The Marlins Are The Collusion
Over on Twitter.com, Phillies prospect guy Matt Winkleman had an interesting thought. Behold.
You know what is really funny in a way. Given the way the offseason has gone, everything would have started falling the Marlins way if they wanted to contend
— Matt Winkelman (@Matt_Winkelman) March 9, 2018
Indeed, the Marlins could have had a very fun offseason. Jeets would be feted as the savior of Miami. If team failed to get off the ground, he could have sold all the same assets at a mid-season mark up.
By now, you may notice this isn’t about fantasy baseball. Strictly speaking, it’s a fantasy about baseball. Kinda adjacent, right? Sure.
Recall the Marlins trades:
1. Dee Gordon to Seattle for three guys
2. Giancarlo Stanton and cash to New York for Starlin Castro and somehow-not-Clint Frazier
3. Marcell Ozuna to St. Louis for Magneuris Sierra, Sandy Alcantara, and two more guys
4. Christian Yelich to Milwaukee for actual prospects – namely Lewis Brinson and Isan Diaz
The series of swaps deprived the Marlins of their four best hitters – they’re fine fielders too – and roughly 17 projected wins above replacement level. Upside for over 20 wins. A team of scrubs plus healthy seasons from those four athletes is basically a 70 win campaign. Kinda like what happened in 2017. There are a lot of ways to add another 15 to 20 wins with the remaining 21 players, the sum of which is colloquially referred to as a “Wild Card contender.”
Presumably, the Marlins didn’t consider adding to this roster because Derek Jeter and friends heavily leveraged their bid to buy the club. Cutting costs was always Plan A. Yet, if they had known how far some of these free agent markets would crater, might they have pursued a different plan? Is it possible to sell tickets to a Marlins game?
We could stop here. It didn’t happen. They had a fire. Sale. Also, by selling, they changed market conditions. To wit:
1. The Mariners didn’t need a center field capable outfielder like Lorenzo Cain, Jarrod Dyson, or Keon Broxton (it is Dipoto…)
2. The Yankees had very little cap room with which to work. No Yu Darvish. No J.D. Martinez.
3. The Cardinals are a tad more fiscally and outfielderly constrained. They spent their most expendable prospects.
4. The Brewers maybe still buy Cain. Or maybe they go for Darvish, Jake Arrieta, or another addition. Or stick with their rebuild. Fantasy owners don’t have to deal with their weird outfield/first base rotation. They look less contendable.
I point this out because it’s easy to say the Marlins could have gotten Mike Moustakas, a couple solid relievers (oh, hello Addison Reed and Tony Watson), and a starter. In reality, their deal making had a stark effect on supply and demand.
Consider the Yankees. I assume they’d still eagerly dump Chase Headley. Probably to sign Todd Frazier thus thrusting Moustakas into the waiting bosom of the Mets. Or maybe it’s Neil Walker who wins in this scenario. We can’t assume Moustakas is there for the Fish. The Royals are indifferent about all of this.
In this scenario, New York also could have money to squeeze in Darvish. Or at least scare the Red Sox into paying more for Martinez. Arrieta reunites with the Cubs.
The Cardinals maybe have a little bit more money to sign relievers. Trade Sierra for Alex Colome, keep Stephen Piscotty, sign Reed or Watson or pony up for Greg Holland. Roster winds up similarly competent in a slightly different way.
The Twins don’t sign Reed. They instead sign Alex Cobb after Ervin Santana’s injury. They still trade for Jake Odorizzi too.
I guess the Mariners find money for Cain. Which means the Brewers are left starring at Lance Lynn or Cobb. They have bullets like Brinson, Diaz , and cash money available for future additions.
Once we sort through the trickle down, we find the Marlins signing players like Walker and Trevor Cahill (Is he dead? Why is he a free agent?) in this wait-out-the-market scenario. This is starting to feel like they’ll get stranded under 81 wins again. Perhaps, even knowing what we know about the slow market, they were right to tear it down as rapidly as they did.
Did you notice what happens if they had kept all their players? Martinez signs for more with Boston, probably in early January as pressure from the Yankees forces them to make a blocking move. The pitching market remains clogged until late-January when the Yankees finally dive on Darvish. They skim just under the tax threshold with Frazier. Moustakas signs yesterday with the Mets, possibly for a few more dollars. The remaining three notable pitchers find a home shortly after Darvish. They get less than they wanted, but they aren’t left holding one-year offers. Walker gets a major league contract somewhere. Holland may be on a roster.
Although a slow offseason – the Dodgers, Giants, and Tigers are still basically completely uninvolved while other big spenders like the Phillies and White Sox are still reading about The Tipping Point – this hypothetical looks a LOT more like recent offseasons.
I think, probably, the worst of the offseason “collusion” can be traced back to the Marlins flooding the market with cheap, premium talent.
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This isn’t even taking into account the fact that Jeets stood up in front of all of the other owners and TOLD them that they were going to cut all of this salary. It’s one thing for the whole league to know a team is selling , something else entirely to know exactly which players MUST be moved. The Marlins flooded the league with young talent, and the talent was cheap because the Marlins had less leverage than they should have had.
OH MY GOD
They had a fire. Sale.
And, Scene.
Tobias Funke
*Slow clap*
Why are we still pretending the Marlins failed in not getting the Yankees to pay more for Stanton (somehow not Frazier)?
It was a $300M contract that almost no team was willing to take. On top of that, Stanton has a full no-trade clause and was dictating basically two teams it was down to. And one didn’t want to pay. The Marlins has exactly zero leverage and did great in getting what they did.
What until mid season? Great, as long as he doesn’t get hurt.
The Marlins did great in getting less than nothing from the Yankees? They took Castro’s contract, they’re paying part of Stanton’s contract, and got organizational filler back.
This is an excellent post. The Marlins fire sale of very talented players has a two way effect, because a talented team (them) was clearly not buying any free agents, and they have filled the needs of several contenders with these four players. In some ways this is like shrinking MLB to 28 teams.
The Pirates had a smaller effect, and less of a case that they might be wild card contenders, but also signalled that they would not be buying free agents. The Astros did not really need Cole, but the Giants may have been shopping for an outfielder if Cutch was not moved. Having Josh Harrison on the block probably did not help Moustakas’s or Frazier’s negotiating position.
While there are always some clear sellers or rebuilders and there is no expectation they will buy in free agency, when a would-be contender or middle ground team unnecessarily shifts into a rebuild, it can have a huge effect on the market.
Players are traded every offseason, though. And none of the guys traded by the Marlins and Pirates would have affected the market for guys like Lucroy and Morrison, who also got a lot less than expected.
Honestly, those were errant expectations. These types of players already slipped through the cracks every recent offseason. Morrison was pretty bad until last year and had some red flags despite the breakout. Lucroy arguably is a terrible catcher now. These are assets that sometimes get very overpaid but legitimately deserve to be paid like a ~1-win player on a 1-year contract.
Moustakas is secretly similar to them, but that’s not something that would have been noticed in past campaigns. From a season ticket sales perspective, a team can sell him as a major upgrade. That’s… something. No Twins fan is suddenly buying more tickets to see Morrison.
Money isn’t the issue for the Cardinals. They could pay Holland, but they don’t have interest in him on a long-term deal at his asking price.
Meanwhile, the Piscotty trade happens either way (partly due to extenuating circumstances), while they would’ve gone after a different outfield upgrade instead. Perhaps they’re the ones who sign Cain in this scenario.
Or maybe they just put up with Jose Martinez’s OF defense mixed with Sierra as a defensive replacement.
Given that everybody is signing for a fraction of their expectation, Holland has to be down to a one-year, $18MM or three-year, $30MM framework.
Why are one year deals bad? The player still gets paid, and the team doesn’t take a risk in purchasing decline years. This is the way baseball should go.
Because we told these guys “hey, we’re going to pay you really shitty wages for 4 or 5 years, then we’re going to pay you good wages but nowhere near what you deserve, then we’ll finally pay you about half you deserve for two more years. And if you can make it through those 12 years, you get to a reward.”
Now they’ve taken away the reward. These contracts would make sense if a guy like Francisco Lindor was making $10MM.
500,000 a year is not “shitty wages.”
No, MLB league minimum and early arb was the middle portion of my comment (“good but nowhere near deserved”). Before that, for about 5 years in minors, they get paid less than most homeless people earn sitting on the sidewalk.
We do disagree, Mr. Johnson. Players are adequately paid, and I am glad to see all these one-year contracts. The owners are finally coming to their senses. Moustakas had an on-base of .308, his fielding metrics dropped substantially, and don’t get me started on Martinez. He wanted teams to pay for his career year. I enjoyed watching the players get taken down a peg this offseason.
So you prefer bloated old dudes to make all the money….
The old dudes aren’t making the money, Mr. Johnson. Owners are avoiding those contracts. The owners take all the risk. How many first rounders don’t make it? The current pay structure is good and fair. No way in hell a mediocre player like Moustakis should have received 80 million dollars, and now the owners are wising up, and won’t pay old guys those insane contracts. Sanity is coming back to the sport. The disastrous Miggy and Pujols deals hopefully will be a thing of the past like the VCR tape or eight-track tapes. As a fan, it offends me to see some old timer hanging around for that last payday. I don’t get paid for what I did last year I get paid for what I do now, and it should be the same with MLB players. Paying for declining years is foolish, and counterproductive. Now if the MLB had contracts like the NFL things would be better. The Angels could release Albert and move on, but because of the current structure, the players fought for they have to pay that washed up has-been. The players decided to screw the lower class when they negotiated the last CBA, and I find it deliciously ironic that the players are now crying about the CBA they negotiated. The players think they are so slick, and I hope they enjoy their chefs and the other perks they received.