You may have noticed that the Seattle Mariners are making an attempt to sign international amateur free agent pitcher Rafael DePaula.

DePaula has spent the last year serving a suspension handed out by Major League Baseball after they determined that he lied about his age.  DePaula and his advisors maintain that he is 17 years old and born on April 1, 1992.

April Fools’ Day.  Really?

The situation is a mess.  MLB’s investigation apparently found documents that have been doctored, with the thought camp DePaula was trying to use his sister’s registration papers to prove he was younger than he actually was.  Apparently, some of the papers had “Rafaela” as the first name with the last letter marked out.  His parents say it was an honest mistake.

An odd mistake to make.

Regardless of his actual age, a team can still sign him, as we’ve seen with these international free agents such as Miguel Angel Sano.  This could present future visa problems, but some teams are willing to cross that bridge when they get to it if it means securing the talent, especially if the teams don’t think the age discrepancy is more than a year or two.  It would be one thing to sign a 22 year old who claimed he was 16, and quite another to get an 18  or even 19 year old who said he was 17.

Last year DePaula was considered one of the top pitchers on the international market, and was expected to get a seven figure deal, and he is expected to get a favorable deal despite the suspension and mystery surrounding his age.  The Seattle Mariners, New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox are three of the teams pursuing him, and the possibility of playing in Japan is out there if MLB presents too much of a hurdle.  ESPN’s Jorge Arangure, mentioned in the above linked MLBTR post, recently tweeted that Seattle intensified their pursuit last week.

The basic scouting report for the 6’3 DePaula is that he throws a fastball in the low-t0-mid 90s with good life, touching as high as 97 at some point last year, and has three secondary pitches (curve, slider, change) that are polished relative to his experience level.  One thing that impresses scouts seems to be his smooth and consistent mechanics, something not easily found in the amateur market.

Here’s some video:

When most baseball people talk about a player having good mechanics all they really mean by that is that they have smooth, fluid mechanics.  Mark Prior had great mechanics, for example, because there were no weird hitches.  The biomechanics community would obviously disagree.  DePaula certainly has fluid mechanics as well.  But unlike Prior, as far as the popular mechanical red flags go DePaula won’t be doomed from the start in the minds of biomechanically minded fans.  The elbow gets a little higher than I would like, but it doesn’t cause much in terms of rushing (seen best in this ridiculous comparison video).  The arm action isn’t “perfect”, but it’s clean enough.  We’ll save further analysis for if he does indeed sign with Seattle.

A young player with a good body and a live arm?  As long as he’s not actually 22, you take that.  What else is there to say?

Addendum:

For more mechanical analysis, check out Jeff Clarke’s two piece rundown over at SSI.

For those of you that will ask how he’d rate among Seattle’s pitching prospects, DePaula could be considered Seattle’s best starting pitching prospect as long as he can find the strikezone on a somewhat regular basis, even if he’s as old as 19.  If struggles with his control and command, he’d still have a leg up on most of the other prospects given his repertoire (as long as that’s not all agent-speak.  I’m sure some of it is).  This speaks to DePaula’s ability, but also to Seattle’s lack of depth.  Michael Pineda is nice, but secondary pitches need work and the elbow injury is worrisome.  Dan Cortes has potential, but is wild and lacks a third pitch.  Same goes for Mauricio Robles.

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Sources/Additional References:

ESPN: DePaula back on the market, 01/27/2010

Diario Libre: Rafael DePaula, futura estrella del box (translated), 01/28/2009

Lookout Landing: Mariners in on 17 year old Rafael DePaula (lots of good info in comments), today

Mariners Minors: M’s bidding for Dominican RHP DePaula, today