It’s not the money I care about. It’s the penalties that you get every year you are over the luxury tax. Every year you are over, the penalties that you get are reset and compound.
This. If you can get him without giving much in the way of prospects AND the Cards pay a significant chunk of his salary, I’d do it. He makes the team better in the field and at the plate.
This is why the LA and NY teams have a huge advantage in this system. Having the revenue streams to afford ungodly prices for free agents, and World wide brand recognition to attract Asian league stars. They don't rely on developing and hoping prospects become stars because they buy them. The fewer prospects the fewer chances for those who don't have those advantages. And that's also why it's vital, if you are a mud market team to turn stars into more young cheap pkayers/prospects unless you can extend them. And don't kid yourself, Houston is mid market
What penalties? The only penalties for going over the first threshold 2 years in a row that aren’t money-related are for compensation draft picks. It’s not a big impact thing. If Crane is willing to pony up to keep the team competitive while Dana Brown rebuilds the farm then we should be all for it.
It’s still an impact though, it’s not nothing. I believe the compensatory picks become higher picks if you are over the tax threshold for consecutive years. The strategy of keeping the team competitive while rebuilding the farm is a tight rope to walk. Can Dana Brown rebuild it quickly enough? It’s in bad shape right now. We don’t have a lot of room for error.
It kind of is nothing. The penalty goes from 20% to 30%. Adding Arenado (assuming Houston takes on ~$15M/yr of his contract) would put the Astros $5M-$10M over. That 30% vs 20% penalty is a difference of $500k-$1M. Thats nothing. The difference between getting a 2nd rounder vs 4th rounder for Framber compensation when he leaves is way more impactful, but still not a big deal. Rough estimate it’s probably a couple million dollars in value.
There is also a penalty if you sign a player that requires you to lose a pick. I disagree that it’s “kind of nothing” it is actually something. It’s enough for me to not want a player whose position is already covered and who doesn’t even want to be here. I don't think he would make that much of a difference in an already crowded infield. Now if he were a legit impact bat outfielder then he might be worth going over the luxury tax.
I'm not understanding how Arenado would put us over, at all. I've seen between 210-218 million total allocated to the Astros in 2025, leaving 23-31 available under the 241 million cap. An extra $15m wouldn't put us in danger of going over. What am I missing?
The $210-218M doesn’t include player benefits, 40 man salaries, and other associated costs that count toward the $241M CBT threshold. My guess is that Houston is currently $4M-$12M below the threshold. There is a chance they could add Arenado and still be below it. I think this site is the most accurate (but is not certain): https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/houston-astros/tax
Some of these posters would rather see the young guys play rather than giving the team it's best shot at winning a championship this year. Thing is because of injury most of these young guys are going to be playing at some point next year anyways.
While I agree with you about the OF impact bat. The infield isn't crowded and Arenado is still a GG 3B. His bat will probably be avg. Depending on how much money the Cards are willing to eat would determine whether I would do the deal. I also agree with you about this issue of him not wanting to be hear.
“Crowded” is a little bit strong, I will amend that to “full”, only because I am not sold on the Altuve as a left fielder experiment. In my mind he is a second baseman or a DH. That may change if he can prove to be an adequate left fielder.
If Spotrac is the most accurate, it's got us with $20m in space (counting full associated costs). Why do you estimate significantly under that?
I disagree with this post. Tell me who Luhnow picked in the 2nd rd? Scroeder/Kessinger etc... You definitely can rebuild the farm without 2nd/4th rd picks. They just have to find the Chas/Pena/Diaz level players and really mine the Caribean for undervalued prospects. Dana is supposed to be one of the best at finding and the staff developing undervalued prospects.
