With Spring Training now a matter of days away, here are three things we’ll be keeping an eye on around the baseball world throughout the day today:
1. Are more extensions on the way?
The Padres once again surprised the baseball world yesterday, this time by extending Yu Darvish on a deal that guarantees the right-hander $90MM in new money over five additional years. There’s plenty of reason to believe more extensions could be on the way, both around baseball and, perhaps, even in San Diego. Two weeks after becoming GM of the Astros, Dana Brown told reporters that he has interest in extending a variety of players from Houston’s 2022 World Series core; not just Kyle Tucker, as previously reported, but also Cristian Javier, Alex Bregman, and Jose Altuve. Broadly speaking, Brown made clear he hopes to follow a similar trajectory to his now-former Braves club, aggressively pursuing long-term deals with key young players. As for the Padres, they might not be done after extending Darvish, with the club expected to pursue an extension with superstar third baseman Manny Machado ahead of Opening Day. Machado has an opt-out clause in his contract following the 2023 season. Spring Training — and the days leading up to it — has long been a time where clubs talk about extensions with their players, so expect plenty of chatter about teams looking to hammer out some long-term contracts.
2. Padres, Blue Jays set to hold press conferences today
A pair of press conferences are expected to take place today, with Blue Jays GM Ross Atkins set to speak to the media at noon CT regarding the clubs three-year deal with star shortstop Bo Bichette to buy out the 24-year-old’s remaining arbitration years. Elsewhere in baseball, Padres president of baseball operations AJ Preller will also be speaking to the media today, in his case regarding yesterday’s extension with Darvish. With Spring Training just around the corner, both top decision-makers are likely to get into a variety of other topics regarding the futures of their respective clubs, as well.
3. Marlins FanFest this weekend
This offseason has been one with a considerable amount of change for the Miami Marlins, as the club has swapped out long-time players like Pablo Lopez, Miguel Rojas, and Brian Anderson while picking up new faces such as Luis Arraez, Johnny Cueto, and Jean Segura. This new-look Marlins team is set to welcome fans back to the ballpark tomorrow for Marlins FanFest, a free event that will run from 1pm to 6pm local time. A variety of Marlins players are expected to be in attendance, with player interviews highlighting the festivities.
I wondered – if we perhaps reversed the letters in the typical first post, the goofball that routinely does this would realize the error of his ways and give it up.
Then it occurred to me…maybe he is already doing that.
Brown keeps referring to his success in Atlanta extending young players, although that really is AA. That doesn’t mean he wasn’t heavily involved, or that he won’t have similar success with the Astros, but what’s clearly different is he’s saying the names of the players up front before they sign an extension. AA operates in more stealth mode. The extensions simply appear. Brown is putting his reputation on the line early if he doesn’t sign the players. Last, is signing Altuve to an extension a necessity at this point. Any new extension would begin in his age-35 season. That one could be worth waiting on to see where he’s at performance wise.
I’m not sure Brown’s referring to “his” success more than he’s referring to the FO group’s collective success in this area.
I can understand Bregman but Altuve? It’s not like he’s under a current very team-friendly deal. I’d much rather have all teams start to announce extensions/contracts after they’re signed with physicals completed. I can’t imagine it’s much fun for players answering questions before the contract ink is dried.
Meh. Astros dealt with James Click for 3 years. He wouldn’t speak about anything. Dana Brown is refreshing. Truthfulness goes a long ways. The fans deserve it. He’s not putting his reputation on the line whatsoever. It takes two to tango. He’s going to extend the Astros window another decade and make the rest of you haters cry in October again and again
I heard MLB is doing away with metal garbage cans in the dugout and going with all plastic cans. Your window just slammed shut.
Allowing the Astros to live rent-free in your head ain’t the way to be, Mr. Retiree.
Hardly. It’s a joke. Didn’t seem there was much to it.
Your joke is trite.
retired/advisory role: To bad we can’t RETIRE you & your ilk. The (trash can/surveillance) scandal was in 2017. There’s ONLY 5 members from THAT team that were still w Houston’s 2022 World Series team That’s even including Verlander who is no longer a them.
Let me clarify a couple of things before I get ravaged by insults. (1) I’m NOT an Astros fan. (2) No, I don’t condone cheating. (3) In actuality, I live 45 minutes away fr Cleveland. I’m originally fr WV so my “hometown” team was the Pirates. (4) I also watched a lot of Braves games on TBS, so they are my “adopted” team.
Retired: I apologize for the rant. I noticed after my post that you said that your comment was meant as a joke. I’m just frustrated with all of the complaining about something that happened six going on seven years ago like it’s relevant today.
You’re right time to let the jokes go.
So is your face.
Extensions/long contracts seem to be very much preferred way of doing business at the moment.
Is there a loophole in the CBT that ownerships are exploiting?
Not a loophole. Teams are simply adapting to the rules, trying to figure out how to best construct rosters while adhering to the CBA guidelines. Locking up younger players at lower cost is one way, but they could bet wrong. We’ve seen that happen previously on extensions to young pre-arb players, and we’ll no doubt see it more as more of these deals are given out. It also takes two sides for a deal.
I do suspect there’s a growing Cohen-factor at play here. Teams will be even more likely to try and sign their younger players knowing he will simply outbid them when he wants.
Terrible take. It’s smart business decision and a product of the current CBT. It has nothing to do with your fear of Cohen laying his elephantdick on the negotiating table is a YOU problem.
To say that Cohen hasn’t disrupted the market is unwitting.
@You…I have no fear of Cohen. I love what he’s doing. Terrible take on your part.
Doesn’t sound like it.
@You, in what way doesn’t it “sound” like it? You said for some reason mine was a “terrible take” yet you agreed entirely with my first paragraph. I guess you’re disagreeing that teams will take Cohen’s money into account when trying to sign their own players. We can disagree on that. He’s a factor that will and has changed the market. I do love what he’s doing. MLB is sports entertainment. Sports teams should be trying to win because sports is about competition and it’s better entertainment. I have significant issues that MLB has created an environment where Cohen is viewed as the bad guy, while teams like the A’s are allowed to totally abuse the system at the bottom end and pocket profits earned by other teams while not even trying to win.
I believe teams (especially those in the mid-to-small markets) are recognizing three things here:
1) FOs understand that they can deal with controlled/known costs now versus unknown costs later in FA;
2) teams that are performing really, really well (Astros/Braves specifically, and to a lesser degree Padres & Ms) recognize they have a great team and want to remain competitive, so they lock up many of those known young players more cheaply than trying to replace it with unknown, more expensive players later; and
3) the smaller markets realize the public beating they’re taking for claiming they can’t afford players and perpetually turning over the roster, so they’re trying to balance maintaining a low-cost roster with keeping the more notable players. Obvious exception here is the A’s who just don’t seem to care about fans at all.
All in all there are inherent dangers of operating like this – if the Yankees locked up their core in 2017-2018 it would’ve looked great, except they would have been terrible signings, a la Aaron Hicks.
@Yankee Clipper, we’re seeing more teams approach the luxury tax tiers, which means more teams will need to make smarter investment decisions on their younger players as a way to keep down costs. That seems smart. On the flip side, we’re seeing bad deals like the Turner and Bogaerts deals where shortstops are being signed to deals until they’re 40 simply as a way to keep down the AAV and stay within certain luxury tax tiers. One form is a good one, the other is a bad one. It basically confirms that MLB teams have a lot of money they want to spend, but are artificially constraining themselves to adhere to the arbitrary luxury tax tier they’ve selected. Steinbrenner’s refusal to go into the Cohen-tax level is the clearest sign there’s a back-room deal amongst owners to constrain payroll levels. The MLBPA should be all over this.
Nice! Marlin’s Fanfest. Visiting the official website, I didn’t know there were that many fans of the Marlins. Or are those people all paid actors posing as fans of the team?
Glad to see the Marlins making some changes! It’s a tough division for sure, but it should be a more exciting year to watch them than in recent years. Hoping they can take a big next step for the team and fans!
Arraez and (to a lesser extent) Segura in front of a healthy Jazz, Soler, and Garcia should lead to more runs. And if Sanchez can finally put it together… They’ll need that because there’s not many bats on the horizon for 2023.
Lol that offense is atrocious….
Lol. That comment is atrocious…
The Padres had more fans at their FanFest this week than the Marlins will draw in a month to watch that embarrassment of a franchise.
150k? About 2 weeks of Marlins fans in the stands.
Nah, you’re being overly optimistic. Live in the now, man.
11k average attendance last season. About 2 weeks.
There’s more people attending WNBA games than Marlins games.
Unless they grossly overpay, no way Machado doesn’t test the market.
It’s the padres. What else would they do ??
Machado has said that he wants to be a Padre for life and have a statue next to Tony Gwynn.
The team took Machado on a trip to Colorado to help plan a clubhouse renovation that doesn’t start until 2023. They also said that they consulted Machado before signing Bogaerts.
The team is stacked and the owner has shown he will spend to win.
The Athletic had this great article about the situation there. theathletic.com/4166342/2023/02/08/manny-machado-p…
So what makes you think they will have to grossly overpay to get him to forgo opting out?
Most people in the industry believe he will sign an extension in the coming days. One that lowers his AAV and makes him the first player to ever sign two $300 million contracts. I think so too.
The Marlins average over 20k tv viewers per game so there is a fan base, its just sad they don’t come out and support the team more. With rising costs to go to a game its unfortunately understandable why though
They somehow come up with the funds to support the Dolphins, and those tickets are much more expensive. I think the problem is with the product.
The state of Florida lives/eats/breaths/drinks/sleeps football, collegiate or pro those seats will be full
Same can be said for literally any state. Football reigns supreme in the US. 60+/100 most watch telecasts belong to football.
football is to baseball as Hootie & The Blowfish is to Led Zepplin
Sure not winning doesn’t help buy the Dolphins only play 8 or 9 home games per season. There is a sense of urgency to go to games as opposed to having 81 MLB home games available.
Sadly winning doesn’t always help. Rays and A’s sit in the bottom 5 in attendance even in playoff years.
I hate seeing teams play to empty houses, especially ones that play in nice ballparks
Miami is a fair weather town, dominated by Dolphins and Heat(to a lesser extent) When the Marlins were competitive in their championship runs attendance rose. Never to the attendance numbers to rich historical teams like the Cubs, or Yankees or Red Sox but they did increase.
The Heat have Pat Riley who has created a perennial title contender for the last 20 years.(although it feels like he’s been slipping lately) The Dolphins have an even bigger rich history since the late 60’s early 70’s. Last season reinvigorated the fan base.
Marlins history is essentially 2 magical seasons wrapped around by failure, fire sales, and ownership changes,
Marlins should have a stronger fan but with Huizengas fire sale after 97, then selling the team in ’98( bc he didn’t want to pay for a new stadium) to Henry, who sold the team to MLB (bc he didn’t want to pay for a new stadium) and they subsequently gifted the Marlins to the POS that is Loria, Who, ironically was hilariously gifted a stadium by corrupted Miami politicians. Aside from ’03 that regime filled with failures, fire sales and lies.s. And now we have the Sherman group who promised a lot with Jeter early on but haven’ t produced much. At least we got a postseason birth in ’20 and knocked out the Cubs.
Again, Miami is a fair weather town and die hard Marlins fans are used to used to failure. Whereas, with the Heat and Fins always hope.
I’m hopeful this year they can push to the 80 win mark and build that into years of sustained competitive seasons.
With all due respect, I don’t think any team’s FanFest is worth mentioning on MLBTR unless something newsworthy happened at said FanFest.
It’s a punchline set up for comments. Fanfest. As in singular, meaning 1 fan. That’s nice for them to put on the event for that guy.
He got all the Billy The Marlin photo opps he could handle, as well as a 5% coupon for seats to Senior Night every Thursday. Heck, its senior night every night in Florida.
The Marlins are a “small market” team. One would think that would lead the organization to become elite at scouting and development.
No player in the opening day lineup will have been drafted by or signed as an international free agent and developed by the Marlins
Among the rotation, only Edward Cabrera and Trevor Rogers (who was abysmal in 2022) will have been drafted by or signed as an international free agent and developed by the Marlins
This team has no hope of competing with the Braves, Phillies and Mets and seeing the potential in the youngsters the Nationals have acquired, the Marlins are headed for 60-102, last place, and a stadium that will rival Oakland for most empty seats.
For those that would say they drafted well but traded their talented developed players I would say that their scouting team (outside of who helped chooses Alcantara) is not doing a good job getting talent from other teams by trade either
Miami is not a small market. The Marlins are just a small-time, second division team.
Machado, 5 years remaining at 160 million. He is 29, and that looks underpaid in this market.
I would assume he is heading for a 10/300+ million extension.
Thoughts? The first contract he landed was a major win for Machado and the Padres. But the next contract will be a win for Machado
He actually has 6/180 remaining if you count 2023. He can opt out of the final 5/150 after this year.
I think they’re going to do what they did on the Darvish deal and add a ton of years to the backend to keep the AAV down, but then frontload the contract a bit. So basically they could replace the remaining 6/180 owed with like 12/320, which lowers his AAV from $30M per to $26.6M.
People are going to freak out about them signing him into his 40s but it’s not about that, it’s about keeping him a Padre for the rest of his career and maneuvering with the luxury tax.
“There’s plenty of reason to believe more extensions could be on the way, both around baseball and, perhaps, even in San Diego.”
No. Comma abuse.
“There’s plenty of reason to believe more extensions could be on the way, both around baseball and perhaps even in San Diego.””
Don’t use them when they’re not needed.
Maybe he’s got a speech impediment.