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The Best Fits For Willy Adames

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MLBTR has taken a look at the markets for Juan Soto, Corbin Burnes and Alex Bregman in a trio of posts for Trade Rumors Front Office subscribers. We'll continue that with a look at the likely market for one of the top free agent infielders: Willy Adames.

The longtime Brewers shortstop is among the most potent bats in the game at his position. Adames slugged a career-high 32 home runs in 2024, topping his previous highwater mark of 31 round-trippers, set in 2022. Over the past four seasons, he's tied with Corey Seager for the MLB lead in shortstop home runs (112). He's more strikeout-prone than some teams might like, but he's cut his strikeout rate in four consecutive seasons now, fanning in one-quarter of his plate appearances this past year. That's still a fair bit, but it's no longer egregiously north of league average, which sat at 22.6% in 2024.

The Brewers bought low on Adames early in the 2021 season when he was struggling with the Rays, sending a pair of generally unproven relievers to Tampa Bay: J.P. Feyereisen and Drew Rasmussen. It worked out for both parties in the end. Adames became an All-Star shortstop, and both pitchers became key parts of Tampa Bay's staff -- Rasmussen in particular. He's rattled off four straight seasons with a sub-3.00 ERA, much of it out of the rotation.

Adames hit .244/.323/.457 in parts of four seasons in Milwaukee. That overall line is dragged down by a pedestrian 2023 season, but Adames has been at least 9% better than average at the plate in four of the past five years, by measure of wRC+ (and at least 19% better in three of the past five). He's typically graded out as a plus defender, though his defensive metrics took an unexpected dip last year -- due largely to an uncharacteristically error-prone stretch in July where he made eight miscues in just three weeks.

Teams will likely still view Adames as a player with strong defensive tools, and he's willing to move to another position -- third base or second base -- if the right opportunity presents itself. Adames made the no-brainer decision to reject a qualifying offer from Milwaukee. He's surely kept a watchful eye as fellow shortstops Trevor Story ($140MM), Javier Baez ($140MM) and Dansby Swanson ($177MM) all cashed in on major free-agent deals heading into their own age-29 seasons. Adames, whose gregarious personality and reputation as a clubhouse leader only further enhance his appeal to clubs, arguably has as much or even more earning power than any of that bunch.

Let's take a look at which teams could be involved.

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MLBTR’s Anthony Franco held a live chat for Front Office subscribers this afternoon.

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MLB Mailbag: Dodgers, Padres, Vlad Jr., Casas, Nats, Cubs, Giants

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Today's epic pre-Winter Meetings mailbag gets into the Dodgers' deferrals, the golden AB idea, traded Padres prospects, the Blue Jays' failure to extend Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Triston Casas and Boston's paths forward, the Cubs' plans, the Giants and draft pick forfeiture, and much more.

Elden asks:

I recently read that the Dodgers now have over $1 billion in deferred salaries on the books even if the sign nobody else. I admit that they have some pretty deep pockets and can weather almost any financial storm but how is this not a manipulation of the CBT rules? Granted that prices go up all them time but their deferred money alone is 4X the first tax threshold How is this good for baseball?

Not to pick on Elden, but fans don't have a seat at the collective bargaining table between owners and players, so "good for baseball" is largely irrelevant.  At that table, there is "good for owners," and "good for players."

The players like having the option of deferring money.  In February, union leader Tony Clark told Jack Harris of the L.A. Times, "We want the players and their individual representation to have as many tools in the tool bag to work with teams to find common ground."

Plenty of teams like having this option as well.  Yes, the Dodgers have deferred a ton of money, more than any club in recent memory.  But all kinds of contracts have included significant deferrals, for example Boston's Rafael Devers extension or the Nationals' signing of Max Scherzer.  Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman correctly said, "I think the Shohei one was just very extreme. But if you set the Shohei contract aside, the rest are all within the norm and standard operating procedure that a lot of teams have done. But I think the Shohei one is just jarring to people because it's so different and I think that the others just unfairly get lumped into that, but I think it's kind of a lazy narrative."

If there's one thing casual fans love, it's a good lazy narrative.  But why are the Dodgers doing so much of this?  Fabian Ardaya and Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic wrote about it in March, suggesting benefits such as "reducing their short-term cash obligations, enabling them to discount luxury-tax numbers and creating flexibility in negotiations with players."

I am not a finance expert, but I'd say the main benefit is reducing short-term cash obligations.  After two years, teams have to put the average annual value in an escrow account, but they can invest all of that and grow it until the player needs to be paid.  And of course, if you're only actually paying Shohei Ohtani $2MM right now, you can spend more on players than if you were paying him $46MM.

It's worth considering, too, that the bill eventually comes due.  If the Dodgers owe retired players, say, $150MM in 2035, that seems like it could reduce their flexibility even if the money was invested along the way.  But what about the Dodgers' competitive balance tax manipulation?

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The Best Fits For Alex Bregman

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MLBTR has looked at the potential markets for Juan Soto and Corbin Burnes in respective posts for Front Office subscribers. We'll continue that series with a look at the winter's #3 free agent.

Alex Bregman could land the largest contract for a non-Soto position player. MLBTR predicted the two-time World Series champ would get a seven-year pact valued at $182MM. Getting to seven years would distinguish Bregman from Matt Chapman, who would've been the offseason's other top option at third base had he not re-signed with the Giants for six years and $151MM. Bregman is a year younger and has a more consistent offensive track record, though he's not quite at Chapman's level defensively.

There have been a few small hints about how Bregman's market could shake out. Ken Rosenthal of the Athletic suggested last month that the third baseman's camp might look for a deal that resembles Manny Machado's 11-year, $350MM extension from Spring Training 2023 rather than general market projections of a contract in the $175-200MM range.

Bregman getting to $300MM+ would be a huge surprise, though. Machado was already guaranteed $180MM at the time of his extension, so that contract amounted to five years and $170MM in new money. The Machado deal also came at a time when the Padres were signing off on a number of huge contracts during Peter Seidler's ownership tenure.

USA Today's Bob Nightengale reported a few weeks ago that the Astros were hoping to retain Bregman on something like a six-year, $156MM pact. That hasn't gotten a deal done, so his camp seems to be aiming higher. At the time, Nightengale wrote that Bregman and his representation at the Boras Corporation were at least looking to crack the $200MM mark.

Let's take a look at what teams could be involved.

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Front Office Subscriber Chat Transcript

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MLBTR’s Darragh McDonald held a live chat this afternoon, exclusively for Trade Rumors Front Office subscribers!

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The Best Fits For Corbin Burnes

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Last week, MLBTR's Steve Adams ran through every team's chances of landing Juan Soto in a post for Front Office subscribers. In the wake of last night's Blake Snell deal, let's continue that exercise by examining where each club stands on the market's top pitcher.

With Snell off the board on a deferred $182MM deal, Corbin Burnes is the only remaining pitcher who might break the $200MM threshold. He just turned 30 and should be in line for seven or potentially eight years. Burnes hasn't been quite as dominant over the past two seasons as he was during the 2020-22 stretch. His strikeouts have trended down in consecutive years, settling at a slightly above-average 23.1% rate this past season. Burnes managed a 2.92 earned run average despite the drop in whiffs. He has an excellent durability record and has reached 32 starts in three straight seasons.

Burnes should at least easily beat the seven years and $172MM which Aaron Nola secured last winter. We predicted him for an even $200MM over seven seasons when we ranked him the top non-Soto free agent on our Top 50. Which teams are best positioned to make that kind of offer?

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MLB Mailbag: Arenado, Bellinger, Phillies, Reds, A’s, Mariners, Brewers, More

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It's time for another edition of the weekly MLB Mailbag here at MLBTR. I'm pinch-hitting for MLBTR owner Tim Dierkes this week.

We received more questions than usual, with a heavy focus on some recent rumors/reporting on big-name NL Central players like Nolan Arenado and Cody Bellinger. We'll address that, plus questions on the Phillies' options, the Reds' outlook following a few early moves, the recent wave of non-tendered players, how the A's can actually spend some money and more.

Onto the questions!

Mark asks:

Should the Cardinals not find a trade partner for Nolan Arenado (or one that he agrees to), how do they sort out the logjam?  Gorman, Donovan, Saggese--and eventually Wetherholt--at 2B/3B, and 1B/DH is kind of occupied now with Contreras and Burleson.  Seems like if they plan to let the younger guys play, tough to see how there is enough playing time to go around.

Eldon asks:

The Yankees are rumored to have interest in Nolan Arenado. Wouldn't this be too much like the Donaldson fiasco of just a very short time ago Hopefully Steinbrenner and/or Cashman wouldn't dare do that again...would they? An aging player with a big contract who seems to be in decline? Why?

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The Best Fits For Juan Soto

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Last offseason, MLBTR took extensive looks at how the market for each of the top free agents might shake out, providing those pieces to our Front Office subscribers. We're doing the same this winter, kicking things off with a look at the likely bidders for Juan Soto and where each stands with regard to payroll and the luxury tax, among other aspects that ought to be considered.

At this point, there's little need to chronicle Soto's greatness to this point in his career. In our Top 50 Free Agent rankings, I penned over 1000 words on Soto alone, outlining just some of the reasons he's rightly referred to as a "generational" talent (a term that perhaps is used a bit too cavalierly these days). To borrow a couple excerpts from that:

"It’s rare for a player to even make his big league debut at 19, let alone to immediately break out as a star. That’s precisely what Soto did, however, belting an opposite-field home run off Chad Green in his second big league plate appearance. One home run doesn’t make anyone a star, of course, but Soto was completely unfazed by MLB pitching and went on to post a .292/.406/.517 batting line and swat 22 homers all before turning 20. In the entire history of the game, no one as young as Soto has turned in a season that good. Soto’s 142 OPS+ in his rookie season is the best in MLB history (min. 300 plate appearances). Soto’s debut harkened back to Hall of Famer Mel Ott’s jaw-dropping 19-year-old rookie season with the New York Giants exactly 90 years prior."

That, of course, is just looking at his rookie year. Soto's only gotten better since then, recording more walks than strikeouts in five consecutive seasons. He belted a career-high 41 homers this past season while slashing .288/.419/.569. By measure of wRC+, he was 80% better than league average at the plate (and somehow still only his team's second-best hitter; we see you, Aaron Judge). Yet Soto and all of his career accolades are hitting the open market at just 26 years of age. Judge, by comparison, played his first full season at age 25. He was entering his age-31 season in free agency. Shohei Ohtani was entering his age-29 campaign. Free agents rarely hit the market this young, and it's feasible we haven't even seen the best version of Soto yet.

When it comes to contract expectations, throw precedent and norms out the window. If you're not willing to put down at least a decade -- and likely 12, 13, 14 or even 15 years -- you're not likely to get a seat at the table. (Though it's fun to at least think of a clean-payroll club offering an extreme AAV on a shorter-term deal with an opt-out; six years, $450MM anyone?)

We know most of the teams that have already met with Soto by now, but let's take a look at each and try to identify which clubs might emerge as the ever-popular "mystery team" based on their payroll, tax status, and other factors.

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Front Office Subscriber Chat Transcript

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MLBTR’s Anthony Franco held a live chat this afternoon, exclusively for Trade Rumors Front Office subscribers!

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MLB Mailbag: Braves, Padres, Red Sox, Rangers, Reds, Rizzo, Buehler

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This week's mailbag gets into Braves, Padres, and Red Sox offseason possibilities, where Anthony Rizzo and Walker Buehler could land, off-the-wall Reds trade ideas, potential Rangers trade partners, and much more.

Bill asks:

What will Atlanta do this offseason with their shortstop, pitching, catching, and outfield needs?

I don't think the Braves will do anything significant at catcher; they might be content to use Chadwick Tromp as Sean Murphy's backup and see how Drake Baldwin comes along.  If they wanted to limit Murphy's playing time, they would've kept Travis d'Arnaud.

In terms of starting pitchers, the Braves have been linked to Walker Buehler, Nick Pivetta, and Nathan Eovaldi so far.  We'll know by Friday whether they tender a contract to Griffin Canning.  I don't love the Pivetta fit, given that he declined a qualifying offer.

12 days ago, Justin Toscano of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution tossed out some of these same names and also speculated on Jordan Montgomery, Jack Flaherty, Kevin Gausman, and Shane Bieber.  I consider Kikuchi another viable free agent option, as well as Max Scherzer, Justin Verlander, and a reunion with Charlie Morton.  The Braves could make a play for Garrett Crochet, or try to trade for Fedde, Sonny Gray, Zack Littell, Jesus Luzardo, Luis Castillo, or Jeffrey Springs.  They could sign Jeff Hoffman as a starter, given how well that strategy worked with Reynaldo Lopez.

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