10 winners, losers from relatively quiet MLB offseason
With about two weeks until pitchers and catchers report across Arizona and Florida, baseball fans are really just waiting for one decision. Trevor Bauer has kept himself in the spotlight, but the chase for the ace has been remarkably quiet.Will Bauer become the only player in this class to get more than $150 million? Will he change the game and take a short-term deal at an insane average annual salary? Will he turn the Mets into a World Series favorite, or send the Dodgers back into an uncatchable position in the NL West?That's all to be decided, but for the most part, the heavy offseason lifting is done. Marcell Ozuna and some other sluggers are available and seeking clarity on the DH rule, and there are plenty of starters who will have to sign for cheap. But most of the bigger names found homes in January, so let's figure out some winners and losers from a quiet 2020-21 offseason ...
Don't overthink it. They traded for Yu Darvish, Blake Snell and Joe Musgrove and still have a top five farm system. Dan Szymborksi's ZiPS system projects them for 98 wins and gives them a 48.4 percent chance of ending the Dodgers' eight-year run atop the NL West.
Maybe injuries will get them -- the scale of their starting pitching additions do make me wonder a bit more about Dinelson Lamet's elbow -- but right now they'll enter camp as a true World Series contender, with enough big league and prospect depth to cover for anything that goes wrong.
Yes, they brought J.T. Realmuto back, giving the lineup a boost and keeping Bryce Harper happy, but it seems like they were bidding against themselves for the league's best catcher. They re-signed Didi Gregorius and added Archie Bradley to their bullpen, so they've actually been pretty active, and new exec Dave Dombrowski has a history of going for it.
Their problem is they already had to find a way past the Braves, and now the Mets are poised to take the leap, too. The Phillies haven't finished better than third since 2011 and they seem stuck in no-man's land, with a huge payroll, a bad farm system, and an uphill climb in their own division. They either have to get really creative or hope for an expanded postseason.
With most of the biggest names now off the board, Gausman is still tied with Marcus Stroman for the third-highest 2021 salary among free agents. Only Realmuto and George Springer beat the $18.9 million qualifying offer.
The Giants haven't guaranteed anyone else more than $6 million a year since Farhan Zaidi took over and Gausman will triple that after calling their bluff. He's now set to start on opening day, and if he builds on his 2020 numbers he can head back into free agency as a 30-year-old with no qualifying offer attached.
The Giants aren't losers here, because they love Gausman as a pitcher and teammate and wanted him back. But they definitely would have preferred a smaller number on a multi-year deal.
When I started working on this last week, that said "Fans in the middle of the country." But then the Cardinals fleeced the Rockies for Nolan Arenado, completely changing the tenor of their offseason and likely vaulting them past the Cubs in the NL Central.
The Cubs dumped Yu Darvish's contract and watched Kyle Schwarber and Jon Lester walk for one-year deals in Washington D.C., signaling a partial rebuild for a franchise that's ... worth more than $3 billion and in a major market. Okay, sure.
The sad thing is that, until the Arenado trade, Cubs owners could take a step back and still feel good about their chances in the division, because the Reds' previous splurge is over, the Brewers are bargain-binning, and the Pirates will be the worst team in the NL.
The AL Central is just as bad. The division could have been a three-headed monster, and the White Sox splurged on Liam Hendriks early on. But the Twins haven't done much and the Indians pretended they couldn't afford Francisco Lindor. It's been just over four years since the Cubs beat the Indians in a thrilling World Series, and both are now cutting back.
The Mets would have come away from this offseason in better shape even if they hadn't added much, because new owner Steve Cohen is a massive improvement on the Wilpons. But Cohen didn't just show up with big promises. He started making moves right away.
The Mets made the biggest splash of the offseason with a trade for Francisco Lindor, a true superstar who should thrive in New York and seems likely to sign a long-term deal to be the face of the franchise, just as Mookie Betts did after a similar trade last year. The Mets also signed James McCann and Trevor May to fill holes and seem to have few true competitors in the bidding for Bauer.
The Jared Porter story was awful, but to their credit the Mets fired their GM within hours. On the field, they will be co-favorites in the NL East.
As tough as it was to watch Marcus Semien take a one-year deal in Toronto that was smaller than the qualifying offer, the A's have enough talent -- especially in their rotation -- to win the AL West again. The rest of the division has been just as quiet in free agency and the Astros lost George Springer.
The problem is, the Semien thing reminded everyone that this cycle is nearing an end, as it always does. If the A's aren't spending now when their window to contend is wide open, what are they going to look like next offseason after another season played without normal crowds? What are they going to do when Matt Chapman ($6.49 million) and Matt Olson ($5 million) get additional raises in arbitration next winter?
A's fans know the answer by now, having seen this over and over again with young cores. This season looks like the last chance for this group.
The prediction all along was that the best players would still get theirs, with the next tiers getting crushed. That's what's happened. Realmuto got $115 million to return to the Phillies and DJ LeMahieu waited and waited and waited until the Yankees gave him $90 million. Those deals would look strong in any offseason.
Teams have become much smarter about paying closers, but Hendriks still got $54 million guaranteed to take over the ninth for a World Series contender. Springer ended up in a great spot, too, signing a $150 million deal with a Toronto team that's poised to take the next step and seriously battle the Yankees.
Only Bauer remains from that top tier, and while his market has been quiet, there's also been no real indication thus far that he's going to be disappointed.
Hendriks got paid, but across the board it's clear that groupthink has hit front offices when it comes to paying for bullpen help. If you take out Tommy Kahnle, who is recovering from Tommy John, only six free agent relievers got multi-year deals, with Hendriks the only one to get three years.
How much has this changed? Only Hendriks got more guaranteed money than the $18 million the Giants gave Jeremy Affeldt on a three-year deal in 2012, and only three pitchers got more than Javier Lopez's $13 million deal (over three years) the next offseason.
Front offices would much rather fill their bullpens with young relievers with options or veterans on small deals, knowing that relievers are inconsistent year to year. The Giants, for instance, scooped up Matt Wisler for $1.15 million and John Brebbia for $800,000. The executives aren't wrong, but it's a bummer if you're a reliever looking for the type of life-changing money you kept seeing elsewhere as you waited to hit free agency.
The thing that has always stood out about Arenado -- beyond the absurd numbers against the Giants and Hall of Fame glove at third -- is just how damn hard he plays at all times. The Giants have made a lot of visits to Coors Field when the Rockies were down in the standings, and you could see on his face and in his body language how disgusted he was by losing.
When Arenado was asked last year why he killed the Giants so often, he mentioned how when he was coming up they were the preeminent winners, "so good, so elite, you knew that they were always going to be there."
Arenado deserves to play for a team that's going to contend, and as insufferable as the whole Cardinals thing can be at times, there's no doubt they'll give him a yearly chance to get into October. They've finished first or second in the NL Central 10 of the last 12 years.
Bonus winner: The Giants, not just because they no longer face Arenado 19 times, but because the SoCal native never found his way to the Dodgers, who have been quietly after him for a while.
In case you missed it over the weekend, MLB -- A FEW HOURS FROM FEBRUARY -- made an offer to the players that included a 154-game season, expanded postseason and one-month delay for spring training. It was quickly shot down by the players, who felt it gave commissioner Rob Manfred too much control over cancelations and also would cause issues for players who are ready to report and have ramped up their training.
This was all just a reminder that the CBA expires after this upcoming season and the two sides have done nothing but publicly fight for the last 11 months. If they can't even agree on a universal DH for 2021, when just about everyone within the game wants it, how are they going to quickly come to terms on much bigger issues?
The world will hopefully get back to normal this summer, but MLB and the MLBPA are headed for disaster, and there's no real reason to be optimistic right now about what's waiting after the final out of the 2021 World Series.
