Remember when the rumors started about them signing a Cuban SS for big money on the international market? The rub being that pretty much everyone else in baseball considered him of the $400K variety and the Reds were rumored to be spending 7MM on him?
Well guess what they went and did? $7MM for another Manos de Oro
Guess what else that did? Yep, you guessed it. Blew their international signing bonus all to hell.
What do most MLB teams do when they blow the budget by a couple million? They take a big bath as it were and blow it by A LOT. What do these ignorant ass fucknuckles do? Just blow it b a couple million, pay the same kind of penalty as if they blew it by 30MM and don't sign shit else for talent.
Bonus fun fact. The #1 guy in the whole pool of prospects (who is, you know a legit prospect and not a defensive replacement) signed for 4.25MM
So to recap they gave Juan castro lite a $7MM signing bonus when real prospects were getting less.
Most other MLB scouts saw him as the $400K variety international FA
Went over budget by about 2MM and will have international signing heavily impacted by that for next few years
Did nothing else to get the most bang for the penalty buck. Just castro Jr.
Amazing display of ineptitude even by Reds standards.