Yes he did. At the time this seemed as though the Phillies had finally changed their approach and would make use of their $, especially at a time that the MLB salary budget was set to rapidly shrink. It also was a change in approach from the Phillies past slavish adherence to what they saw as the spirit rather than the actual rule of Selig's bonus limits. It seemed like what would be a sustained positive trend, because we had just dropped $1 million on Encarnacion, which was a ton for the Phillies in recent years. This is exactly why I was so disappointed in not going to 150% this past season.
I disagree with Julio that the Phillies didn't have time to prepare to spend this year. They knew their salary budget would be down, they knew their team would stink and they would have one of the largest allocations, they were on the radars of the top agents after finally spending the big $ on Encarnacion and Ortiz, they had already crossed the Rubicon and purchased allocation (a decision which must have been made well over a year ago, because they clearly settled on a $ amount with Ortiz prior to his stock dropping a bit), and freer-spending ownership was firmly in place.
Plus, the Phillies have tended to be a plugged in team with baseball's front office. I find it hard to believe that they didn't know that hard caps were coming.
There were complaints up-thread that some of us mentioned the Phillies past practices in LA and that was ancient history not current minor leagues. It was in response to comments of basically 'who has done better than us', but beyond that, it is relevant for a team which has missed the playoffs 5 years in a row and is conceding again this year, claims to be holding back on spending on FA to build a future sustainable winner, and yet passed on our last opportunity for a big spend in LA. That is counter to building a sustainable winner, because it cuts out another 50% of the last big LA class for us -- the guys who would have been hitting Philly 5-6 years from now, when we are seeking young talent to sustain.
To me, this is a continuation of the Giles thinking that things are 'good enough' so why spend more on the minors?
Looking across our minors, I see a ton of depth of mid-level prospects, a handful of guys above that, and a real shortage of guys we can point at as likely future stars.
This past international season was just the latest missed opportunity by TPTB. Since the rules have changed, it also was the last potential opportunity for quite a long while, as far as domestic or foreign under-23 guys are concerned.