90's Box Breaks

Brien Taylor made huge headlines in 1991 when he was drafted by the Yankees as an overall 1st Round #1 draft pick. I can remember him fondly over other draftees in that decade, mainly because I lived in NC at the time and his home of Beaufort, NC was about 40 minutes away.

At the time in 1992, his Topps RC was the most sought-after card in the set, only to be shadowed by his Topps Gold parallel. The base card commanded between $12-$15 at the time, with the gold version commanding about 10x more. Now, you can find both cards, along with the 1992 Topps Gold autograph #793 for a total of $25 or less. How the mighty have fallen.

1992 Topps Gold Autograph Brien Taylor

So what happened to Brien that caused him to lose such status? I blame Scot Boras.

Brien was offered $350,000 to sign a minor league contract, which was standard at the time. However, in typical Scot Boras fashion, he advised the family that Brien was worth much more and that they should hold out for a higher contract. Basically, Scot reminded them that Todd Van Poppel received over $1 million in his contract when he was drafted and signed by the Athletics the previous year.

Naturally, money talks, and so they waited for the Yankees to raise the contract price. At the last minute, however, the Yankees finally signed Brien for $1.55 million. Not that he wasn’t worth the price, but I believe had the Taylors used another agent, perhaps the whole money ordeal wouldn’t have gotten to Brien’s head.

Brien was going through the minors faster than any player at the time, thanks to his wicked pitching arm. Unfortunately, drinking and pitching do not mix well. One night, Brien and his brother were at a bar when a fight broke out. Brien was defending his brother when he tore his labrum, causing his arm to suffer tremendously. Before the incident, Brien was in AA, but the rest of the season he was sent back to A and never advanced.

Now the interesting part to me is that the Yankees actually kept him in their system until 1998, 5 years after the incident. Yes, they finally released him that year, but somehow the Mariners and Indians thought they could use him at some point and kept him in their minor league system. Well, we know that he never made an MLB debut, and he finally retired in 2000.

I can’t believe he lasted that long, honestly. So why do I blame Scot Boras? Let’s face it, growing up poor like Brien did meant that even the paltry $350,000 contract would have been a great deal. However, whenever Boras is the agent for a player, we all know that we can expect outrageous demands and prices. Hey, he has to eat too.

Before all of that took place, Brien wasn’t a greedy player nor was he cocky. In fact, he was a complete gentleman and courteous player. But when you get a contract of $1.55 million, that can all change in an instant. It might even make one player think he’s invincible and that nothing can bring him down. As a pitcher, however, one little bar fight can change all that, and that’s exactly what happened here. I don’t know how the fight started or what caused it, but I’m sure it could have been avoided.

Currently, Brien has moved back home to Beaufort, NC and is involved in real estate, buying and repairing homes for resale.  Not sure how up to date that is, but that’s what I’ve found on him.

1992 Classic 4 Sport Brien Taylor