The 2026 international free agent signing period begins on January 15th, and so far the Detroit Tigers appear to set to sign a pretty good crop of players. Baseball America released their top 50 list of IFA prospects to be signed on Monday, and the Tigers place three players in those rankings.
Now, before we get too excited, these players are obviously a very long way from the major leagues, and being among the top guys in the class guarantees nothing beyond the rough size of their signing bonuses.
Plenty of the Tigers top IFAs since they finally started spending big on some of the top guys have flamed out entirely, and bonus size hasn’t correlated well to success.
Currently, the Tigers top international free agent prospect is our fourth ranked player in the system, C/1B Josue Briceño. The Venezuelan slugger is still just 21 years old, but he’s already a top 100 prospect who has good, tangible value as a trade chip already. The Tigers seem entirely disinterested in trading top prospects, so Briceño is going to have to work out to actually produce real value, but he’s very much on track to be an above average power hitter at the major league level. Briceño was signed back in January 2022 for an $800,000 bonus in Al Avila’s last IFA class.
The Tigers spent a good deal more than that on Cuban outfielder Roberto Campos ($2.85M, 2019) and Dominican infielder Cristian Santana ($2.95M, 2021), and they seem unlikely to see much of a return on those investments, which are the equivalent of mid-first round money in the amateur draft. Campos is still young enough to potentially break out and wasn’t totally overwhelmed at the Double-A level last summer as he turned 22 years old. Santana has flamed out in Single A-ball after a really strong start to his pro career. He’s still only 22 as well, but while he continues to walk a lot in Single-A, he’s been a mess the past two years and unable to even reach High-A yet. He’s probably done enough to get that chance in 2026, but something is going to have to change pretty quickly to improve his trajectory.
Outfielder Cris Rodriguez, the big prize of the Tigers’ 2025 class, is off to a strong start at least. The Tigers spent $3.2 million on him, fourth most in the whole class. That was the largest bonus the club has ever given out. Rodriguez looks worth the gamble, and launched 10 home runs in 50 games in the Dominican Summer League in 2025. He has some speed and a pretty good arm, leading to expectations that he’ll move from center field over to right field as he continues to fill out. There’s some swing and miss in his game but he was the only player in the Summer League to hit over .300 with 10 home runs, so it’s a really intriguing combination of power and overall athleticism. So far, so good.
The Tigers top signing in the 2026 class is expected to be Venezuelan catcher Manuel Bolivar, who ranks 12th in terms of his expected bonus per Baseball America. The 17-year-old catcher stands six-foot-three, and weighs in officially at 190 pounds. A right-handed hitter, Bolivar already shows potential for plus raw power, and while there are some weaknesses in terms of his contact ability that might become a problem once he starts playing against college age talent in a few years, he’s hit good pitching pretty consistently in his age group. He’s an athletic catcher described as having very advanced skills and a strong arm for his age already.
Thanks to Tigers Torkmoil on X for compiling a lot of video on the current class.
Next up on BA’s rankings is Venezuelan shortstop, Oscar Tineo. The slightly built, six-foot-two infielder is still just 16 years old. He checks in as the 33rd ranked player in terms of bonus expectations, per Baseball America. As you’d expect for a teenaged shortstop, Tineo is a good athlete with speed and fluidity to his actions. His arm still draws just average grades, but he has a lot of frame to fill out with good muscle in the years ahead. A switch-hitter, Tineo makes a lot of good contact and has developing gap power at this point. Projections on his bat will depend on how his batspeed improves as he gets stronger.
Outfielder Randy Santana checks in as the Tigers’ third ranked international free agent, and ranks 36th overall on BA’s top 50. The Dominican born Santana is 17 years old and stands 5’11” with an official weight of 180 pounds. Baseball America describes him an explosive athlete with plus speed, a big arm, and likely average power projections. He’s a free swinger at this point, projecting for more power than pure hit tool, but again, he’s 17 years old. He profiles as a center fielder now, but if he loses a step that cannon of a right arm would make him a perfect fit in right field.
You can find Baseball America’s full top 50 right here, but while it is well worth the subscription, it is behind a paywall.
Obviously the Tigers have made Venezuela a focal point of their international efforts for more than a decade and three different front office groups. Currently, the Tigers have three Venezuelan players, second baseman Gleyber Torres, pitcher Keider Montero, and catcher Eduardo Valencia on the 40-man roster.
No doubt the recent US seizure of President Nicholas Maduro has teams on edge as to how their players and international staff might be impacted. No doubt it would quite interesting to hear the discussions going on in various teams’ international departments right now. Whether this actually ends up impacting anything baseball wise is probably just going to depend on how stable the situation remains, and obviously there are a lot more important matters at issue.
As to whether recent events will cause problems in signing the new class of players or in terms of acquiring visas is hard to say, but things were rarely a significant problem under Maduro despite the state of relations. Probably we should expect some delays as teams prefer to travel to sign their young players in person. Still, most of these agreements are in place years in advance and unlikely to be affected in the long run. We’ll just have to see how things unfold over the next few weeks.
