IBC

After reviewing ExCo threads and the forum section of our board, it appears that the latest announcement we have regarding draft eligibility is from Dec. 2011, made by Ken, who at the time, was serving on ExCo. That announcement can be found here: viewtopic.php?t=3865.

The rules state that players from other professional leagues have until Opening Day to sign with their teams. Like Darvish in 2012, Tanaka will have until Opening Day 2014 to sign his contract, and is eligible to be drafted.

Tanaka and Darvish's posting dates were both in 2011 and 2013, though as Bren noted, the posting rules have changed and it's more like free agency. However, we have not changed the rule itself since Darvish, and it would be inconsistent to not include Tanaka.

ExCo will review the rule this time and have a clearer rule in place for the 2014 draft, but changing the rules 2 days before our draft starts would be unfair.

I think it's funny that the first comment after Ken's post is mine about the rules not being updated. And here we are still with the rules not updated, two years after Ken's post and almost 7 years since the rules were last updated.

Everyone knew before now that you had to be signed by the time the draft started, making Tanaka eligible IS changing the rules 2 days before the draft starts.