The month of January isn’t typically a big month for free agent signings, but this year, it might almost have to be. An uncharacteristic number of big-name free agents are still available, including Justin Upton, Chris Davis, Yoenis Cespedes, Alex Gordon, Ian Desmond, Wei-Yin Chen, Dexter Fowler, Ian Kennedy, Yovani Gallardo and Howie Kendrick, among others, remain available. By this point in the year, key free agents have usually already signed, but this winter, many teams will be doing their offseason shopping well after Christmas.
Too see the difference between this year and previous winters, here’s a look at key January transactions from the last five seasons, via MLBTR’s Transaction Tracker. As we’ll see, January frequently contains a bit of drama, and top free agents do sometimes wait to sign. None of the last five offseasons have seen the kind of free agent movement that seems likely in the coming weeks, however.
- 2015: The only significant free agent move in January was indeed a big one: the Nationals’ agreement with Max Scherzer to a seven-year, $210MM deal on the 19th. Beyond that, the largest deal was the Astros’ $8MM pact with Colby Rasmus. James Shields ($75MM) and Francisco Rodriguez ($13MM) were the only key free agents who signed in February.
- 2014: This was the recent offseason with the most post-New Year’s activity. The Yankees signed Masahiro Tanaka to a $155MM contract in late January, and the Brewers got Matt Garza on a four-year, $50MM deal at around the same time. In addition, James Loney agreed to a three-year, $21MM pact with the Rays, who also signed Grant Balfour for two years and $12MM. A number of key free agent signings (Ubaldo Jimenez, Bronson Arroyo, A.J. Burnett, Fernando Rodney, Nelson Cruz) were delayed until February, while Ervin Santana (whose market, like that of Cruz, was depressed by the qualifying offer) did not sign until March. Two other qualifying offer free agents, Stephen Drew and Kendrys Morales, did not sign until after the season had begun.
- 2013: Nick Swisher and Edwin Jackson both signed right after New Year’s, each getting four-year deals in excess of $50MM. Later that month, Rafael Soriano and Adam LaRoche each got two-year deals in the $20MM-$30MM range. Two free agents with qualifying offers attached, Michael Bourn and Kyle Lohse, signed later.
- 2012: The Tigers signed Prince Fielder to a huge nine-year, $214MM contract in late January. The other key free agent deals that month were those of Coco Crisp and Hiroki Kuroda, both of them comparatively minimal in value. In early February, Jackson agreed to a one-year, $11MM deal with the Nationals.
- 2011: Soon after the new year, Adrian Beltre agreed to a five-year, $80MM deal with Texas. Later in the month, Soriano got three years and $35MM from the Yankees. The only significant February signing was Vladimir Guerrero’s one-year, $8MM deal with the Orioles.
An obvious common denominator with many of these signings was that a number of key players were represented by Scott Boras, including Scherzer, Fielder, Beltre, Bourn, Jackson, Lohse, Soriano, Rodriguez, Drew and Morales. As is widely known, Boras operates on his own timeline, and his clients’ frequent late signings reflect that. For this year, that’s worth keeping in mind for Davis, Chen and Kennedy.
The other obvious common denominator is the qualifying offer, which had obvious effects on free agents like Bourn, Lohse, Santana, Cruz, Drew and Morales. The qualifying offer could end up having a significant effect on the markets of a few current free agents, like Kennedy.
Still, those two factors do not explain the logjam of free agents currently on the market. Most of them (Upton, Cespedes, Gordon, Desmond and so on) are not Boras clients. And many free agents who might have been most affected by the qualifying offer (Marco Estrada, Rasmus, Matt Wieters, Brett Anderson) either already signed or accepted their QOs.
In any case, this year’s free agent market figures to be considerably busier in January (or even later) than it typically is. In a recent column, FOX Sports’ Ken Rosenthal explored reasons why the market has been so slow. Some usual big spenders, like the Yankees and Angels, have been relatively quiet on the free agent market. In addition, the trade market has perhaps been a factor — recent deals involving Craig Kimbrel, Aroldis Chapman, Todd Frazier, Andrelton Simmons, Shelby Miller and Ken Giles, for example, have shown that the trade market has had plenty of good talent available. As MLBTR’s Jeff Todd implied last month, too, the signing of one of the many numerous bats available via free agency could lead to a run on the rest. In the meantime, though, a number of stars still need homes, so expect plenty of activity in the coming month.
Wow, one could make a heckuva team out of the remaining FAs – wonder if a team out there would exploit that and grab 4-5 of them?
What team has the need and the money to make that happen?
They all “have the need”….but none “have the money”…..LOL
Except the Yankees – but the Yankees don’t necessarily want to spend that money, AND an equal amount on the luxury tax.
WOW! I would say most January deals have turned out to be busts!!! Hold on to your water until March.
I know huge spending sprees don’t have a great track record of success but I still dream of a scenario where the Orioles go out and sign a bunch of players. It would probably result in a payroll for 2016 of 200 million( not crazy for some teams but certainly out of the Orioles comfort zone) but the results look promising…
Tillman
Jimenez
Gausman
Gonzalez
Gallardo
Kim LF
Schoop 2b
Machado 3b
Jones CF
Davis 1b
Upton RF
Trumbo DH
Wieters C
Hardy SS
You must not follow the Orioles very closely to even be fantasizing about such things.
You must have missed that bit in his last sentence “..certainly out of the Orioles comfort zone..” so I don’t find it unbelievable that he follows the Orioles
Aside from the dollars to sign: Upton, Davis and Gallardo I can’t see the Orioles give up their 14th and 53rd overall picks in the draft to sign Upton and Gallardo.
I agree but they themselves have indicated Gallardo is a target depsite the comp pick being attached so the assumption is once they sign one player with pick attached a 2 nd one is not a stretch especially when they are sitting on an estimated 5 picks.
It’s not a compensation pick that’s attached. If the O’s sign either Gallardo OR Upton they will lose their 14th overall pick in the draft. They will only get a compensation pick, that’s after all the first round regular pick if some team signs Davis. So far the market for Davis has been pretty quiet. Even if they get that pick for Davis at some point there is a pretty big difference between the 14th pick they would be giving up and potentially a mid 30’s compensation pick for Davis.
And it still wouldn’t make the playoffs. That team is wirse than Boston and probably worse than Toronto and NY too.
Toronto is still the best team in the AL East as of today. The Red Sox and Yankees aren’t separated by that much in spite of all the money the Sox have spent this winter.
I think all three of the Yankees, Red Sox, and Blue Jays are quite close. The Blue Jays need another good reliever or two before I’d consider them the favourite. I also don’t think Estrada repeats his year, and same with Happ.
I still think I’d give the advantage to the Jays in the division as of today. All 3 teams: Jays, Sox and Yankees have their warts.
I really like the yanks for next year, I don’t know what it is but I had the same feeling about the royals before 2014.
No way. Each team has plenty of flaws. Boston is relying on moving ham hands Ramirez to first with plenty of rotation issues outside of Price, the Yankees have a good amount of health question marks, and Toronto lost Price and is relying on a questionable rotation. I think this Orioles team will compete for the division.
@ GoRav114, not as presently constructed. Last years Orioles team wasn’t very good and so far this team is looking much worse.
Hence the “certainly out of their comfort zone”
I would be happy with Upton and Alvarez
It’s beginning to look more and more like Ian Kennedy and Yovani Gallardo made the wrong decision by turning down their teams qualifying offer.
Seemed obvious from the start, especially in Kennedy’s case. How often have teams given up draft picks to overpay #4-#5 starters? I think there’s been enough recent history of these long-term, $10-13m AAV contracts for mediocre pitchers being disastrous (EJax, Garza, Nolasco) to bad (Ubaldo) to actually ok but still not well regarded (Lohse) that teams are going to cut back on giving them out0. Without checking, I think so far only Happ has gotten one this year, and he didn’t have a QO attached and was one of the best pitchers in baseball at the end of the year and is a lefty. Estrada was smart enough to see what his market would be like and took a 2-year deal to avoid free agency.
I see Kennedy getting like 2/21-23 and Gallardo getting 3/33-4/40. Though I don’t see that many teams that would be willing to give up picks to sign those guys, even to favorable deals. Maybe Miami (protected pick, need pitchers, capable of going on a random spending spree) White Sox (for all the talk of their needing offense their rotation is a joke after 3, protected pick, pretty liberal with mid-money, medium-term deals) Phillies or Braves (could view one of those guys on a favorable contract as having more value than the 40th pick or whatever) Rockies (need pitchers, low payroll [especially if Reyes gets suspended and/or Cargo gets traded]).
I think that we are more likely to see a team with either a protected pick or a team which has already sacrificed their first rounder sign Gallardo or Kennedy.
I think you are right.
I think Desmond is another guy who should have accepted his QO. Unless he is injured, he sure could benefit from spending another year rebuilding his value, while getting paid 16 million.
Nope. They’ll both get deals WAY over the $15.8m QO. I’d guess in the 3/$36m range for both of them.
It’s the position players that are getting the short end. Watch out, Dexter Fowler, especially if Denard Span is healthy enough to take one of the available CF slots.
I think that, because of his age, Justin Upton is a guy who could accept a 2 or 3 year deal, then return to the free agent market at 31 (or younger) and still sign a seven year deal…….. giving him the potential for a total of 10 more years under contract
If it’s a choice for Upton between a 2 year or 3 year deal and becoming a FA after the 2017 season or the 2018 season. He should opt for becoming a FA after the 2017 season. As of now the 2018 FA class is very very strong: Harper, Machado, Donaldson, McCutchen, Pollack and Gordon most as strong if not stronger and some younger.than Upton will be in 2018.
I agree that 2017 would be a much better winter to be looking for work than 2018….. because of the exact reasons that you offer
The Nationals are going to be in a world of hurt if they can’t sign Bryce Harper to an extension before the end of 2018. Jason Werth is gone after 2017…… and there’s really no one waiting in the wings to take his place. I happen to think that the Nationals should go after Justin Upton right now in sign him to an eight-year deal. Then they should trade Harper in July 2017. I do not believe that the Nationals will be willing to pay 400 million for the Harper extension. … so they might as well get as much as they can for him before that day arrives.
Scott Boras is Harper’s agent.If the Nationals don’t sign Harper to an extension this year some time I definitely think Boras takes Harper to free agency after that. Trading him during the 2017 season could be their only and best option.
I think Rizzo (the Lerners) have to give Bryce the cash and if it means shedding salary or sacrificing future expenditures so be it. Bryce is the best player in the world right now and it’s not all that close, he could be the face of the franchise for 20 more years. You really don’t get that type of player every day and as a Nats fan I don’t want him to go. Boras a year or two ago straight up said he would consider an extension (although it would have to start at 12 years) so why not just do it?
He has only 1 healthy year of his career…signing him to a long term $400m deal is a HUGE risk…
IF he backups up his 2015 (production and health(aka games played) then that would help a little
Boras won’t let Bryce sign an extention unless he receives record AAV and Total salary marks that won’t be broken for a few years to come…
@ LH, actually it is very close. Josh Donaldson and Mike Trout are in my opinion just as good. Trout could be even better consider considering he has a more successful track record even at just 24 years old. Don’t get me wrong I don’t think you can go wrong with any of the 3 but lets see how Bryce does over a couple of 2 or 3 years before we make him the “best player in the world”.
I’m shocked the jays are not in on anything 5hey have a team that can win it all if they get another top arm chen would be nice
Of course Boras would consider taking an (overpay) extension. He says that about all his clients. Very few extensions get signed however. Bryce may be the best player, but I’d rather my team spread $400MM over several (deserving) players than just one, no matter how good. Trout is the current king of the diamond, but didn’t make the playoffs and his team is too close to the cap to fill the gaps on the roster. Not the situation I want my team in. Oh wait, my team is Detroit. Guess it’s already in that situation.