No deal for Crow

The Nationals could not come to terms with first-round draft pick Aaron Crow before the midnight deadline. They did, however, sign 11th round pick Marcus Jones (a D.C. kid who went to NC State) and 15th round pick J.P. Ramirez, a high school outfielder from Texas who was considered a much brighter prospect and actually received a seven-figure signing bonus two minutes before the deadline. Crow, as it turned out, is only one of two first-rounders not to sign (along with Gerrit Cole, taken 28th by the Yankees). That means the Nationals will be given the 10th overall pick in next year's draft as compensation to go along with their regular pick (which is likely to be one of the top three, based on their record this season). According to GM Jim Bowden, here's how the negotiations all went down... -- Prior to draft day, Crow's agents (the Hendricks brothers) informed the Nationals that their client would be seeking a major-league contract and a signing bonus that was "out of the box." In other words, something well above the recommended slot of $2.15 million. Bowden said every potential draft pick they talked to said similar things, and the organization was prepared to meet those demands. -- According to Bowden, the Crow camp did not submit their first contract offer to the Nationals until Tuesday, three days ago. That offer was for $9 million and a major-league contract. They didn't change that offer until 11:40 p.m. tonight, coming down to $4.4 million. -- The Nationals offered a major-league contract. That was not the sticking point. But they were not willing to go up to $4.4 million, not after giving $2.1 million to Ross Detwiler (the sixth overall pick) last year and not after watching the top pitcher taken this year (Brian Matusz) sign for about $3.2 million with the Orioles. Washington's final offer, according to Bowden, was for $3.5 million. So the difference came down to $900,000. The two sides talked right down to the very end. Quotes from Bowden: "We worked extremely hard. We were extremely competitive in trying to sign him. We offered a major league contract. Dollar-wise, we offered more than Brian Matusz got. We were there doing everything we could to sign the player. Obviously, we're disappointed. We were very pleased with drafting him and wanted to sign him." "We gave them a major-league contract in this process. We gave them an out-of-box deal in this process. And every other agent we were talking to was asking for the same thing. ... But I can tell you the only time we ever got a figure from them was on August 12. That was the first time we got a figure from them. And that was $9 million." "We wanted to sign him. We drafted him. We liked the pitcher. We really wanted to sign him. We gave a tremendous effort to sign him." "Our intention the entire time was to sign the player. We weren't able to get an agreement at the deadline. We worked very hard for it. We went above and beyond our budget. We went above and beyond the market. Brian Matusz was the first pitcher taken in the draft. He went fourth in the country to Baltimore. We went north of that offer to get a deal done and weren't able to get it done. The market for pitchers in this market was very clear. We offered our pitcher more than anybody in this draft. We wanted to sign the player." Asked if the organization will have the financial werewithal to sign two top 10 picks next year: "Yes. We've spent the dollars on the draft. We've drafted good players. We've signed players at very competitive numbers throughout the draft, and were willing to do that here."