Ardolis Chapman Signs With Cincinnati Reds

Sports News - January 11th, 2010 - Written By Bryan

It appears baseball's soup de jour has agreed in principal to start his MLB Baseball career in a surprising location.

Sources close to the deal have reported that Cuban defect Ardolis Chapman, who has shown a fastball at or above 100 MPH, will sign with the Cincinnati Reds for $30 million over five years.

The deal isn't official, and is only being reported on the word of sources at the moment. But all news outlets, including Yahoo! Sports, CBS Sports and ESPN, are all insinuating the deal is all but done.

Chapman apparently would have like to begin his career in a bigger city, but no one could match Cincinnati's dollar amount.

The 22-year old became the most coveted pitcher out of Latin America since Jose Contreras after leaving Cuba's national team earlier in '09. While there were doubts initially, he only saw his stock grow after a bullpen session on Dec. 15, in which he lazily reached 97 MPH on most radar guns. He grew interest from a dozen teams courting for his services, attending a New York Yankees playoff game in October, and recently met with Boston Red Sox officials.
The Toronto Blue Jays, Los Angeles Angels and Florida Marlins also got involved in the bidding, but the Marlins got out when the asking price topped $20 million.

The highest reported offer prior to Cincinnati's was $23 million by the Blue Jays, but members of the Reds' front office were said to be going after Chapman "like crazy", and far outbid their competitors.

"He's the real deal,'' one scout told ESPN. "He's a real good athlete. When he was pitching for Cuba, it was almost like he was a reliever when he was starting, told to throw as hard as he could for as long as he could.

Chapman pitched sparingly in the World Baseball Classic last March, but never really got the chance to show off his wares in front of top scouts. Most of those doubts were eliminated after the "fabulous" bullpen session in which he also showed off his legendary slider.

"He's not ready for the big leagues yet," the scout continued. "But he has a fabulous arm. His slider is going to be a plus pitch, and though he has no feel yet for the changeup, his arm action is good and that could come with time.''