Major League Ready

Now you are just refusing to acknowledge the problems associated with a straight salary floor. As I said, some folks just love the idea of forcing teams to spend so much that they are willing to overlook the obvious flaws in such a plan. I'm out.

I agree completely. That's why I suggested an alternative. Distributing revenue sharing based on team salary level takes away the financial incentive to tank. There personnel decision would be driven purely by what's best for the organization. It also provides more financial resource to low revenue teams. This is a much better way to improve competition or at least the opportunity to add players in a window of contention. It also eliminates the opportunity to circumvent the system by trading for bad contracts. The problem at hand is teams not investing revenue sharing in players. This plan is really just a flexible salary floor just like we have a flexible salary cap. The flexibility assures revenue sharing dollars are spent on players and it distributes those funds to the teams in the best position to utilize those funds to build a competitive team. It not only takes that revenue sharing away from teams that don't hit a certain floor, it increases revenue sharing to other low revenue teams that are in a better position to actually contend. I think people are in love with the idea of making teams spend that the flaws in such a plan are overlooked. Just think of how much angst there is here over spending regardless of if it makes sense in a given year. Do you think bias might influence how people see the value of a salary floor and how it's implemented?

There is generally a way to put in mechanisms to support the intended result. With bad NBA contracts they generally have to match the annual salary. They also have a salary cap and a much smaller variance in team salaries. I have not given this a great amount of thought I see talking on bad contracts as a way to circumvent the intent. As I said previously, I think the bigger problem is that even if it were not circumvented, a salary floor is not going to improve 57 or a 62 win team to matter in most cases. Plus, most to the bad teams spend sufficiently. Not to mention we can't force players to sign with bad teams. The idea has severe conceptual flaws IMO. However, redistributing revenue sharing based on payroll levels is a very similar concept that would increase revenue sharing to small and mid market teams when they were in a window of contention or fund teams willing to extend players. What I am suggesting is virtually the same thing as a salary floor without the challenges of a straight salary floor. Basically, give a handful of teams more financial resource to produce an actual contender instead of improving two or three 60 win teams by 4 or 5 wins.

Sure makes sense to me. I love Arraez but I would much prefer to keep Polanco. His wRC+ was 19 points higher than Arraez and I fear those knees. The problem I see is that the type of team (contender) that would trade for Arraez is unlikely to trade away an impact SP. They are going to offer prospects. Sure, there are exceptions but how often to Contenders trade good pitching and a rebuilding club is not going to be interested. By the time they are good, Arraez will be approaching free agency.

Four through seven look great. My initial reaction to a salary floor was it sounded good. Then I started thinking about the practical implications. Here are problems I would expect. 1) Most of the bad clubs including the Twins were spending reasonably. The Cubs and Nationals also were among the worst. Even the Diamondbacks spent $100M. The only bad teams with low salary last year were the Pirates and Rangers. The Rangers obviously shred their salary to prepare to reload and did so in a big way. Let’s forget 2020. In 2019 there were 4 bad teams, the Orioles, Royals, Tigers, and Mariners. The latter 3 have all successfully rebuilt in a modest amount of time. 2) The clubs spending very little are not markets that attract Free agents even when they are winning. How are these teams going to attract difference makers when they are in a terrible state? The only way is a vast overpay. A win through free agency is already cost $8M+. So, we are going to drive wages up and then add an over pay so a win is going to cost $10M or more. How many wins would be added? Four, maybe 5 wins. This is not going to make a 60 win team a different product. 3) It’s very likely teams in this position would take on an albatross contract in exchange for prospects. Spending on a free agent is going to do very little for the team during a rebuild so why not invest the money in future talent when it could matter. This would facilitate the high revenue teams dumping bad contracts so that they could sign productive free agents. It won’t cost them all that much because the small market teams are forced to spend. Once again widening the disparity. 4) If teams were able to sign the guys that make a difference on the field and payroll, a significant portion would turn out to be Chris Davis, Jason Heyward, Johnny Cueto, Jacoby Ellsbury, Eric Hosmer, Carl Crawford, or any of the 5+ year pitchers that were terrible in their final 3 years. Many of these acquisitions will not only be ineffective, they are going to be a major problem for the revenue disadvantaged teams when the get through their rebuild period. 5) There is a good chance the additions would be end of career guys like Simmons. I know most of us did not want to see Simmons when we could be playing someone that at least had a chance of being part of the future. A better approach would be to distribute revenue sharing to qualifying clubs based on what they spend. Reduce payments to clubs that are not spending on payments. That way teams can spend when it makes the most sense and a greater amount is distributed to teams in the years they have a decent shot at contending. Something definitely needs to be done with how the product is distributed. It’s hurting the game. However, it’s not realistic or fair to ask the teams that have great TV contracts/revenue to take a big hit and redistribute the revenues equally. Those teams will continue to generate far more broadcast revenue regardless of how it is distributed. MLB is not one business. It’s an industry and while I would love more parity, asking one business to subsidize their competitor is simply not reasonable. Would we suggest the highest paid players share their salaries with the lowest paid players? A salary floor has absolutely nothing to do with the relative merit of a luxury tax. If you raise the floor and take away the soft ceiling you have done nothing. With all of the holes in 1 and 2, 3 is very likely to contribute to the overall failure of this plan.

Balazovic Ryan SWR Winder Canterino I could see the 1st 3 in any order. Winder and Canterino could be reversed too so who knows. I will be interested to see why you rank them where you do. Great series, Seth.

I hear ya ... Some of them you don't think will be much develop a new pitch and all the sudden they are a different pitcher. MacKenzie Gore looked like one of the best prospects in baseball and now his future is questionable. Who knows! I am high on Raya while realizing he has not proven much so far.

I am curious who you mean specifically in the 11-20 group. Enlow (11) and maybe Strotman (15) we view as high ceiling guys, A lot of the other guys seem like they are just showing up as having upside now. .

I wondered where Raya would be ranked. Seems like Berrios is a pretty good comp. He would be a good bet for the Twins pitching prospect that makes the biggest jump in the national rankings this year.

Put another way. If Tampa / Oakland and NY / LA are run with an equal degree of skill, LA or NY could sign Verlander / Robbie Ray / Simien / Baez / Starling Marte and have the As or Ray's budget left over. If that's not a gigantic advantage why would anyone care about signing free agents.

Your idea sounds good in theory, not so good in practical application. If a team spends but does not lose they get nothing. That's not going to promote spending. How about a formula that ties a certain percentage of revenue sharing to the amount actually spent? That way, if a team decides their best avenue to contention results in less spending those funds can be redirected to teams that do spend. That's the best way to assure revenue sharing is spent on players.

Donaldson has negative value. Sano has no excess value. His 2023 option includes a $2.75M buyout so a team looking to trade would consider his current salary to include that buyout. $12M total. Maeda won't pitch in 2022 and it a FA after 2023. There is a lot of uncertainty the year after TJ so his value is minimal. Rogers salary negates his value but I would think he would still bring back a decent prospect in trade.

What is the solution? The Pirates or any other 60 win team should be required to spend $30 or $40M on free agents so that they can win an extra 4-5 wins? Are they going to be able to find someone who is both willing to come and won't be blocking a prospect at some point? One thing is for sure, if you take away revenue sharing their capacity to spend goes down. We simply have very different ways of interpreting data, practices and strategy. More importantly, we have come to very different conclusions and solutions. I think there is absolutely zero chance that the players current demands would not widen the level of disparity. That level of disparity already threatens the game and punishes the fans of any team outside the top revenue teams. Therefore, to extend that disparity would be idiotic on the owners part and a blow to fans of mid and small market teams.

You can say they all have the same chance all you want. The WS has been won by a team in the top portion of revenue 19 of the 22 years this century. The three teams that have won (Royals / Marlins / Dbacks.) it got there by sucking royally for long periods. The only two years the Royals and Marlins won 90 games this century is the year they won it all. The advantage of the revenue disparity is so brutally obvious that failing to acknowledge it sure seems lacking in objectivity. Where the Twins choices are concerned. I agree with you completely. However, that has nothing to do with the conversation we were having about tanking. All you did was confirm my point that we as fans want the prospects played and the teams SHOULD want to play them in order to build a contender. Yet, you are railing on teams for playing prospects. Apparently, it's bad simply because they are not punished financially for rebuilding. BTW ... If the revenue disparity does not matter, and the huge advantage in signing free agents does not matter, why is anyone here concerned at all about signing top free agents?

Once again, you are over simplifying to suit your narrative. The Dodgers hired a new front office and drastically changed their approach. The first several years of this century they tried to buy free agents and trade for stars. Enter the new front office that used their revenue advantage much more wisely. They kept top prospects, resigned their own great players, and they were much more selective in the free agents they added. The result is 9 straight years of 90 wins seasons and I am sure they will be there again this year. This is how dominant a top revenue team can be with the right practices. You also single out one team (Oakland) and ignore that 6 of these teams have 2 or less 90 win seasons. The top 3 teams all have 11 or more but you want to focus on the one team that has managed to beat the odds. I guess that would be important if the goal was to determine if it were still possible to win. I think the more relevant thesis is the probability of winning given the disparity in revenue. The answer is quite clear if you ask the relative probability of winning. Where reducing revenue sharing is concerned .. You are suggesting that if we take away revenue these teams are more likely to invest more money. That's really ill-conceived. If you want to be absolutely certain to diminish their capacity to contend., this works. If you want to curtail tanking, there are much better options. I would also ask what did Twins fan want when the season was lost. Did they want to see veteran players that were not part of our future or did they want prospects to get a shot? Teams focus on youth because they know it's essential to rebuilding. The Tanking thing has become propaganda for the players because it's a good sound bite.

You are assuming fans should be happy with a 500 team "every so often". Sounds like you are from NY or LA? We should be happy to be mediocre. A little improvement in parity could not hurt but that's not really the situation before us. The Player's ask is a significantly higher Luxury Tax Threshold and reduce revenue sharing. Those two thing individually would produce greater disparity. Together they are a big problem. Then, add the players want shorter terms of control and the top players are all in a big market a year earlier. That's their goal. Great if you are from a top 5 or even top 10 market. Just a kick in the groin for the rest of us. Here are the win percentages for the top 3 revenue teams since 2000 as well as number of 90 win seasons. Below them is the same for the bottom 14 teams. The result of their revenue advantage is quite obvious and while I agree improving the current level of disparity is very unlikely. I just don't understand for the life of me why any Twins fan or small market fan would be OK with the players demands. Dodgers 0.557 11 Yankees 0.582 13 Red Sox 0.551 11 ------------------------------------------- Oakland 0.535 10 Indians 0.516 9 Rays 0.490 8 Twins 0.502 6 Dbacks 0.490 4 Rockies 0.489 1 Brewers 0.488 4 Reds 0.481 3 Mariners 0.480 4 Marlins 0.480 1 Padres 0.476 1 Orioles 0.459 2 Pirates 0.452 2 Royals 0.442 1

I hope not. Seeing Smeltzer would mean they did nothing to improve the rotation after the lockout. If we see him after the first couple months it would also mean that the the plethora of Twins SP prospects with more upside than Smeltzer are still not ready.

I agree that capping contract length would have advantages that are good for the game and would be more equitable in terms of how revenue is distributed among players. The problem is players would fight this tooth and nail. They see this as something that would reduce the total amount paid to players and increasing their split is the start, middle, and end of why we might not have a full season this year. If contracts had length limits, Pujlos and many others would not get paid huge money to be replacement level and the players think this increases the amount owners spend. That’s a very parochial view and contradicts 50 years of history. Teams have spent and are going to continue to spend 85-90% of revenue less operating expenses. The long contracts also contribute to a disproportionate percentage of total salaries going to the top 5% of players. Obviously, the guys with the 7 or 10 or 13 year contracts are the players making massive amounts of money. If you want to pay players earlier, you can’t pay guys $25 or $30M to play at replacement level. You have to believe there is a Boras effect here. His interest is laser focused on the top earning players. While I agree with your position, we need to be cognizant of the current state of these negotiations. The players are asking for a laundry list of concessions. The owners are asking for more playoff games which is as much a win for the players as it is for the owners. Asking them to concede something at this point would result in a short season or none at all. I also agree that redistribution of revenue would be great for mid and small market teams. However, let’s think about what we are asking. We are asking one business owner to give up their competitive advantage. We are also asking them to give their competitor many millions of dollars. Why on earth would they agree? Would you suggest those top 50 players you referenced that are making a boatload give a significant portion of their salary to the younger players? Same basic concept, right? We need to keep in mind that players are going to fight for whatever they believe will get them every possible dollar regardless of the long-term impact on the game. They are here for a very short period. Owners are going to protect profits. That’s literally the goal of every for profit business. Our expectations as fans tends to ignore this is a business. The good news is the owners have a big time invested interest in the long-term health of the game. The bad news is these divergent interests have resulted in a lock out and may result in less baseball this summer or perhaps none at all.

I have had basically the same thought about this whole situation. You make a very good point. Owners are not going to spend because the super two rules change or free agency becomes shorter or even as a result of increased minimum salary. They have a high degree of control over the bottom line so long as revenue does not go down which is why I don't agree it's about power. I believe like many others here that the large markets already have an enormous advantage. The owners have offered a reasonable solution to most of the demands. The impasse is shortening, reducing revenue sharing, and the amount of increase to the luxury tax. The players demand would elevate the already large competitive advantage for top revenue market. Eliminate a year of control and the top players in bottom half markets all end up in the top markets a year earlier. Taking away revenue sharing while raising the luxury tax to any significant degree obviously increases the current level of competitive disparity which is already threatening the product on the field. These things together should have any fan of teams in the bottom half of revenue saying hell no.

I was critical of Sano when that not a popular position so I am not a supporter. However, his numbers are above average so it's not like he is a total slug some make him out to be. Career PAs 2778 with a wRC+ of 118 and an OPS of 819. Roasrio has 3242 PAs with a wRC+ of 105 and an OPS of 782. Having said this, my hope for Sano and his future is that he comes to camp in shape, has a great 1st half, and is traded for something of value at the deadline.

The Milb players that become MLB players are going to do just fine. Perhaps more to the point is that the a high percentage of high bonus players never make it to the majors. Why should Mark Appel get a bonus equal to what 3 EMT’s would make in their entire lifetime? Perhaps more to the point is that ML teams are already paying out almost $300M a year in draft bonuses. More than that if you count International. It’s paid based on a presumption these are the players that will make it when we know for certain a high percentage fail. So, why don’t we pay them when they actually earn it and in the meantime pay all of the players their fair share? You want to have the bonus pool start at $2M. Fine, the amount of money redistributed as salry goes from roughly 77% of the bonus pool to 60%. You want to weight the distribution more heavily to AA and AAA to take care of more tenured Milb players, fine. There are many ways to reconfigure the present system but paying players who fail a bonus equivalent to a hundred years salary for the average American and then paying all of his peers squat seems unfair to me. I am not even a little concerned about the guys who make that on average make 100X your EMT example and I surely don't see a need to protect the guys making $100M or $200M or $300M. They will be just fine without our concern.

This came up earlier. How many 1st rounders or any rounders are good enough to have a legitimate shot at being great professionals in two sports? A couple a year and certainly not a 1st rounder every year. Of those players, most turn out to be Kohl Stewart not Dave Winfield. Should we / should the union & owners take care of all of the Milb players or the 1 in a 5,000 that ends up being a great baseball player. Half of those would still probably elect to play baseball.

I think you are pretty much spot on. I hate to admit it but I am satisfied to just keep the status quo where parity is concerned because it just does not seem possible to get either side to do much about parity. What I don't want is shorter control or less revenue sharing in the form proposed by the players.

You have a point on the universal DH. I am not sure if either side has proposed the universal DH. I had the impression from numerous radio shows that both sides want it. The Owners to liven up the game and the players because it adds high paying jobs. Perhaps that should probably go under things both sides want. Both sides have proposed amendments to free agency. However, if you want to put the DH and free agency on the player’s side or position in whatever manner you like. What exactly are the owners asking players to give up that they have now? What is this pound of flesh? The owners are not asking for anything in return. There is no give and take here. They simply are not giving them everything they have asked for and as previously discussed, the other things they are asking for is detrimental to the game and fans of most teams. Perhaps more importantly, how do these proposals of both sides impact fans. That's where this was heading. The owners proposals are all positive for fans. Please feel free to point out any that are harmful. We can't say the same for the players proposals.

The fans don't have to lose. Each side has proposed certain changes. Not all of them hurt the fans. The owners have proposed .... Expanded Playoffs. Some fans don't like this but it would not be on the table if fans did not want to watch additional playoff games and we saw from the test season that it created more interest for fans of several teams. Universal DH. Same thing. Some fans will hate it but I think the majority find this a win. Moving up free agency based on age. Very nice for a subset of players. No benefit to owners and a modest loss for fans in small markets but overall not a big impact. An increase in the league minimum. Net gain for players. I see this as relatively inconsequential for owners and completely inconsequential to fans. Draft Lottery - Small win for fans The players have proposed .... Less revenue sharing and an increase in the luxury tax would be a big win for a few teams. Obviously, it's a detriment to the fans of all of the other teams to varying degree depending on their relative revenue. Players have proposed to reduce the time to free agency although there are conflicting reports as to the actual demand. This would benefit large market teams to the detriment of small teams and their fans. The relative degree would depend on specific terms. Changes to Super-two eligibility. A win for players. Relatively meaningless to fans. I would say it's quite clear the fans would suffer some losses if the players prevail. I see absolutely no detrimental affect for fans in anything the owners have suggested. Actually, I some of their proposed changes are a modest win for fans although the expanded playoffs are probably a fairly significant win for fans of all of those teams that remain in the playoff race. I don't think improving parity is essential. However, the disparity has reached a point where furthering it would be detrimental to the game and certainly detrimental to the fans in mid and small markets.