Actually, I think there's some evidence that we've had above average scouting in LA for a while, just look at our current roster (Herrera found in winter ball, Franco, Galvis, Hernandez, Ramos, Neris, S Gonzalez), then look at our farm system, Ortiz is the only big money signing, we have some $500K-1M bonuses, few of which have panned out, while most of our top LA prospects (a good chunk of our top 30) are low bonus signings (Kilome, Medina, Sixto, Pinto, E Garcia, Rivero).
Like many teams we overpaid for the highest ranked LA talent (because teams with limited scouting resources but lots of money bid up the prices of the best known prospects). Given the problems in Venezuela, if you haven't already built a solid network, it'll be a decade before you'll have that opportunity, conversely the DR is probably "overscouted" these days, but the rest of LA is fair game for a team willing to invest in scouts (not just salaries, but paying for hotels, planes, side payments to your network for tips, etc
The hard cap won't constrain the price of the top prospects (other than a couple each year that broke the bank) but may discourage some teams from investing in LA scouting since it's not that hard to scout the top 50-100 or so and spend to your limit on 2 or 3. But scouting the top 500-1000 requires a major investment over a number of countries (in the millions), so many teams may not think it is worth the investment if they have limited funds to chase those players.
It also suggests the best strategy for the Phillies will be to avoid the top 10-20 prospects who will be overvalued, and take advantage of less money chasing 2nd tier prospects (because teams could choose to both overpay the top guys and chase 2nd tier guys for two years can't slide money between years with that strategy) to garner quantity. This is where a decade of building up their LA organization can pay off.
