How Baseball Cooled the Stove

MLB players are upset. Owners aren't opening up checkbooks and writing checks for players for whatever number they throw out there. Players are looking to their union to do something about it. There has to be some kind of collusion they say. It seems like just a few years ago that the biggest free agents every year were setting new records right and left for biggest contracts. Now people sit around for months not getting gigs. Now I certainly don't want to stick up for the owners but there are many factors that have lead baseball to this situation.

1. Too many contracts not living up to the money. If players want big money then they have to make sure that when they sign a big contract they live up to it. Too many contracts are the Albert Pujols and Robbie Cano contracts and not enough JD Martinez contracts. The players love the money but they are leading to more wins for teams. Chris Davis got the big contract and played worse. Mike Trout's contract is huge and if he were a free agent, he may get another big one because he shows up and makes his team better. The Rockies spent big money on their bullpen in 2018 and the players who pitched best were players already in the organization and young guys.

2. Analytics have turned most players into average players. Why should a team sign any player when it seems like a 100 of them are all alike? Does it seem like all players are hitting .245 with 21 hr's and 100 strikeouts? The shifts have turned great players into average players. It is so hard to believe that a player is an all star and then because a team plays them all to one side of the infield they turn into a .265 hitter. Take your launch angle and launch a ground ball to the opposite side of the field and hit .400. Why pay someone 20 million a year that can produce the same as a minor league call up making a couple hundred grand.

3. Players are mad that teams aren't spending, they are mad that the teams they want to spend aren't spending. Machado and Harper can get the money they want from the Nationals, the Phillies, and or the White Sox, but they are mad that it isn't the Yankees, the Red Sox, the Cubs, or the Dodgers. The Player's Union and the Agents should get the boys to sign big contracts with the Phillies and the White Sox and set the market for the other guys to sign up right after. There are players who aren't signing, or who don't know what to sign up for, because they are waiting on Harper and Machado. However, those two are mad because the teams they want to play for aren't paying the same as the teams they don't want to play for. Sign for the money or sign for the place you want to live but sign. The Yankees are and can only sign so many people for 300+ million.

4. The Owner's aren't innocent. In the MLB it isn't as big of a deal to tank. Just as many players picked in later rounds end up great players as do first round draft picks so tanking to get better picks is stupid. Playing young players to get them experience when you suck makes sense, but getting rid of everybody good and not going for it every year is dumb. Don't over spend if it doesn't equal wins, but try your best to win the World Series every year. Build a culture of winning. If you put in a great scouting program and development division for you organization, you don't have to pick top ten year after year to get great players come up through your ranks. To do the Miami thing makes no sense. The Yankees replenished their farm system in one month a few years back. Billy Beane has been signing second tier players and then trading them for prospects half way through the year for many seasons and its helped keep them relevant. Teams that tank make no sense at all.

5. Stop trying to get a ten year deal and just get a big deal on a five year deal. NBA players and NFL players keep getting higher per deals every year with hard salary caps but they also have shorter term deals. Instead of ten year at 400 million, get five years at 225. Teams may give more per year if they know it won't kick their ass for the next decade and four different general managers.

There doesn't need to be work stoppages and there doesn't need to be massive rule changes. There just needs to be some common sense and the Hot Stove can get burning once more.

The Dr