He has to prove 2 more full years of health/performance. It wasn’t that long ago that people thought he was “done” and had no business batting 3rd (and by that I mean June 2022). Hell, he broke his finger in game 6. By leverage I mean they have exclusive negotiating rights. I don’t expect him to take any discounts. Maybe the Astros don’t want to lock post 30 year olds into longer deals. Maybe Crane will be happy for everybody to play it out and they do a soft re-set starting in 2025. And maybe the players know they’ll get more money in 2 years even if they are oft-injured and on the decline. If Bregman wants to be here for the rest of his career, I expect they’ll work something out (but yes, it will be at market rate). Its almost the exact scenario the Astros had with Biggio back in 1995.
He’s a 3B without great range at 30 years old with some history of injuries and without great power. He will make good money but I’d project something like 8/200 if he gets all the way to FA. I’d offer him 5/150 right now as an extension and give him a handshake deal that if he’s still playable at 35 we will give him top of that market to stay in Houston if he still wants to be here and be a lifetime Astro. Altuve I’d offer 2/50 with the same handshake deal on paying him whatever the top of his market is 4 years from now if he signed that extension.
Contact and plate discipline tend to age well. Automated strike zone is coming in 2024. All Bregman needs is some health and some of those Yankee baseballs, and he's going to have a couple of monster seasons. If he gets to FA, he's going to get paid.
I saw an article that said the Padres we're going to offer Judge even more than he signed for but over way more years. It noted that MLB was going to nullify that contract if it would have been submitted because they said it would have been circumventing the cap rules. When I saw Carlos's contract I was curious if they were going to take the same approach. But I guess MLB only cares that the Yankees get what they want.
The Giants signing Correa to this deal shows that they are also cognizant of the luxury tax and wish to avoid it/minimize their own penalties, and they are a big boy franchise. I think part of what separates the strategy of Crane's from the Giants/Dodgers/Padres/Mets/Yankees et al is a tolerance for paying aging veterans at a point in time when the team may not be competitive. Crane will not tolerate paying an aging player $20M+ during a period when the Astros are not competitive.
I agree with this in general BUT With all the long term deals the big money teams are signing right now, at some point they are going to be maxed out. Who knows what the situation will be by 2026. I mean how many of these long term mega deals can any one team (other than the mets) afford? Even the dodgers are doing what they can to get under the tax this year to reset it. I haven't looked at the free agent lists for after next year, 24 or 25, but you have to figure there will be more mega deals in those years also. And it will be in the 2030's before the ones signed this year start to come off of the books
Judge's Padre rumored offer would have taken Judge to 44 years old. I think it would have been easy for MLB to justify that the contract is circumventing the rules.
Yeah there were a number of people involved.... and there are still questions about how he ended up with the Dodgers and then the Astros. Everyone involved denies it, but the Astros and Dodgers likely violated the rules.
I all but wrote Tucker off as leaving as a FA as soon as he can based on what I have read over the last several months. After seeing these FA contracts this off season I am sure of it. He's the next Springer. I just hope he gets a WS MVP before he goes.
I'm of the opinion the market is going to start forcing Crane to hand out lengthier contracts if he wants to sign younger free agents (not older guys like Abreu, while still good, are on the back half of their career).
No, but this situation is a little different. There were discussions a week ago of the Giants and Padres offering deals for him into his early 40's and now Correa just got a 13 year deal. He will only be 41 when the deal is done, so it may just result in the league internally reminding teams to not exploit the CBA. I am thinking they will approve it, but at some point they will not....
The problem is that pre arb players are cheap. Once a player signs an extension he is no longer cheap regardless of how much service time he has. For example. Julio Rodriguez is going into year 2. Without an extension, he would have a salary of less than $1M and count less than $1M toward CBT. Since he signed an extension, he counts $17.442M. No team can do that with more than 1 or 2 players and still keep a "reasonable" payroll. Having 10-15+ players on minimal salaries is what allows teams to pay superstars even larger deals. And I do expect the 20 or so "cheap" owners who do not want to spend $150+M per year to complain and try to pressure the 5 or so big spending owners into slowing down. A salary cap ( which players have always opposed) will be #1 item owners push for on next CBA.
It won’t happen. Especially since you’ve given the perfect example of how the tax still regulates spending for a lot of teams, while salaries for superstars continue to go up. What really should happen is imposed salary floors that go up every year as revenue goes up. There are a lot of teams that could/should be spending more.
Of course I agree with this. But I don't see an agreement on either a floor or a cap unless there is both. Players would require a floor in order to agree to a cap Owners would require a cap to agree to a floor.
I agree but to me the rule sound ambiguous. Besides what if player and team say we plan on playing player X until he is 44 because they believe in modern medicine being able to extend playing careers? You can't say its impossible. They just need a true hard cap. Look at the Mets, the owner has F YOU money. He is trying to buy his way there. If they are not going to hard cap they can look for the bottom teams sit around and not even try to be good. Collect that tax revenue. Owners like winning but they LOVE making money.
I'm waiting to see what MLB would do if the Mets decided to have a 1 billion payroll. I'd assume they'd start nixing deals before it reached that point. It'd be an interesting trainwreck to watch, that's for sure.
Yes but most owners want a cap and players have refused to agree to it. Not a single owner wants a floor but most players do. If the goal is to get a floor and require the cheaper owners to spend, they will force a cap as the trade off to agree.
