There were 20 players on Major League Baseball Opening Day rosters this season, most products of the league’s First-Year Player Draft, which was instituted for Puerto Rico in 1990. In 2006, that number was 33, according to Caribbean Business, a Puerto Rico-based publication.

‘You can talk about it all day,’ Florida Marlins pitcher Javier Vázquez, from Ponce, Puerto Rico, said. ‘A lot of people have pointed to the draft, I guess, but I’ve always said that if you’re good enough to draft, you’re good enough to sign as a free agent.’

Outfielders Carlos Beltrán of the New York Mets, Andrés Torres of the defending champion San Francisco Giants, and Alex Rios of the Chicago White Sox – not to mention catchers Iván ‘Pudge’ Rodríguez of the Washington Nationals, Yadier Molina of the St. Louis Cardinals, Geovany Soto of the Chicago Cubs and Jorge Posada of the New York Yankees – are among the few big name Puerto Ricans in the game.

But those players and most of the others are all fairly far along in their careers, creating a generational gap of sorts between those veterans and the few Puerto Rican potential future stars.

Players and those close to the game admit there is a decline and cite reasons for it, but they believe it’s a cycle – that there is talent in the minor leagues, colleges and at high-school age that will bolster the ranks in the years to come.

‘Baseball is coming back to the island and it’s just a matter of time,’ Rodríguez, 39, the longest-tenured Puerto Rican major leaguer, said. ‘Just take one step at a time, and maybe in a few years it’s probably going to be back the way it should be.’

Until 1990, Puerto Ricans were free agents with the same status as players from the Dominican Republic, Venezuela and other Caribbean countries. They could be signed at age 16 or 17 as raw talents and learn the pro game faster than their American counterparts, who couldn’t be drafted until they were done with high school and, in a lot of cases, weren’t drafted until they were in college, and by then in their early 20s.

Now Puerto Ricans are part of the draft. Today’s best prospects include Javier Báez, an 18-year-old shortstop and native of the island who now lives in Florida. He went to the Chicago Cubs with the ninth overall pick in Monday’s First-Year Player draft and could get more than $2 million in a signing bonus if he signs a contract.

The lower-round selections stand to make much less money, which leads them to consider other sports, going to college or other pursuits.

That cuts into the talent pool from Puerto Rico, even though a number of players from the island will be chosen throughout Rounds 2 through 50 Tuesday and Wednesday.

‘It’s not like in other countries where baseball is the only way out,’ Vázquez said. ‘In Puerto Rico it’s not the only way. Other guys study, a lot of guys do different things. Baseball has taken a dip to other sports as well.’ Read more: http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/sports/2011/06/08/rapid-decline-puerto-rican-pelotero-boricuas-make-comeback/#ixzz1PYkwHwwm