players has already begun, with mixed results at the outset but with a potentially huge upside in Xander Bogaerts, Mookie Betts, Christian Vazquez and Jackie Bradley Jr., and Blake Swihart, Garin Cecchini and Deven Marrero clamoring for their day to come sooner than later.
Where does Moncada fit? The Sox will worry about that later, even if the three positions he is most often linked to -- second base, short and third -- are held by what look like permanent occupants in Dustin Pedroia, Bogaerts and Sandoval. Moncada's ETA at Fenway would seem to be at least a year away, maybe two, by which time the Sox could very well have shifted things around in either the infield or outfield, where some evaluators have profiled Moncada as a potential center fielder.
The team also has placed itself in an even better position to move the prospects it would take to acquire an elite pitcher, like Cole Hamels.
Unless the entire scouting profession has lost its bearings, Moncada's ceiling projects as a cornerstone player, a franchise piece with speed (he outran Castillo in races held at the Cuban All-Star Game), power (still growing at 6-foot-2, 205) and versatility. The Yankees, who need a star in the middle of the infield after losing Robinson Cano to free agency and Derek Jeter to retirement, made their own judgment on Moncada, and yielded to Boston. The Sox hope it's one that haunts them for years to come.