The Table Setter, Jan. 11, 2024: Surprise! A Deadline

News continues to come more in trickle than torrent, but by today at noon, teams have to either agree with arbitration-eligible players on deals to avoid that noxious process or submit their figures for a potential hearing. At 7 PM tonight, those figures will be officially exchanged. That's what much of today will be about, and then moves should pick up starting this weekend.

Everyone Just Wants a Longer Long Weekend
With much of the country set to observe Martin Luther King Jr. Day Monday and enjoy a three-day weekend, the league and the players association agreed last month to move up the deadline for the exchange of arbitration figures from Friday to today. Presumably, at least for teams who have a decent chunk of their offseason moving and shaking done, this means a four-day weekend for some folks who have worked hard for it. Call it anything you want, but you can't call it unrelatable.

Big Twins Decisions Coming Into Focus
Why does this seemingly banal procedural deadline matter? Say you're the Twins. You're facing pretty strict financial constraints this winter, pending the resolution of the TV rights questions hanging over everything, and you have seven players eligible for arbitration. Add their projected salaries (per MLB Trade Rumors) together, and they account for $18.8 million of your payroll for the coming season. That's no chump change, given how much you have committed to Carlos Correa and Byron Buxton and the holes you still need to fill.

It's also not a real number, though--not yet. As good as MLBTR's projections typically are, it could easily be as little at $17 million or (more likely, in this particular case) as much as $20.5 million that you end up paying those seven players. A few million dollars don't go as far as they used to, in MLB, but that range of possible outcomes is not totally negligible. They can shape and alter your set of options for the balance of the offseason.

For that reason, look for the team to get deals done with just about all of these guys, and if they don't get one done (with Kyle Farmer, for instance), it might signal a greater likelihood that they'll trade that player, rather than a real willingness to go to a hearing with them.

It also matters because of how the same process shapes other teams' options. The Twins are still in contact with the Brewers about a potential Corbin Burnes trade, but both sides will want to know what Burnes is actually going to make in 2024 before talking more concretely about the secondary pieces in such a trade. Today will be busy, and the stakes are higher than you'd think.

You'll Hear Nothing and Like It
While we're all going to get clarity on some arbitration stuff 24 hours earlier than expected, no one is getting clarity any time soon on the bankruptcy of Bally Sports parent company, Diamond Sports Group. An important hearing was pushed back this week, delaying any move that might give the Twins (or Rangers, or Guardians, or any of several other teams only slightly less urgently interested in how this will all shake out) more certainty about the ways they might broadcast their games (and get paid for the rights) in 2024.

As has been the case going back two decades (to the days of the first fights between cable companies and the channels trying to mill their rights to live sports into sky-high carriage fees), all of the extremely wealthy people and entities involved will ultimately win in this staredown. They're fighting over the rightmost six or seven numbers in ledgers with nine or 10 digits before the decimal point. The losers, again, are the fans. I'm not sure there's anything we can do to change that, but we shouldn't lose sight of it.

A Few Thoughts on Specific Arbitration Cases
Farmer will garner the most eyeballs today, because if his projected salary of $6.6 million pans out, he's a bit of a luxury for a team on a budget. He's not the only name worth checking on closely, though. MLBTR only pegs Jeffers for $2.3 million, but given his surface-level numbers in 2023, I would take the over. His playing time will cap his earning power, but he has a chance to get expensive over the next couple years. Catcher is one place where the Twins farm system is shallow, and finding a legitimate medium-term prospect who could take over for Jeffers should be on their to-do list for the year.

Are you ready for Arbageddon? (Get it?) Do you think the Twins will pull the trigger on any form of a Burnes trade? Let's chop it up, as the stove heats up just in time for the cold of January to really seize us all.