Headlines

Go To Pro Hockey Rumors
Go To Hoops Rumors

Yankees Rumors

Latest On Blake Snell, Jordan Montgomery

By | at

While many around the game have long assumed that the free agent market, particularly that for pitching, would pick up following right-hander Yoshinobu Yamamoto’s decision to sign with the Dodgers last week, that seemingly has not come to fruition to this point. Chris Cotillo of MassLive.com suggests that may be due to the fact that agent Scott Boras, who represents top remaining free agent starters Blake Snell and Jordan Montgomery, “may be keen” on taking his time in finding new homes for the two southpaws. That’s hardly out of character for Boras, who has in previous seasons allowed star clients to linger on the free agent market well into Spring Training, as he did with Bryce Harper during the 2018-19 offseason.

That willingness to wait out the market could be, at least in part, due to the number of potential suitors still available for the pair to choose from. Jon Heyman of the New York Post suggests that the Phillies, Red Sox, Giants, and Angels are all interested in both lefties. The Angels and Giants were linked to Snell last week, though their apparent interest in Montgomery was not mentioned in that reporting. Heyman also adds that the Yankees have interest in Montgomery, who had previously been floated as a back-up plan for them if they failed to lure Yamamoto to the Bronx, though he notes that it’s unclear if the club is interested in Snell as well.

It’s hardly a surprise that the Angels and Giants would expand their purview beyond Snell to include Montgomery, given the duo’s status as the clear top starters on the free agent market and each team’s obvious needs in the rotation. Likewise, the Yankees are known to be in the market for a top-of-the-rotation starter and clearly aren’t afraid to spend big after reportedly making Yamamoto a $300MM offer. Similarly, the Red Sox have been connected to top-of-the-rotation arms all throughout the offseason, though Cotillo cautions that the club is currently more focused on free agent arms a tier below Snell and Montgomery like Lucas Giolito and Shota Imanaga.

The Phillies are perhaps the most surprising inclusion on this list. While the club was among the finalists for Yamamoto’s services, the club has reportedly since pivoted to prioritizing a contract extension with Zack Wheeler rather than adding additional impact talent to the 2024 club. President of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski confirmed as much when discussing the club’s pursuit of Yamamoto with reporters recently, noting that future additions to the club figure to come “more around the edges” of the roster than anywhere else. That being said, the club evidently had the payroll space available to be a significantly player in the Yamamoto sweepstakes, making it at least feasible that the Phillies could make the top offer to either Montgomery or Snell if they so chose. Reporting early in the offseason described the club as “lukewarm” on Snell, though it’s possible the club’s tune regarding Snell has changed now that he would be pitching alongside Nola in the rotation rather than replacing the club’s homegrown ace.

The two southpaws’ markets being somewhat intertwined is not necessarily a surprise given their stature as the clear best free agent starters remaining on the market. That being said, the pair bring noticeably different skillsets to the table. Montgomery, who celebrated his 31st birthday yesterday, has been a model of consistency in recent years, with his year-to-year stats never drifting too far from his career norms: a solid 22.5% strikeout rate, a low 6.6% walk rate, and a 3.68 ERA (116 ERA+). With that being said, Montgomery’s 2023 season saw him take a step forward in terms of his run-prevention numbers as the lefty posted a 3.20 ERA and 3.56 FIP across a career-high 188 2/3 innings of work, giving him the look of a potential front-of-the-rotation workhorse with a stable, middle-of-the-rotation floor.

Snell, by contrast, has seen significantly higher highs and lower lows throughout his career in the big leagues. Having won the AL Cy Young award in 2018 and the NL Cy Young award this past season, Snell is among the most electric pitchers in baseball when he’s on as demonstrated by his sterling 1.23 ERA and sensational 35% strikeout rate over the final 23 starts of his 2023 campaign. On the other hand, however, Snell is also prone to stretches of significant struggles. From 2019-21, Snell posted just a 4.06 ERA and 3.73 FIP across 61 starts thanks to a severe problem with home runs (16.9% of his fly balls left the yard during that time) and a concerning 10.6% walk rate. During that three-year stretch, Snell had the look of a #4 starter despite never posting a strikeout rate below 30%. Even in his best years, he struggles to maintain his command as demonstrated by him allowing free passes at a league-leading 13.3% clip even en route to the second Cy Young award of his career this season.

Even as the suitors for both players are mostly similar, the differences in how each lefty gets to his results may be creating disparity in their price tags on the open market. Cotillo suggests that while Montgomery is expected to command a “massive” deal this offseason, some in the industry reportedly believe Snell’s market is less robust with Cotillo noting that a “person with knowledge of the pitching market” suggested that teams could end up offering Snell a three-year deal with a high average annual value and multiple opt-outs, similar to the deal shortstop (and fellow Boras client) Carlos Correa signed with the Twins during the 2021-22 offseason.

Of course, that report is just one source’s view of Snell’s market. It’s worth noting that MLBTR projected Snell for a far more significant seven-year, $200MM contract in our annual Top 50 MLB free agents list, where he placed fourth behind only Shohei Ohtani, Cody Bellinger, and Yamamoto. While a deal similar to Correa’s first pact in Minnesota could certainly make sense for Snell if his market fails to materialize, the number of clubs reportedly in search of front-of-the-rotation talent and Boras’s previous willingness to wait out the market in search of the best deal make it unlikely a more creative, shorter-term arrangement would come together anytime soon.

Latest On Clubs’ Interest In Yariel Rodriguez

By | at

December 28: ESPN’s Enrique Rojas reports (on X) that Boston, Pittsburgh and Toronto have all shown interest in Rodriguez as a starter. Cincinnati, San Diego and the Yankees prefer the right-hander in a relief role. Rojas indicates that Rodriguez prefers to start, although there’s no indication he has officially ruled out any teams targeting him in a bullpen capacity.

December 27: The Reds and Red Sox are among the teams still showing interest in free agent right-hander Yariel Rodriguez, tweets Francys Romero. Last week, Romero reported that the Pirates, Astros, Blue Jays and Yankees were also in the running.

Cincinnati hasn’t been frequently tied to Rodriguez throughout the offseason. The Reds were among roughly half the league that sent scouts to evaluate the righty’s throwing session in the Dominican Republic on October 10, a few days after he’d been granted his release from the NPB’s Chunichi Dragons. There hasn’t been much to connect the sides since that point, although it’s not especially surprising that Cincinnati is involved on one of free agency’s younger pitchers.

The Reds have made two major league additions to the pitching staff. Swingman Nick Martinez signed for two years and $26MM, while reliever Emilio Pagán inked a two-year, $16MM deal. President of baseball operations Nick Krall indicated that Martinez will compete for a rotation spot but stopped short of calling him a lock for the season-opening five.

Rodriguez falls into a similar category, as there’s some question about whether he’ll stick in an MLB rotation. The 26-year-old worked out of the bullpen with the Dragons in his final NPB season in 2022. He turned in a stellar 1.15 ERA while striking out 27.5% of opponents over 54 2/3 innings. His 8.3% walk percentage was right in line with the MLB average.

Despite the strong results in relief, it’s likely whichever MLB team signs Rodriguez will give him an opportunity to compete for a rotation spot. He had started in Cuba’s top league before his stint in Japan, and he worked out of the rotation for the Cuban national team during last spring’s World Baseball Classic. Clubs that feel Rodriguez has mid-rotation upside could entertain a noteworthy contract. One evaluator with whom MLBTR spoke before the beginning of the offseason suggested Rodriguez could land a guarantee between $30MM and $50MM.

The Reds have a projected rotation of Andrew Abbott, Hunter Greene, Nick Lodolo and Graham Ashcraft. Left-hander Brandon Williamson and Martinez stand as the top competitors for the #5 job. Aside from Martinez, it’s a generally young group. They’ve all shown promise at the MLB level, but each of Greene, Lodolo and Ashcraft battled injuries last season. None of Abbott, Williamson nor Martinez have ever pitched a full season out of an MLB rotation. That’s also true of Rodriguez, of course, but the Reds could view his youth and ability to work multiple innings as a strong fit as they move firmly into win-now mode after their 2022 retool.

Boston has been linked to Rodriguez more frequently throughout the winter. The 6’1″ hurler held a workout in front of Sox’s and Padres’ evaluators last month. Boston is casting a wide net on the rotation front. While they’ve been tied to top-of-the-market hurlers like Jordan Montgomery and Blake Snell, the Boston Globe’s Alex Speier recently wrote they appeared more focused on the middle tiers of the free agent class.

Dodgers Sign Yoshinobu Yamamoto To 12-Year Deal

By | at

For the second time this month, the Dodgers have made a record-setting free agent strike. Los Angeles announced the signing of Yoshinobu Yamamoto to a 12-year contract. The NPB star lands a reported $325MM guarantee, an all-time high for a pitcher. The deal comes with a near-$51MM posting fee to the Orix Buffaloes of Nippon Professional Baseball, bringing the overall commitment north of $375MM. Yamamoto is represented by Wasserman.

“I’d like to thank everyone in the Orix organization, the Dodger organization and all the people close to me who have given me so much support throughout this free-agent process,” Yamamoto said in a statement released by the team. “I am truly excited to wear Dodger Blue and can’t wait to play in front of a packed Dodger Stadium.”

Yamamoto receives a massive $50MM signing bonus and a pair of opt-out opportunities. Those are conditional on the status of his elbow but would allow him to retest free agency after the 2029 and ’31 seasons if he stays healthy. If he doesn’t incur a serious elbow injury, he’d be weighing whether to opt out of the last six years and $170MM once the 2029-30 offseason arrives. The deal does not contain any deferred money.

The right-hander has been the best pitcher in Japan for the past few seasons. He spent parts of seven years with the Buffaloes. By his age-20 campaign, he’d emerged as one of the top pitchers at the second-highest level of professional baseball in the world. Yamamoto turned in a 1.95 ERA that season, kicking off a run of five straight years allowing no more than 2.20 earned runs per nine.

That includes sub-2.00 ERA showings over his final trio of seasons. Yamamoto has won the Sawamura Award as Japan’s best pitcher in all three years. He worked to a 1.39 ERA over 193 2/3 innings in 2021, followed by a 1.68 mark in 193 frames the next season. Yamamoto somehow turned in an even better year in his final season, pitching to a microscopic 1.21 ERA through 168 frames.

Among NPB pitchers to reach 100 innings, Yamamoto’s ERA was more than half a run lower than anyone else’s. (Shoki Murakami finished second with a 1.75 mark in 144 1/3 frames). Only Shota Imanaga, who is also available to MLB teams this offseason via the posting system, topped Yamamoto’s 169 strikeouts. He punched out 26.6% of opposing hitters against a tidy 4.4% walk rate.

It’s about as dominant a body of work as a pitcher can build before he faces any MLB hitters. The elite production is supported by both scouting and quantitive evaluations of Yamamoto’s arsenal. Evaluators are nearly unanimous in projecting him as a high-octane major league starter. Conservative estimates on his upside point to a future as a high-end #2 starter, while other scouts have pegged him as a potential ace.

Eno Sarris of the Athletic recently broke down Yamamoto’s repertoire. He suggested Yamamoto brandishes three plus or better offerings highlighted by a split-finger that should be among the best in the majors. The righty worked in the mid-upper 90s with his fastball in shorter stints during the World Baseball Classic. He also sports a promising curveball and a cutter as his third and fourth offerings, while evaluators praise his athleticism and command.

Yamamoto would have been in high demand even if he were in his late 20s or early 30s, the standard age for a free agent pitcher. That he debuted in NPB as an 18-year-old and was made available via the posting system only adds to the appeal. Yamamoto turned 25 in August, making him the first marquee free agent pitcher that age since Masahiro Tanaka signed during the 2013-14 offseason. He’ll be paid through his age-36 season.

To the extent there are concerns about Yamamoto, they’re limited to his lack of MLB experience and a smaller 5’10” frame. That hasn’t worried many evaluators, though, and they’re clearly not issues for the Dodgers.

Entering the offseason, it was widely believed Yamamoto would land the largest contract ever for a player coming over from NPB. It’d have been a far bolder prediction to peg him for the largest deal of any pitcher in major league history. That’s what he’ll receive, though, setting the mark in both contract length and guarantee. He’s the first pitcher in recent memory to reach even the 10-year mark. The guarantee edges past the $324MM which Gerrit Cole landed with the Yankees during the 2019-20 offseason. Yamamoto’s deal stretches three more seasons than Cole’s does, but his camp is surely pleased with the guarantee record even if it required slightly lowering the annual salary.

The deal comes with a $27.08MM average annual value. Regardless of the precise salary distribution, that’s the relevant factor for the Dodgers’ competitive balance tax picture. That pushes L.A. well into the third tier of luxury tax penalization. Roster Resource calculates the club’s CBT number in the $282MM range.

The Dodgers are set to pay the tax for a third consecutive season. They’re taxed at a 50% rate for spending between $237MM and $257MM, 62% for their next $20MM, and a 95% clip for spending between $277MM and $297MM. (They’ll be taxed at a 110% rate for any dollars above $297MM.) By pushing the Dodgers from around $255MM to $282MM from a tax perspective, the contract adds roughly $18.2MM in tax payments. It also means that future acquisitions will come with an elevated tax height.

On top of the money to Yamamoto and the tax payments, the Dodgers are on the hook for a huge sum to Orix. Under the terms of the NPB/MLB posting system, a posting fee is calculated as 20% of a deal’s first $25MM, 17.5% of the next $25MM, and 15% of further spending. That comes out to $50.625MM which the Dodgers owe to the Buffaloes.

It’s a staggering outlay, one that pushes near the $400MM mark in aggregate. It’s the kind of massive strike the Dodgers envisioned in the wake of the Shohei Ohtani signing. The defending AL MVP deferred $680MM of his $700MM deal until 2034-43. That left plenty of money at the front office’s disposal to fix the starting rotation. With Ohtani unable to pitch until 2025, he signed with a team that only had Walker Buehler and Bobby Miller as locks for the Opening Day rotation.

Within a couple weeks, the Dodgers have constructed a star-studded pitching staff to complement their strong bullpen and loaded lineup. Los Angeles acquired and promptly extended Tyler Glasnow. Adding Yamamoto to the group gives them a potentially elite front four. There’s still some risk. Glasnow and Buehler have concerning injury histories, while neither Yamamoto nor Miller has pitched a full season in MLB. Yet it’s also not difficult to see the path to excellent results regardless of whomever takes the final spot. Ryan Yarbrough, Emmet Sheehan and Michael Grove project as the top internal options, but it’d be foolish to rule out the Dodgers adding a veteran arm to continue their all-in push.

Aggressive as the signing is for L.A., they weren’t meaningfully above their top competitors in the bidding. Martino reports that the Yankees put forth a 10-year, $300MM offer, while the Mets put the same $325MM figure on the table. According to Martino, Yamamoto’s camp had sought opt-out provisions after the fifth and eighth seasons in those discussions. The Giants, Red Sox, Blue Jays and Phillies were also in the running down to the final week.

In the end, it seems Yamamoto preferred the Dodgers to the other clubs that were seriously involved. The Athletic’s Will Sammon reports that the Mets first presented the $325MM offer, which the Dodgers agreed to match. He’ll join Ohtani, Glasnow, Buehler, Mookie Betts, Freddie Freeman and Will Smith on a team that’s likely to enter the 2024 campaign as the most popular World Series pick.

The rest of the clubs will look elsewhere. The Mets seem likely to have a fairly quiet offseason, as they reportedly viewed Yamamoto as a unique free agent based on his youth and talent. They’re not expected to pivot to the next tiers of free agency. The Yankees, Giants, Blue Jays and Red Sox could all still be in play for top-of-the-market talent, either on the rotation front or at other positions. Blake Snell and Jordan Montgomery now stand atop the starting pitching class, while Cody Bellinger is arguably the best remaining overall free agent. The market could also now accelerate for Imanaga, the #2 NPB pitcher who has until mid-January to sign with an MLB team.

Jack Curry of the YES Network first reported that Yamamoto would sign with the Dodgers for more than $300MM. Jeff Passan of ESPN reported the 12-year, $325MM term. USA Today’s Bob Nightengale was first with the $50MM signing bonus, while Ken Rosenthal of the Athletic reported the absence of deferrals. Passan reported the two opt-out possibilities.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Guardians Acquire Estevan Florial From Yankees

By | at

The Yankees and Guardians have agreed on a trade that will send outfielder Estevan Florial to Cleveland in exchange for right-hander Cody Morris, per an announcement from both clubs.

The trade ends Florial’s tenure with the Yankees, with whom he signed out of the Dominican Republic back in 2015. After posting solid numbers in the lower levels of the minor leagues during his teenage years and reaching the High-A level before his 20th birthday, Florial began getting buzz as a consensus top-50 prospect throughout the sport prior to the 2018 season. Unfortunately, things came off the rails for Florial somewhat from there as the outfielder struggled at the High-A level in both 2018 and 2019. He made his big league debut during the shortened 2020 season and since then has served as a depth outfielder for the big league Yankees, with 48 appearances in the majors total in his four-year big league career.

While Florial, 26, has managed a slash line of just .209/.313/.296 across his 134 career plate appearances in the majors, his time in the minor leagues has seen him improve substantially in recent years. Fl0rial sports a career slash line of .265/.358/.490 at the Triple-A level, with an even more impressive .284/.380/.565 slash line in 101 games at the level in 2023. Given Florial’s extremely limited big league exposure to this point in his career, it’s easy to imagine him finding some level of success in Cleveland, where he should have a clear path to at least semi-regular at-bats. The Guardians put forth the third-worst outfield unit in the majors last year by measure of wRC+, as the club’s outfielders collectively hit just .250/.312/.342. Florial could challenge the likes of Ramon Laureano and Myles Straw for regular playing time alongside Steven Kwan, who appears locked into left field entering the 2024 campaign.

In exchange for Florial’s services, the Guardians are parting with Morris. The 27-year-old right-hander was the club’s seventh-round pick in the 2018 draft and first made his big league debut in 2022, where he performed well in seven appearances (five starts). While Morris posted an elevated walk rate of 12% that pushed his FIP up to 4.34, he struck out a respectable 23% of batters faced and managed an excellent 2.28 ERA in 23 2/3 innings of work during his first season in the majors.

In the minor leagues, Morris was even more impressive, with a career 1.68 ERA and a 37.8% strikeout rate in 80 1/3 innings of work between the Double-A and Triple-A levels as the 2022 campaign came to a close. Morris opened the 2023 season on the injured list due to a teres major strain but returned to action in June. While the right-hander put up respectable numbers at Triple-A, including a 3.23 ERA in 39 innings of work across 21 appearances, he struggled badly across six relief appearances in the majors with a 6.75 ERA over eight innings of work.

Despite Morris’s struggles with injury and ineffectiveness at the big league level last year, he provides the Yankees with an interesting, optionable arm who has experience pitching both out of the rotation and in the bullpen with strong numbers at the minor league level and some small-sample size success at the big league level. That type of arm would surely be attractive to just about any club, but could be particularly appealing to the Yankees after the club shipped cost-controlled pitchers like Michael King, Randy Vasquez, and Jhony Brito to San Diego as part of the package that landed the club Juan Soto earlier this month.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Astros, Blue Jays, Pirates, Yankees Continue To Be Interested In Yariel Rodriguez

By | at

Yariel Rodriguez’s market continues to percolate, as the Astros, Blue Jays, Pirates, and Yankees “are still in the bidding for” the right-hander’s services, according to reporter Francys Romero (X link) earlier this week.  Romero’s post came prior to Yoshinobu Yamamoto’s deal with the Dodgers, as Romero suggested that Rodriguez’s suitors were first waiting for Yamamoto to sign.

This would seemingly refer to the Yankees and Blue Jays in particular, who were known to be in the running for Yamamoto’s services.  Toronto was a bit more on the periphery of the hunt while the Yankees were seemingly one of three or four finalists, joining the Mets and Giants in falling short of the Dodgers in the bidding for the Japanese ace.  Presumably neither the Yankees or Jays would’ve been in on Rodriguez if they had signed Yamamoto, so the presence of two big spenders still in the market is good news for Rodriguez and his reps at WME Baseball.

It should be noted that Romero didn’t state that these four teams were finalists for Rodriguez, or that any other known suitors were out of the running.  The Astros, Jays, Pirates, and Yankees were all listed among the 10 interested teams in Romero’s initial report about Rodriguez in early November, and that group (which also included the Dodgers, Giants, Mets, Phillies, Rangers, and White Sox) has grown to include the Rays, Red Sox, and Padres in subsequent reports.

Rodriguez is something of a wild card in the free agent pitching market, given that he has spent most of his career pitching in Cuba, he worked mostly out of the bullpen with the Chunichi Dragons of Nippon Professional Baseball from 2020-22, and he didn’t pitch at all in 2023 (apart from the World Baseball Classic) since he sat out the NPB season trying to get released from his contract with the Dragons.  However, Rodriguez doesn’t turn 27 until March, and there is enough intrigue in his upside as a starter that MLBTR ranked him 28th on our list of the offseason’s top 50 free agents, and projected him for a four-year, $32MM contract.

This price point would put Rodriguez in range for even lower-payroll teams, even if such clubs are taking more of a risk in such a financial commitment for a pitcher with no Major League track record.  For the Pirates specifically, $32MM for Rodriguez would rank as one of the eight most expensive contracts in the franchise’s history, so it would seem rather aggressive for a Bucs team just coming out of a rebuild to suddenly splurge on an unproven arm.  That said, the Pirates are known to be looking for more rotation help, and they could have enough faith in Rodriguez’s upside that they could view something like a $32MM investment as a potential bargain.

International signings have been the backbone of the Astros’ run of success over the last decade, in the form of inexpensive deals for future stars like Jose Altuve or Framber Valdez, or Houston’s more significant investment in a five-year, $47.5MM deal for Yuli Gurriel when he came to the big leagues from Cuba during the 2016 season.  Current Astros general manger Dana Brown naturally wasn’t in change of the front office back in 2016, though he did suggest that his team was looking to add “a legit third starter or better” this offseason, while acknowledging that the Astros were working with a somewhat limited amount of spending space.  Roster Resource projects Houston’s 2024 payroll to sit almost exactly at the $237MM luxury tax threshold, which is notable since the Astros have only once (in 2020) exceeded the tax line in their history.

Signing Rodriguez would be an interesting fallback position from Yamamoto for either New York or Toronto.  Rodriguez’s lack of track record wouldn’t necessarily solidify a rotation that already has a couple of injury-related question marks in Nestor Cortes and Carlos Rodon, as well as the unproven Clarke Schmidt as the projected fourth starter.  However, the Yankees might view Rodriguez as an upside play as a de facto fifth starter, or perhaps even a bullpen addition if he doesn’t work out as a starter.

The same could be said about Rodriguez’s possible usage on the Blue Jays’ staff, even if Toronto’s rotation is a little more defined.  Kevin Gausman, Chris Bassitt, Jose Berrios, and Yusei Kikuchi project as the top four, with Alek Manoah penciled in as the fifth starter for now despite all of the uncertainty in the wake of Manoah’s rough 2023 season.  Adding Rodriguez would give the Blue Jays more depth if Manoah can’t bounce back, or perhaps the Jays would then feel more emboldened to trade Manoah or even Kikuchi to address other needs in the lineup.

Eight Teams Combine For Record $209.8MM In Luxury Tax Bills

By | at

Major League Baseball has finalized the luxury tax calculations for the 2023 season, and the eight teams over the Competitive Balance Tax threshold will combine for a total bill of $209.8MM, Ronald Blum of the Associated Press reports.  Both the total number of tax-paying teams and the total sum are new records, surpassing the previous highs of six teams (in 2016 and 2022) and $78.5MM (in 2022).

Here is what each of the eight teams owes for surpassing at least the $233MM base CBT threshold….

  • Mets: $100,781,932
  • Padres: $39.7MM
  • Yankees: $32.4MM
  • Dodgers: $19.4MM
  • Phillies: $6.98MM
  • Blue Jays: $5.5MM
  • Braves: $3.2MM
  • Rangers: $1.8MM

As a reminder of how the luxury tax operates, the CBT figures are determined by the average annual value of salaries for players on the 40-man roster.  A player earning $20MM over two seasons, for example, has a CBT number of $10MM, even if the player might earn $8MM in the first year of the contract and $12MM in the second year.  Deferred money in a contract can reduce a luxury tax number to some extent — most famously, Shohei Ohtani’s $700MM deal with the Dodgers contains $680MM in deferred money, so his CBT hit will be roughly $46MM per season instead of $70MM.

A team is considered a “first-time payor” if they haven’t spent above the CBT threshold in the previous season.  A first-time payor would owe a 20% surcharge on any dollar spent between $233MM and $253MM, 32% of anything between $253MM and $273MM, 62.5% on anything between $273MM and $293MM, and then 80% of overages for anything beyond $293MM.  These percentages rise if a team is a tax payor for two consecutive seasons, and then even further if a team exceeds the CBT line in three or more consecutive seasons.  This year’s CBT class featured three first-time payors (Texas, Atlanta, Toronto), three two-time payors (Philadelphia, both New York teams) and two three-time payors (San Diego, Los Angeles).

The $293MM threshold was instituted in the last Collective Bargaining Agreement as a fourth penalty tier, and it is unofficially known as the “Steve Cohen Tax” in a reference to the Mets owner’s penchant for big spending.  Even though New York has only topped the CBT whatsoever in 2022 and 2023, it isn’t surprising that Cohen’s team set new standards for tax payouts.  The Mets’ tax payroll of $374.7MM and approximate $100.78MM tax bill far exceeded the 2015 Dodgers’ previous records of $291.1MM and $43.6MM, respectively.

This bill would’ve been even higher if the Mets hadn’t unexpectedly struggled, and unloaded some expensive contracts at the trade deadline in order to save some money and reload with an eye towards probably 2025 as a more clear-cut return to contention.  Blum also notes that the Mets received a $2,126,471 tax credit related to a CBA provision, which slightly reduced their bill further.

As always, the actual financial cost of exceeding the tax is perhaps the least-important part of the penalties, especially for teams who barely across the first threshold.  Teams who exceed the CBT line would face further punishment in regards to free agents who reject qualifying offers, whether that translates to additional compensation required to sign a QO-rejecting player, or lesser compensation received if a team’s own qualified free agent signs elsewhere.  For instance, signing Ohtani cost the Dodgers not just $700MM, but also $1MM in international draft pool money and their second- and fifth-highest picks in the 2024 draft.  For a team like the Padres, should Blake Snell or Josh Hader sign elsewhere, San Diego’s compensatory draft selection wouldn’t come until after the fourth round of the 2024 draft.

Spending on talent is more often than not a recipe for success on the field, though obviously hardly a guarantee.  The Mets had a losing record, and the Padres and Yankees each squeaked over the .500 mark with 82-80 records.  The other five tax payors reached the playoffs, though the Phillies and the World Series champion Rangers were the only members of that group of five to win at least one postseason series.

The $209.8MM in tax revenues will be split up in three ways by the league.  The first $3.5MM is devoted to funding player benefits, $103.15MM will go towards funding individual player retirement accounts, and the other $103.15MM will be put into a supplemental commissioner’s discretionary fund and distributed amongst revenue-sharing recipient teams who have grown their (non-media) local revenue over a pre-determined number of years.

Latest On Yankees’, Mets’ Failed Pursuits Of Yoshinobu Yamamoto

By | at

The Yoshinobu Yamamoto sweepstakes ended late last night when the 25-year-old right-hander agreed to a 12-year deal with the Dodgers worth $325MM. The massive figure is a record for free agent pitchers (aside from two-way superstar Shohei Ohtani’s $700MM deal with LA earlier this month) as Yamamoto slightly surpassed Gerrit Cole’s nine-year, $324MM guarantee with the Yankees.

Among the most aggressive suitors for Yamamoto’s services aside from the Dodgers were the two New York teams. Both the Yankees and Mets met with Yamamoto multiple times and reportedly made offers that appeared to match or even exceed LA’s in terms of aggressiveness. Previous reporting indicated that the Mets offered Yamamoto a matching $325MM guarantee while the Yankees offered $300MM over just ten years, boosting the deal’s average annual value to $30MM. In the aftermath of Yamamoto’s decision to head to Los Angeles, more details regarding both clubs’ ultimately fruitless pursuits of the right-hander have come to light.

According to Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic, the Yankees’ offer to Yamamoto exceeded that of the Dodgers’ in a few key areas despite offering $25MM less in terms of total guarantee. In addition to the aforementioned higher AAV, Rosenthal indicates the Yankees were willing to offer Yamamoto opt-out opportunities after the 2028 and 2032 seasons, both one year earlier than the opt-out opportunities he received in his contract out west. The differences in those offers are more meaningful than they may immediately appear. Had Yamamoto signed in the Bronx, he would have had the opportunity to hit free agency for a second time before his 30th birthday, while his deal with the Dodgers will offer him his first chance to opt-out after his age-30 season. Generally, players younger than 30 are widely considered to be far more attractive candidates for long-term deals than those older.

In addition to the potentially more lucrative opt-out situation, the Yankees’ offer to Yamamoto was not back-loaded, as his deal with the Dodgers reportedly is. That the contract Yamamoto ultimately agreed to is back-loaded is no small factor; not only does that mean that the deal’s present day value is diminished somewhat, it also means Yamamoto would be leaving a larger portion of his guaranteed money on the table by opting out of his contract with the Dodgers. No such concern would exist with the Yankees’ offer.

For the Mets’ part, Mike Puma of the New York Post indicates that the club’s 12-year, $325MM offer to Yamamoto was “among the first received” by the right-hander, and that the club was not offered the chance to improve upon that offer. Puma goes on to note, however, that the club may not have significantly raised their bid above that $325MM figure due to the roughly $50MM posting fee the club would have owed to Yamamoto’s NPB team, the Orix Buffaloes, had a deal come together.

The Mets have long been expected to largely avoid top-of-the-market bidding wars for starting pitchers this offseason if they were to miss on Yamamoto, and club owner Steve Cohen seemingly confirmed that stance in conversation with reporters today. As relayed by Puma, Cohen discussed a more cautious approach to free agency this offseason than in previous seasons under his ownership.

“We’re going to be thoughtful and not impulsive and thinking about sustainability over the intermediate long-term, but not focused on winning the headlines over the next week,” Cohen said. “I think there’s a couple of ways to build a team… We’ll build it. It will happen. Slowly and surely you will see changes and improvements.”

Such a measure approach to the 2023-24 offseason has seemed to be a possibility in Queens ever since veteran right-hander Max Scherzer indicated last summer that the club viewed 2024 as “a kind of transitory year” with 2025 and 2026 as the club’s true focus in terms of returning to contention. Since then, the club’s pursuit of Yamamoto has largely taken center stage as the club has made smaller moves on the periphery, adding Luis Severino and Joey Wendle in free agency while picking up Adrian Houser and Tyrone Taylor in trade.

One factor that may have helped the Dodgers in their pursuit of Yamamoto, as discussed by Rosenthal, is the $50MM signing bonus he’ll receive as part of the contract. Rosenthal notes that Yamamoto’s bonus, paid entirely in 2024, would not be subject to California state taxes so long as he is not a resident of the state. That structure reportedly could save the right-hander as much as $7.2MM. Perhaps even more valuable than that savings would be the Dodgers’ unique position to accommodate his transition to the majors. NPB teams typically use six-man rotations with starters expected to pitch just once a week, making the move to MLB a significant jump in workload for overseas arms.

As noted by Mike DiGiovanna of the LA Times, the Dodgers are all but guaranteed to plan on a six-man rotation for the 2025 season given the expected return of Ohtani to the mound that season. The lessened workload could help Yamamoto stay healthy throughout his big league career, which DiGiovanna relays is perhaps the primary concern of scouts regarding his future in the majors thanks to his undersized 5’10”, 176lb frame. Of course, there’s no guarantee that such an arrangement will be the plan for the Dodgers in 2024, when Ohtani will be rehabbing UCL surgery. Even so, DiGiovanna notes that the Dodgers’ starters appeared on regular rest in just 42 regular season games last season, leaving the door open for Yamamoto to get extra days of rest built into his schedule even if the club doesn’t go with a proper six-man rotation.

Giants Out Of Bidding For Yoshinobu Yamamoto

By | at

9:06pm: Yamamoto could make his decision within the next 48 hours, tweets Mark Feinsand of MLB.com.

7:55pm: MLB.com’s Jon Morosi tweets that Yamamoto has at least one offer of $300MM or more in hand.

6:59pm: The Giants have been informed they’re out of the running for Yoshinobu Yamamoto, reports Alex Pavlovic of NBC Sports Bay Area (X link). While there’s no indication that Yamamoto has made his final decision, Pavlovic adds the Giants expect he’ll sign with the Dodgers or one of the New York clubs.

Andy Martino of SNY tweets that the Mets have not received any indication they’re out of the running. That’s also true of the Yankees, according to Jon Heyman of the New York Post (X link). Heyman indicates the Yankees have put a “significant bid” on the table.

Crossing San Francisco off the list technically leaves six known finalists. In addition to the Dodgers, Mets and Yankees, the Blue Jays, Phillies and Red Sox have been involved. Philadelphia has made an offer this week. That said, reports have cast the Phils, Jays, and (to a lesser extent) the Sox as longer shots.

Yamamoto has been weighing offers throughout the week. While he technically has until the evening of January 4 to sign, the expectation is that he won’t take things to the wire. That his camp is now in the process of whittling the field lends credence to the idea that a decision might not be far off.

The bidding seems as if it’ll surpass $250MM, before accounting for a posting fee owed to the Orix Buffaloes that could tack on another $45-50MM. That fee is in proportion to the contract size, calculated as 20% of the deal’s first $25MM, 17.5% of the next $25MM, and 15% of additional spending. That reflects Yamamoto’s atypical youth for a free agent pitcher (25) and his sheer dominance in Japan. Named NPB’s best pitcher three years running, he’s coming off a 1.21 ERA while striking out nearly 27% of opponents in 164 innings.

It’s a tough blow for the Giants, who come up short on another top-tier free agent. The Giants have missed on pursuits of Aaron Judge, Trea Turner and Shohei Ohtani within the past two offseasons alone, while their deal with Carlos Correa fell through because of the physical. Yamamoto will join that list. San Francisco did land KBO star Jung Hoo Lee on a six-year, $113MM pact — the largest deal of Farhan Zaidi’s tenure as baseball operations president — but they haven’t gotten a truly elite free agent in some time.

San Francisco still has plenty of spending capacity as they decide on their next steps. Roster Resource projects their 2024 spending around $158MM. That’s about $30MM below this year’s Opening Day figure. From a luxury tax perspective, they’re almost $45MM south of the base threshold. That opens the possibility for a run at any of the top remaining free agent talents. Blake Snell and Jordan Montgomery headline the rotation class, while Matt Chapman was on the radar earlier in the offseason. So was the top available hitter, Cody Bellinger, although the Lee signing seems to rule out a pursuit of another lefty-swinging center fielder.

Yankees, Nick Burdi Agree To Minor League Deal

By | at

The Yankees have agreed to a minor league pact with hard-throwing right-hander Nick Burdi, reports Jack Curry of the YES Network. The Apex Baseball client will be in big league camp this spring.

Selected 46th overall out of Louisville by the Twins back in 2014, Burdi joined the professional ranks as a power-armed closer who could potentially have a fast track to the big leagues. He’d obliterated the opposition in college, posting a 1.79 ERA while fanning a comical 47% of his opponents during his NCAA career. He looked the part of a big league reliever following the draft, too, climbing to Double-A less than a year after being drafted and posting gaudy strikeout totals along the way.

As is the case with so many flamethrowing young arms, however, injuries intervened. A bone bruise in his upper arm wiped out most of Burdi’s 2016 season, and his 2017 campaign was cut short by Tommy John surgery. The Twins lost Burdi in the 2017 Rule 5 Draft — the Phillies selected him and immediately traded him to the Pirates — and he made his MLB debut with Pittsburgh late in the 2018 season.

Because he spent the bulk of the year on the injured list, Burdi’s Rule 5 designation carried over from the 2018 season into the 2019 season. He pitched just 8 2/3 innings before undergoing thoracic outlet surgery and missing the rest of the year. Burdi returned in 2020 but pitched just 2 1/3 MLB frames before hitting the injured list with an elbow issue that eventually resulted in his second career Tommy John surgery. Burdi finally returned to the mound with the Cubs organization in 2023, but as if the slate of arm injuries hadn’t been difficult enough, he also missed a substantial portion of the ’23 campaign after requiring an emergency appendectomy in late May.

Although we’re coming up on nearly a decade since Burdi was drafted, he’s pitched just 15 1/3 innings in the Majors due to that stunning slate of injuries. The results haven’t been good, as he’s allowed 16 runs in that time. Burdi, however, has a 3.51 ERA in parts of six minor league seasons and has whiffed just shy of 33% of opponents in his professional career (big leagues and minors combined). His durability is an enormous question, of course, but his arm strength is not; in the tiny sample of three MLB innings with Chicago last year, Burdi averaged 98 mph on his heater and reached triple digits at times.

If he can remain healthy enough to emerge as an option for the Yankees, he still has all three minor league option years remaining, which would give New York plenty of flexibility in the ’pen. He has to be viewed as a long shot to remain healthy, given his track record of injuries, but Burdi still looks to have plenty of fire in his right arm and deserves credit for grinding through a grueling slate of injuries that would surely have been enough for many pitchers to call it quits.

Yankees, Luis Gonzalez Agree To Minor League Deal

By | at

The Yankees and free agent outfielder Luis Gonzalez have agreed to a minor league contract, reports Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic. He’ll be in Major League camp this spring.

The 28-year-old Gonzalez has played in parts of three big league seasons between the White Sox and Giants, compiling a .253/.328/.368 batting line in 363 plate appearances. The 2017 third-round pick once rated as one of the better prospects in the ChiSox’ system, but he hasn’t yet found sustained success in the big leagues.

Gonzalez got out to a hot start in 2022, his first season with the Giants, after coming over from the Sox via waivers late in the 2021 season. Through June 21 of the 2022 season, Gonzalez was hitting .302/.361/.447 in 180 plate appearances, but a lower back strain shelved him for the next two and a half weeks. He was activated on July 9 but returned to the injured list with another back strain about six weeks later — this time missing the remainder of the season. Gonzalez may never have been fully healthy upon returning, as he batted only .204/.282/.270 in 170 trips to the plate between those two IL stints.

The back troubles persisted into the 2023 season, and Gonzalez eventually underwent surgery to repair a herniated disc. That procedure kept him out from mid-March through early July. He didn’t make it back to San Francisco’s big league roster but did suit up for 31 minor league games following the operation, during which he posted a .248/.350/.352 batting line in 123 trips to the plate.

The Yankees obviously have no room in the big league outfield after acquiring Juan Soto, Trent Grisham and Alex Verdugo in trades this offseason. Soto and Verdugo will flank Aaron Judge, who’ll be the team’s primary center fielder, while Grisham will give them a lefty-swinging fourth outfielder with a plus glove to come off the bench late in games. Like Grisham, Gonzalez is a lefty bat with experience at all three outfield slots. The Yankees have a trio of depth outfielders — Everson Pereira, Estevan Florial and recent waiver claim Oscar Gonzalez — all on the 40-man roster ahead of their new signing. Gonzalez seems likely to open the year in Triple-A Scranton Wilkes-Barre.

Show all

MLB Trade Rumors is not affiliated with Major League Baseball, MLB or MLB.com

Do not Sell or Share My Personal Information

hide arrows scroll to top