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The Major League Baseball Players Association has issued a press release announcing that 147 players have officially filed for free agency. This year's crop of free agents is headlined by the likes of Robinson Cano, Jacoby Ellsbury, Shin-Soo Choo and Brian McCann, as shown on MLBTR's Free Agent Power Rankings.

Teams will have exclusive negotiating rights with their own free agents for five days following completion of the World Series. In other words, free agents will be free to begin negotiating with all 30 Major League clubs at 12:01am EST on Tuesday, Nov. 5.

For a look at the top names available (minimum 20 IP or 50 plate appearances), check out MLBTR's 2014 Free Agent List.

The offseason is officially upon us, and the first order of business for most teams will be to address the various contract options that apply to the 2014 season. As MLBTR's Tim Dierkes noted earlier, most (and possibly all) of these decisions will be wrapped up by 11:59pm ET on Saturday.

Many of the options are no-brainers (e.g. James Shields), but others aren't quite as clear (e.g. David DeJesus). It's also important to remember that players with options can be traded in the coming days. For example, with the signing of Alexander Guerrero, Mark Ellis appears to have been displaced in Los Angeles. However, other teams may find his $5.75MM club option appealing and be willing to work out a trade with the Dodgers to acquire him at that price rather than take their chances on the open market. Most famously, we saw this one year ago today with the Royals' acquisition of Ervin Santana.

We've also already seen a few options exercised and declined. The Rockies picked up their $11MM option on Jorge De La Rosa and declined their $4.25MM option on Rafael Betancourt, who went down with Tommy John surgery. The Brewers exercised a cheap $1.9MM option on Norichika Aoki, and reports have indicated that, not surprisingly, Jon Lester's option will be picked up by the Red Sox as well.

With all that said, here's a team-by-team look at the various contract options — club, player and mutual — that each team will be resolving in the next few days.

AL WEST

Angels

• None

Astros

• None

Athletics

• Brett Anderson: $8MM club option ($1.5MM buyout; will be arbitration eligible if option is declined)
• Coco Crisp, OF: $7.5MM club option ($1MM buyout)
• Kurt Suzuki, C: $8.5MM club option ($650K buyout)
• Chris Young, OF: $11MM club option ($1.5MM buyout)

Mariners

• Franklin Gutierrez, OF: $7.5MM club option ($500K buyout)
• Joe Saunders, SP: $8.3MM mutual option ($900K buyout)

Rangers

• Lance Berkman, DH: $12MM club option ($1MM buyout)
• Joe Nathan, RP: $9MM club option ($750K buyout; Nathan can void and elect free agency)

AL CENTRAL

Indians

• Jason Kubel, OF/DH: $7.5MM club option ($1MM buyout)
• Ubaldo Jimenez, SP: $8MM club option (Jimenez earned the right to void this option when he was traded from the Rockies to the Indians)

Royals

• James Shields, SP: $13.5MM club option ($1MM buyout)

Tigers

• Jose Veras, RP: $3.25MM club option ($150K buyout)

Twins

• None

White Sox

• Matt Lindstrom, RP: $4MM club option ($500K buyout)

AL EAST

Blue Jays

• Mark DeRosa, 1B/3B/LF/RF: $750K club option ($25K buyout)
• Casey Janssen, RP: $4MM club option
• Munenori Kawasaki, 2B/SS: $1MM club option
• Adam Lind, DH/1B: $7MM club option ($2MM buyout)

Orioles

• Alexi Casilla, 2B/SS: $3MM club option ($200K buyout)
• Dan Johnson, 1B/DH: $800K club option
• Tsuyoshi Wada, SP/RP: $5MM club option

Rays

• David DeJesus, OF: $6.5MM club option ($1.5MM buyout)
• Yunel Escobar, SS: $5MM club option
• Juan Carlos Oviedo, RP: $2MM club option ($30K buyout)
• Ben Zobrist 2B/RF/SS: $7MM club option ($2.5MM buyout)

Red Sox

• Jon Lester, SP: $13MM club option ($250K buyout)
• Matt Thornton, RP: $6MM club option ($1MM buyout)

Yankees

• Derek Jeter, SS: $9.5MM player option ($3MM buyout)

NL WEST

Diamondbacks

• None

Dodgers

• Chris Capuano, SP: $8MM mutual option ($1MM buyout)
• Mark Ellis, 2B: $5.75MM club option ($1MM buyout)

Giants

• Ryan Vogelsong, SP: $6.5MM club option ($300K buyout)
• Barry Zito, SP: $18MM club option ($7MM buyout)

Padres

• None

Rockies

• Matt Belisle, RP: $4.25MM mutual option ($250K buyout)

NL CENTRAL

Brewers

• None (Aoki's already exercised)

Cardinals

• Jake Westbrook, SP: $9.5MM mutual option ($1MM buyout)

Cubs

• None

Pirates

• Wandy Rodriguez, SP: $13MM player option ($2.5MM buyout)

Reds

• None

NL EAST

Braves

• Reed Johnson, OF: $1.6MM club option ($150K buyout)

Nationals

• None

Marlins

• Jacob Turner, SP: $1MM club option (part of a Major League deal signed out of the draft)

Mets

• Johan Santana, SP: $25MM club option ($5.5MM buyout)

Phillies

• None

The 2014 MLB Free Agent Tracker is now available at MLB Trade Rumors!  All free agents are listed, and you can filter by position, signing status, signing team, qualifying offer status, contract years and amount, throwing and batting handedness, and any combination of the above.  For the most part, our cutoff for a player's inclusion on the tracker is 50 MLB plate appearances or 20 innings pitched in 2013.  Led by Robinson Cano, Jacoby Ellsbury, Shin-Soo Choo, Brian McCann, and Masahiro Tanaka, our Top 50 Free Agents list with predictions will be published Sunday night.  For now, make your wish lists with the free agent tracker, read up with our free agent profiles, and check out my top ten free agents from earlier this month.  We also have a basic list that shows which free agents remain available at each position, found here.

The Red Sox front office will have little time to bask in the glow of the franchise's eighth World Championship.  Upcoming important dates:

• Players with at least six years of Major League service and no contract for 2014 are eligible to become free agents as of 8am central time today, October 31st.  That marks the opening of the Quiet Period.
• MLBTR's Top 50 Free Agents list with predictions will be published the evening of Sunday, November 3rd.  Our prediction contest will open at that time as well.
• The five-day Quiet Period ends at 10:59pm central time on Monday, November 4th.  During the Quiet Period, free agents may talk to any team about either side's interest, the player's potential role, the advantages and disadvantages of playing for that team and city, and length of a potential contract, guarantee provisions, and no-trade provisions.  A free agent may not, however, negotiate terms or contract with a new team during this period.  He may negotiate terms and enter into a contract with his former team.
• During the Quiet Period, the former team may tender a qualifying offer, which is a guaranteed one-year, $14.1MM deal for 2014.  Qualifying offer decisions by the team are due by 4pm central time on Monday, November 4th.  Check out MLBTR's qualifying offer reader poll from September for an idea of which free agents are likely to receive one.
• Additionally, option decisions must be decided by the end of the Quiet Period.  A large majority (all of them last year) will be resolved by 10:59pm central time on Saturday, November 2nd.
• Once the Quiet Period ends Monday night, free agents can negotiate with any team.
• A free agent has until Monday, November 11th by 4pm central time to accept a qualifying offer.  Any player who accepts is considered signed for 2014.  If a player declines a qualifying offer, his former team becomes eligible for compensation if the player signs a Major League contract with another Major League team before the 2014 draft.  The former team receives an amateur draft choice as compensation, while the signing team forfeits its highest available selection and the accompanying bonus pool money in the draft.
• Baseball's GM Meetings are from November 11-13th in Orlando, Florida.
• The non-tender deadline for arbitration eligible players is December 2nd.
• Baseball's Winter Meetings are from December 9-12th, also in Orlando.

Some ideas are better in theory than in practice. I was tasked a while back by MLBTR owner Tim Dierkes to come up with a free agent salary system similar to the one Matt Swartz created for arbitration salaries. To put it simply, it was a failure. After coming to a agreement, Tim and I decided to scrap the idea and go our separate ways…until about a week ago when I decided to look at the problem a different way.

By using a weighting of similar production and age, a player's contract can be estimated by using a few comparable contracts. It is way too close to the hot stove season to create an estimate for all players, but I was able to scrap together a list starting pitcher salary estimates.

Below are my model's projected salaries using the top 21 free agent pitchers (ignoring Masahiro Tanaka and the recently extended Tim Lincecum). Also, the expected contracts from MLBTR's free agent profiles were added if one has been given.

Note: The salaries are based on inflation-adjusted 2013 salaries. If salaries increase 10% across the board this offseason, the values need to be adjusted accordingly. A confidence value is added. The closer the value is to 0, the more pitchers are similar in production to the pitcher in question.

	Similarity Projections			Expected Contract
Name	Years	Total Salary ($M)	Confidence (0 is best)	Years	Total Salary ($M)
Ricky Nolasco	2.6	$40.5	14	3	$36
Ubaldo Jimenez	2.7	$39.6	28	3	$39
A.J. Burnett	1.9	$24.3	36	1	$12
Bronson Arroyo	1.8	$23.4	28	2	$24
Hiroki Kuroda	1.6	$21.2	33	1	$16
Tim Hudson	1.6	$17.3	62	1	$9
Paul Maholm	1.7	$15.2	46	1	$7
Roberto Hernandez	1.5	$10.8	57	1	$5
Scott Feldman	1.2	$7.9	99	2	$17
Scott Kazmir	1.2	$5.7	417	2	$16
Josh Johnson	1.0	$2.2	68	1	$8
Total	18.7	$208.1		18	$189
Ervin Santana	2.5	$36.5	17
Dan Haren	2.3	$29.5	24
Jason Vargas	1.7	$17.9	34
Chris Capuano	1.5	$14.0	64
Bartolo Colon	1.4	$12.2	159
Matt Garza	1.6	$10.7	22
Phil Hughes	1.3	$8.1	67
Jason Hammel	1.4	$7.3	21
Wandy Rodriguez	1.1	$5.7	90
Roy Halladay	1.0	$4.2	107

Overall, the values hold up decently. The Similarity Projections estimate almost the same length in contracts, but thinks about $20M more will be spent. Also, with the the years in decimal format, it can be seen how uncertain a player may be in getting a certain number of years on his deal. For example, I have Tim Hudson at 1.6 years and $17.3M. Adjusting those values to one year, he gets $10.8M. It would increase to $21.6M for two years.

Individually, nothing seems completely out of whack. The one contract with the largest disagreement so far is Scott Kazmir's. Basically, there aren't many pitchers that don't pitch at all for two straight seasons and then come back to post an ERA near 4.00. The three most similar pitchers were Chris Capuano (2011), Jake Westbrook (2011) and Carl Pavano (2010). The trio averaged 155 innings in their comeback season and only 26 innings in the two seasons before their comeback. While I used more than three samples for the above value, the three averaged a salary of $9.4MM for 1.3 years (or adjusted to $7.3M for one season or $14.5M for two seasons).

Also, Roy Halladay's projected salary seems a bit out of place, but not many pitchers his age have gotten huge guarantees after the season he had last year. One of the top comparable contracts was the one Roy Oswalt signed in in 2012 at $5MM. Oswalt was younger and was coming off a better season.

The elephant in the room is Matt Garza. Demand has been limited in the past for starters who have averaged only 150 innings over the past three seasons. Unreliable pitchers have unreliable contracts. In terms of innings total, he is getting lumped in with the like of Shaun Marcum and Francisco Liriano. For example, last season Liriano had thrown 480 innings combined in the three previous seasons, with a noticeably worse ERA, but ended up with only a guaranteed 1-year deal for only 1MM. However, prior to his most recent contract, Jorge De La Rosa had similar numbers and received a three-year, $32MM deal. Right now, I think expectations may be a bit high on Garza's salary, since teams are willing to pay more for a reliable starter.

The model was just a year off with Lincecum, predicting $47.4MM over 2.9 years. That is equivalent to a a two-year, $32.7MM contract. The Lincecum deal is the first salary to determine how much salary inflation there is this season. His two-year, $35MM deal works out to 7% inflation. It is way too early to set an exact inflation amount, but it is something to keep an eye on.

The best part about this finding is that we should be able to complete the projection model well in advance of free agency next season, which could lead to a greater number of predictions. At the very least, the starting pitcher salaries that are handed out this offseason should serve as a reference point for future studies that will allow us to better set expectations for the free agent market.

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A deal reached between MLB and the players' association will allow major leaguers to participate in winter leagues this season, Jeff Passan of Yahoo Sports reports, citing anonymous sources with knowledge of the talks. The agreement was ratified by the Caribbean Confederation on Saturday and will permit players to report within a week.

The agreement will bar pitchers on the 40-man roster with a majority of their time spent at Double-A from participating in winter ball if they accumulated more than 140 innings, a decline from 155 innings in a previous agreement. The threshold has also been lowered for Double-A relievers, who will not be able to participate if they appeared in more than 45 games, a decrease from 55 appearances in previous years.

Restrictions were relaxed on major league position players, as those with up to 552 plate appearances will be allowed to participate, up from a previous limit of 502 PAs. Passan adds that the process of declaring "physical incapacity" for a player will now be more stringently regulated — teams were formerly able to do so by simply providing documentation. Other changes in the new deal include better equipment and fields, along with higher standards for clubhouses and bathrooms.

Sources told Yahoo that the negotiations grew tense as MLB sought to keep young pitchers from overworking their arms after long seasons and the union aimed to secure as much freedom for players as possible. At one point, the status of the negotiations reportedly caused some to worry that players on clubs' 40-man rosters would be prohibited from playing this year.

As Passan notes, the Venezuelan Winter League and Mexican Pacific League are scheduled to commence this week, while the Dominican Winter League starts Friday and the Puerto Rican League opens on Nov. 1.

There could be significant changes on the horizon for Cuban players, writes Ben Badler of Baseball America. The Mexican League is working with the Cuban government to work out an agreement that would allow Mexico to import Cuban players to play in the Mexican League in the spring and summer. Those players would still be able to return to Cuba to play in Serie Nacional — Cuba's top professional league — over the winter.

The change would be significant, as the Mexican League could offer Cuban players significantly more in terms of salary than they are currently receiving to play in Serie Nacional. In addition to benefiting players, it would benefit Cuba, as the government would stand to profit by leasing player rights to Mexican teams.

Former Cuban stars German Mesa and Omar Linares have joined the Veracruz Red Eagles of the Mexican League, one of the two teams expected to be most active in recruiting Cuban imports, according to Badler. Veracruz is the same team that sold right-hander Luis Heredia's rights to the Pirates three years ago. Heredia is now one of Pittsburgh's top prospects, but Badler cautions that the new arrangement would not allow Cuban-born players to be sold to Major League organizations, even though the Mexican League is technically an affiliate of Minor League Baseball.

Mesa and Linares will work with Mexican-born players to develop them for the Red Eagles' top team and to be sold to big league clubs. Other examples of big league teams purchasing the rights to Mexican League prospects include Manny Banuelos of the Yankees, Roberto Osuna of the Blue Jays and Julio Urias of the Dodgers.

Major League teams would benefit from the arrangement by being able to scout Cuban players with much greater ease. As it stands right now, the only time MLB scouts can see Cuban players live is during international tournaments; the rest of their scouting has to come via video footage from Cuba. Major League teams would be able to freely scout Cuban talent in Mexican League competition, however.

Eventually, it's possible that Japan and Korea could become involved in a similar arrangement, writes Badler. For now, the hope is that the additional salary earned by Cuban players in the Mexican League will curb some of the desire to defect to America. Cuba has seen several of its top players defect in recent years, including Aroldis Chapman, Yasiel Puig, Yoenis Cespedes, Leonys Martin, Jose Iglesias, Jose Dariel Abreu and Miguel Alfredo Gonzalez, among many others.

Here's a look back at this week at MLBTR.

• Hiroshi Yamauchi, the majority owner of the Mariners, passed away at age 85.
• The Phillies removed Ryne Sandberg's "interim" tag, making him their next manager.
• Yankees pitcher Andy Pettitte will retire after the season.
• Padres outfielder Mark Kotsay will retire after the season.
• Pirates pitcher A.J. Burnett is still considering whether to retire after the season.
• The Brewers claimed pitcher Josh Ravin from the Reds. To make room on their roster, they designated C/1B Blake Lalli for assignment.
• The Reds designated pitcher Kyle Lotzkar for assignment.
• The Orioles designated utilityman Wilson Betemit for assignment.
• The Yankees outrighted pitcher Jim Miller.
• The Royals promoted pitcher and top prospect Yordano Ventura.
• The Nationals received pitcher Matthew Spann from the Rays to complete the David DeJesus trade.
• The White Sox acquired pitcher Frank De Los Santos from the Rays for cash considerations.
• The Tigers signed pitcher Justin Miller to a minor-league deal.

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