More thoughts on Puerto Rico and Draft.

As some of you long timers may remember, I wrote a somewhat popular post back in the day comparing the decrease in MLB talent from Puerto Rico and how it may be similar to the decrease in American blacks in baseball. Today, I decided just to illustrate the decrease in MLB production from Puerto Rico. In the graph below, I included three countries who were strong in developing talent in the 1970s and 1980s. I used birth date to approximate how the 1990 inclusion affected each country and the prospects they produce. With that in mind, I would read 1973 and prior as before the draft. 1974-1978 as a transitional time where the infrastructure is still having an affect on prospects. Post 1978 should be seen as when the infrastructure has probably been significantly degraded and no longer much of an issue.

Click on the picture to make it larger and more legible.


After the jump, the raw numbers.

Years PR Ven DR
54-58 16 5 26
59-63 20 15 31
64-68 32 18 57
69-73 29 28 81
74-78 39 47 108
79-83 19 67 105