The Baltimore Orioles are breaking new ground.  In January, the O’s signed a 17-yr-old South Korean player entering his final year of school to a contract.  MLB’s agreement with the Korean Baseball governing body says teams cannot have contact with a player until he is in his final year of his deal  The Orioles may have been just a little premature in making the deal.  The team has been criticized in the past for doing a poor job with International scouting.  This was one of their first “big” signings in that realm in quite a long time.  Now, the South Korean governing body is banning all Orioles scouts from attending games.

MLB is at a crossroads, as is baseball in South Korea.  While the banning organization claims that signing its youth players away from South Korean leagues will hurt the local ability to attract Korean talent, the opposite may actually be true.  Young kids may see baseball as an avenue to financial security.  What it also will do will insure that South Korean baseball remains a lesser league than MLB, and that is what the South Koreans are really afraid of.

South Korea has watched how Japanese teams have made money from their posting system, allowing home grown players to become locally famous and drawing fans first.  Then, making money from MLB teams through the posting system when a player is good enough or wants to come to the US to play.  South Korea wants that.  But they won’t get that if they allow their most talented players to go to the United States prior to playing locally.  The best talent will be siphoned off before they can make a South Korean team money.

How this plays out will determine not only the fate for any kind of international draft, but also the fate of professional baseball in South Korea and probably China as well.  And the Orioles are at the forefront, for good or for bad.