Baseball Strike or Team Expansions? The Start of the 2018 Baseball season
Pitchers and catchers are checking into the clubs spring training facilities this week, where the start of a new baseball season is beginning. Handful of players will be joining new teammates who decided to join with different clubs this season, like Christian Yelich who was traded from the Marlins to the Brewers and Yu Darvish who signed with the Chicago Cubs this past weekend. The current issue with this past off season has been the lack of signed players to new clubs this season, with the demand of having multi-million contracts that are well in the nine digit range. Clubs have regretted making some these contract signings over the past decade due to the circumstances of the players not living up to their expectation and health issues that go along with age.
A handful of players agents are even demanding for their clients to receive the highest amount possible and using other elite players as examples in order to be treated the same way. Example, in 2016 David Price demanded to be paid like Clayton Kershaw had been with the Dodgers because he believed his career resume was just as good with many playoff appearances with multiple teams (Rays, Tigers, and Blue Jays), starting for the American League in the 2010 All Star game, and one Cy Young from 2012; needless to say, he got what he wanted with the deal he signed with Boston worth $217 million over seven years. Notorious baseball agent Scott Boras represents the second best pitcher this off season; Jake Arrieta, who demands to be paid a contract that is Max Scherzer or Price worthy in the $200 million dollar range with feats that include a Cy Young from 2015 and an All Star selection along with a World Series ring in 2016. The problem is teams are looking at the high risk over the reward Arrieta has to offer, with his early struggles in the game followed by a decline of his high octane performance from 2015-2017. Let’s be real for a second, did the Angels “care” about the risk or age factor after they signed Albert Pujols after winning a World Series? Did the Tigers put their foot in their mouth after giving Miguel Cabrera a dream contract and sold the rest of the team along with hopes of ever becoming a contender again? Are the Marlins finally eating it after trading away Giancarlo Stanton to the Yankees after providing him a contract that even they know they could never afford? Yes, all these teams regret it now, because they game is constantly changing in this new era of baseball; however, what goes along with this new era of baseball are the new features of talent that continue to be utilized to the games highest potential year after year.
With the league looking at this problem dead in the face, it is not completely unrealistic that the commissioner of baseball actually take into account of what he was looking forward in the near future and that’s league expansion. Another ridiculous factor that baseball writers have surfaced is that with the amount of free agents this off season, you can fill a whole 25-man roster for a whole team. To make this ridiculous claim even more realistic, a great amount of these free agents have arrived in Florida for spring training and practice under former MLB coaches in order to display their best for scouts and teams this season. The unfortunate side from this entire picture is that not all of these players are “invited” to participate in “real” spring training scenarios, like actually playing a game against teams this spring. Now, with the amount of free agents left unsigned this season and the huge amount of players that will be available as free agents the following season, it is not unrealistic for the league to allow new ownership to come forward and create new teams for the MLB. With the current free agent class, let’s pretend that these new teams existed and signed these players for two new teams; one for each league:
Catcher: Jonathon Lucroy and Geovany Soto
First Base: Eric Hosmer and Logan Morrison
Second Base: Neil Walker and Arismendy Alcantara (also Brandon Phillips is an honorable mention
Third Base: Mike Moustakas and Eduardo Nunez
Shortstop: Erik Aybar, Stephen Drew, and/or J.J. Hardy
Left Field: Jon Jay, Ben Revere, Melky Cabrera, and/or Colby Rasmus (depending on if Rasmus is still hung up on “retirement”)
Center Field: Carlos Gomez and Jarrod Dyson (Rajai Davis is another honorable mention)
Right Field: J. D. Martinez, Carlos Gonzalez, Jose Bautista, and/or Andre Ethier
Team One Rotation: Jake Arrieta, Lance Lynn, Andrew Cashner, Brett Anderson, Chris Tillman
Team Two Rotation: Alex Cobb, Jamie Garcia, Jason Vargas, Jeremy Hellickson, John Lackey
Closers: Greg Holland and Huston Street
These are just highlighted names that are still on the top ranked free agent list that still have not been signed yet. This also does not include more names to fill the rosters entirely, like the bench and bullpen (also inserting the fact that these teams have farm systems). If either of these were a team, they probably would have made a fantasy baseball playoff run; either way if these names came up on ONE team they make that team scary good on paper. Problems that follow making the selected rosters with these players only come with finances, age, and staying healthy; despite going to a new city that would feature baseball for the first time to the MLB and playing more teams from the divisions that are lucky to add a six team and join their competition. There are numerous amount of baseball fans that believe they can do a job better than Rob Manfred, and if anyone from the office of the commissioner is reading my blog, let’s have less focus on rule changes for “the improvement of the game” and get to making with more teams for my season to become more enjoyable.
These are all high hopes and we look for the rest of the dominoes to fall in free agency before the start of Opening Day. Who knows? Maybe we will see some new faces as spring training roll along bit by bit. Maybe some of these players will take a year off and play elsewhere like Japan and then test free agency at the end of this season again. I’m happy we’re getting baseball back soon and I’ll have some cold brews to share with you all.
Speaking of, Tampa Bay Beer Week is less than a month away and I will be sharing more beer posts sooner than later as we keep getting further and further into the season. Until then, cheer and stay warm friends!
