The latest on several pitchers…
- The Yankees won the bidding for right-handed ace Gerrit Cole on Tuesday, when the two sides agreed to a history-making deal worth $324MM over nine years. But the runners-up, the Angels and Dodgers, made mighty competitive offers in their own right. Both clubs were willing to go to eight years, with the Dodgers’ bid at exactly $300MM and the Angels’ just below that line, Jorge Castillo of the Los Angeles Times reports. Both teams’ offers included deferrals, whereas the Yankees’ didn’t.
- Free-agent righty-hander Rick Porcello has a three-year offer in hand, but he’s more inclined to accept a one-year contract, Jon Heyman of MLB Network relays. By taking a short-term pact, Porcello would be betting on himself and pinning his hopes on bouncing back next year after a tough 2019. In possibly his last season as a member of the Red Sox, the former AL Cy Young winner struggled to a below-average 5.52 ERA/4.76 FIP, though the durable 30-year-old did pile up at least 170 innings (174 1/3) for the 10th time in his career.
- Righty Tanner Roark came off the market Wednesday when he reached a two-year, $24MM agreement with Toronto, but a couple NL Central teams were also in the race for him. The Reds, with whom Roark spent the first half of 2019, and the Brewers pursued him, per reports from Jon Heyman of MLB Network and Tom Haudricourt of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. So far this offseason, Cincinnati hasn’t yet added to an already formidable rotation fronted by Luis Castillo, Sonny Gray, Trevor Bauer and Anthony DeSclafani. On the other hand, the Brewers made a low-risk, possibly high-reward signing Wednesday in grabbing former KBO star Josh Lindblom.
- Speaking of Lindblom, the Blue Jays put a “significant” offer on the table for him before he headed to Milwaukee, per Ben Nicholson-Smith of Sportsnet. The details of that proposal aren’t known. Lindblom would up agreeing to a three-year deal worth $9.125MM.
- The Marlins are drawing some interest in righty Jose Urena, Craig Mish of MLB Network reports on Twitter. The Blue Jays are said to be one of the clubs to have called on the hard-throwing 28-year-old, who’s under arbitration control for two more seasons. Fellow Marlins starters Sandy Alcantara, Caleb Smith and Pablo Lopez have also gotten clubs’ attention, as upward of half the league’s teams have inquired about them, Joe Frisaro of MLB.com tweets. However, Frisaro writes that it’s “extremely unlikely” the Marlins will trade anyone from that trio.
Great acquisition by the Yanks! Hopefully it all works out.
Let’s see how Yankee fans are liking this deal after he doesn’t opt out and they are on the hook for $34MM for a declining mid-30s starter.
On the hook for $34mm after 2024.? Don’t you mean $144mm? (36*4 years left)
Interesting question: if the Yankees win 1 (or possibly more) ring(s) in the front half of the Cole deal while he is a front line starter and then trails off to an average at best for the second half of the deal (think Miggy Cabrera-type career minus the ring) and is clearly not worth the $34 mil is that deal still a good deal when everything is said and done?
^^^Whoops it’s $36 mil per yr my bad
Absolutely that deal is worth it if they win one World Series. Just gets better and better if they win more than one. Even if they make the playoffs every year he is there and he pitches well in the playoffs it’s still a win for them.
The Yanks ring-getting days are over. They played over their talent level last year. The team is mediocre at best
Sour shorts lol
Cole 2020: 18-11 3.36. Cole 2021: 12-12 4.27. Cole 2022 “Yankees open to offers for Cole.
I would love to have Ricky back in Detroit. But, these free agent prices are off the charts.
Yankees dont defer they just stop paying players later on
You realize taxes in NY are just as high as Ca.
Just ones that don’t play 5 of 7 years.
yup
What is the point of deferring? You’re still on he hook for x a mount of years when the player is not on he team. And it still counts agains the lux tax. Nats will be paying Scherzer $15m a year for 7 years after his contract is up.
The nationals haven’t been paid their fair share of tv revenue due from MASN because angelos/orioles appear to be cheats.
For the angels there’s a number of bad contracts still on the books where although they could afford the one 36m player, then the rest of their spending would be negatively impacted.
Gotta be DiPoto with the 3 year offer for pitching right?
That Cole contract is going to bite the Yankees and MLB hard. Stupid.
I think we all realize this contract will be bad at some point but if I were a Yankees fan, I would be ecstatic right now and for at least the next 5 years.
They will be lucky to get 5 years from him before his elbow implodes.
That’s exactly what contracts are geared towards. The overpay at the back end, offsets the underpay at the front.
If you expect production ALL the way through the life of the contract, then earlier years will cost a ton more than they do today.
It’s economics – something most baseball fans can’t seem to get a handle on.
yup and he gotta watch his weight
Except the deal was reported to be 36m each year, not backloaded or front-loaded.
No that’s AAV.
Time will tell. Funny how because of it and Strasberg’s deal, Price is getting attention. One week ago, his contract seemed untouchable.
Unless these crazy contracts are a way to keep the labor peace going…
That would amount to collusion. Just a byproduct of some teams resetting their tax base last year with others having new projected money streams. Also, while low payroll clubs have recently made the playoffs, big money teams have won since 2016. Houston is now a big money spender. Imagine that.
I don’t think you realize the penalties teams have for going over some of the tax thresholds.
The Red Sox current situation is putting them on the path for a $33m luxury tax in each of 2021, 2022, and 2023 if they don’t change direction post haste. Other franchises are about to enter a ceiling as well.
It’s easy to sit at a keyboard and type, look at total revenue, and call billionaires cheap. But they made the investments. They have to work it 24/7/365 along with high-priced lawyers and financial experts. Not counting the money to wire up their parks electronically and pay high salaries to professionals that have to keep that equipment up and working every day (construction people know that the ground shifts; when you have over a dozen electrical devices capturing each pitch / batted ball, sending the images through a central area, and working on complex algorithms to clearly document what happened, any microscopic movement by the earth skews the published results.)
There’s a lot going on that can’t get published in places where what a player said about another player or his manger is the big story, or someone looks at a spreadsheet of 2 dozen calculated stats, picks out 3 that make their point – and publish it with a “so there!” attitude.
I guess you don’t understand the hidden money in baseball that doesn’t show up on the books. Like undervalued network deals because of their own ship interest in them. Like the continued cost for content that will continue to pour $$$ money into years’ cash flow,. Like the belief of most that the next CBA will have changes benefitting large market clubs. The overhead is already met by revenue streams before the ump says play ball in late March. I could go on and on. The Red Sox seem to be betting against the next CBA changes but mist everyone else isn’t. I too was waiting for other teams to reach the threshold but by 2021 there will likely be so many that either the terms get changed or free agency falls worse than the last two years.
Doesn’t really matter if there are various assets or not we don’t all know of and not commonly known. Facts are nobody really likes giving out money for no reason unless they absolutely have to. John henry is one who has gone on record saying this and been fined before for doing it, believe it was Luria as his target a cpl times, but any non spending small market team getting his hard earned cash would do as an example and one cannot blame him for wanting to cut down any payments to other owners.. who themselves are not “poor” by any means, especially when each of those teams are already getting freebie draft picks and other perks his team and other so called well off teams are not.
I’m pretty much in favor of some way to get the salaries down this year if possible, but all the fans so desperate to hang onto betts (and pay him beyond 2020) had just better wonder about the exploded value now of top 3b value with Boston’s 22yo Devers. this guy put up better numbers than arenado and rendon last year.. he’s 5y younger than Betts w/4y control left.. Maybe worry about his extension. betts is gonna cost 35m+ now.
John, first I’m in the minority but I want to see Devers do it again to realize he wasn’t just a byproduct of the 2019 ball. If he would sign an Atlanta type deal, fine. Otherwise, let’s see what happens in 2020. The new CBA has to be factored in and if the team waits until free agency to pay him market rate, they can plan now. Even if Betts is signed, their only obligations as of now for big money long term would be him., Sales and Bogaerts.
definitely
Rendon just got $35mm a year. Seems like just as much an overpay as Cole.
Except, I think a true ace is much more difficult to acquire, as there will not be one on the market until Walker Buehler, and this fit a very specific Yankees need (their missing piece), so it’s essentially more of an overpay.
Porcello was probably offered 3/30 by the Rangers… they like doing that haha! I did think the Giants would target him and he would be a fit for Oracle park
My guess is he’d prefer to stay in Boston for one more year if they trade Price as is now rumored. In today’s stat adjusted world, GMs look at computers as much as or more than through their eyes when projecting forward so which park he pitches in means less on a one year make do contract. For all his warts, let’s not forget he won the CYA in 16 and was so important to the Red Sox playoff success in 18.
Porcello should be thanking his lucky stars to have a multi year offer. I can’t imagine him turning it down.
Probably a low AAV. If he can get $10m – $12m for one year or say $22.5m over three, he’s betting on himself to get more than $5m – $6m per in 2021.
the Cali teams didnt stand a chance. they would’ve had to put up much higher numbers to offset taxes.
Cals is 13.3 and new york is 8.82 in 2018 so yeah a huge difference
Next CBA should include a cost of living index when computing a team’s tax threshold. Smaller market clubs won’t be happy but agents should insist on it to create additional budget space for the larger market clubs.
That’s fair as long as they also take into account Florida, Texas, etc not having income taxes.
That’s exactly my point. Sounds ludicrous to say but a $100m contract in Texas or Florida is financially worth mo than a $125m contract in California or New York.
I’m not an accountant so the numbers may not be exactly right, but everyone gets the idea.
I bet the Porcello 3 year offer is from the Rangers
Yes! The reds are making a run at the greatest “almost signed them” team of all time!
Posting “[insert team here] had interest in [insert free agent name here]” is pointless..
Except it brings out a lot of trolls (of teams which generally haven’t made any deals either) making stupid comments about how your team is too cheap, then turn around and comment how the team that did sign them grossly overpaid.
They still have a ways to go before catching the Brewers and White Sox in that category. Cincy will be tough next year.
Well the reds are mediocre at best. City, payroll, etc.
Will they actually sign a starter or reliever? Seems the field is dwindling and what soon will be left over is comparable to what they have. If they are looking for a steal of a deal, I would think they are few and far between if at all.
Taijuan walker is the sleeper this year.
Yankees are still trash lol
Rotation:
Cole 2.5 era (with a cheating ball club)
Paxton 3.8 era (cant stay healthy)
German 4.02 era (terrible second half)
Severino (injured all last year)
Happ 4.27 era (mediocre outside 2/3 years)
Tanaka 4.45 era (rag arm at this point not good)
So hearing biased media and yankees homers like thetruth talk out their *** how exactly is this team built for a deep run? Sure they hit a lot of homers they also strike out a ton. Their rotation with cole is still bad and outside of ottavino and chapman their bullpen stinks. All this while having the highest payroll in baseball.
So because Severino was injured he sucks? A healthy Severino is close to being as good as a healthy Cole as evidenced by his prior results. With their offense the Yankees dont need 5 guys with ERAs under 3 and many teams do not have that luxury. Also, to say the Yankee bullpen stinks shows me you didn’t watch any of their games.
Dodgers fan lol
Don’t be a hater bro. All you’re doing is looking at the negatives from every perspective. You can do that with any team.
Plus, have you watched Tanaka in the postseason? His regular season stats are not impressive but he goes into another gear in October. Sevy is also very good and still improving, although he’s very young. By all accounts, if Yankees had Cole, they would’ve been the favorites, hands-down.
Think of them as the Dodgers pitching staff, only good and in their prime. And I’m not exactly sure how the ballclub cheating while hitting helps his ERA or your position.
Unlike the weak-hitting NL, in the American League the league average ERA was 4.76
Compare that to the yankees ERA and, as much as I hate base era as a stat rather than era+, at least you can see they were ALL varying degrees of above average.
Still nothing anyone has posted has shown that they are better than other teams in al….astros are still better overall team without cole and its not close. Just find it funny when yankees idiots post they rag on teams like angels when angels rotation looks the exact same.
If you think the Angels rotation looks the same right now you may need to be on some sort of medication
The Yankees and another Jacoby Ellsbury type contract
If Porcello has a three-year offer, unless it’s from the Marlins or Orioles, he needs to pounce on it.
I notice Willie Mays is nowhere around to comment on porcello’s offers.
Some days ago he mentioned he’d admit he was wrong if rick generated interest like this.
It’s even more telling that clubs want to lock in multiple years by buying low, and it’s the player who wants the shorter deal…
I have a couple of wonderments.
While teams like the Yankees and Bostons continue to get the best players because they have the most money to spend I have often wondered what baseball would look like if there was a hard salary cap. With state taxes being higher in big cities might then the Yankees/Boston etc teams be less attractive to the best players?
Also are there any Yankee fans that that feel their lofty standings most every year after year are tainted due to the fact they mostly can go out and buy whatever they want?
I like grapes