MLB 2026 Off season

JeBurkhardt said:

Jearlpam0925 said:

Wobbie said:

Jearlpam0925 said:

If there's a team dumb enough to give him $50MM/yr it's the Mets. But I love Tucker.

Also, scratch that - every fan should want their owner to throw money around like it's nothing.

there’s an ongoing debate about “cheap owners.” some points are valid but it’s also true that some teams have huge financial advantages. others have huge disadvantages.

Sorry can't have any sympathy to the idea of broke owners. I always come back to the idea that the sport needs a salary floor more than a cap.

I did a search and based on 2024 numbers, the lowest team revenue was $257M. 24 teams had payroll less than $257M.Only 9 teams had a revenue/payroll ratio of over 50%. The money is there to spend on payroll to improve the team if they want to.  

there’s plenty of talk about “cheap owners” who don’t care about winning and only care about lining their pockets.

there’s also plenty of talk about how the d*dgers are “ruining the game.”

I think both are true. the so called “small market” teams could offer ridiculous contracts to a few players….not to entire starting nine like the d*dgers….if you have $257M in revenue, you can’t have a $400M payroll like the d*dgers. and even if the pirates had offered 4/240M to tucker, would he go there? and would the d*dgers then just offer 4/250?

Wobbie said:

JeBurkhardt said:

Jearlpam0925 said:

Wobbie said:

Jearlpam0925 said:

If there's a team dumb enough to give him $50MM/yr it's the Mets. But I love Tucker.

Also, scratch that - every fan should want their owner to throw money around like it's nothing.

there’s an ongoing debate about “cheap owners.” some points are valid but it’s also true that some teams have huge financial advantages. others have huge disadvantages.

Sorry can't have any sympathy to the idea of broke owners. I always come back to the idea that the sport needs a salary floor more than a cap.

I did a search and based on 2024 numbers, the lowest team revenue was $257M. 24 teams had payroll less than $257M.Only 9 teams had a revenue/payroll ratio of over 50%. The money is there to spend on payroll to improve the team if they want to.  

there’s plenty of talk about “cheap owners” who don’t care about winning and only care about lining their pockets.

there’s also plenty of talk about how the d*dgers are “ruining the game.”

I think both are true. the so called “small market” teams could offer ridiculous contracts to a few players….not to entire starting nine like the d*dgers….if you have $257M in revenue, you can’t have a $400M payroll like the d*dgers. and even if the pirates had offered 4/240M to tucker, would he go there? and would the d*dgers then just offer 4/250?

finally, I’m tired of the narrative that the d*dgers “are smart and draft and develop well.” how fucking “smart” do you have to be to sign every top FA? it’s not like they’re taking a chance on these guys (and if they do turn out badly, it doesn’t even matter….they’ll just buy replacements). as far as drafting and developing, they don’t….smith, muncy and pages are the only guys they drafted. with the addition of tucker, I’m not even sure pages plays anymore. most of their so-called prospects (may, lux, outman, etc. have turnedout to be very average).

as pjhawks said, this can’t be good for baseball. the only upside is more and more people are coming around to hating the d*dgers as I ALWAYS have.

Correct. No talent or skill involved in buying up all the players. The Phillies have done a good bit of this as well, but certainly not to that level.

pjhawks said:

No one can argue Kyle Tucker getting 60 million per year is good for the game.  

The lockout after next year is going to be brutal,  the small market teams need to organize and get major changes to the salary structure changed significantly.  As a Phillies fan I’m a fan of a team that spends a lot but I know it’s not good for the game.  Manfred allowing the Dodgers to defer so much salary especially for Ohtani was a complete failure as commissioner.  

NFL does deferring all the time.  I don't see a problem with it.  Kyle Tucker getting 60 a year IS a problem.

Jearlpam0925 said:

JeBurkhardt said:

Jearlpam0925 said:

Wobbie said:

Jearlpam0925 said:

If there's a team dumb enough to give him $50MM/yr it's the Mets. But I love Tucker.

Also, scratch that - every fan should want their owner to throw money around like it's nothing.

there’s an ongoing debate about “cheap owners.” some points are valid but it’s also true that some teams have huge financial advantages. others have huge disadvantages.

Sorry can't have any sympathy to the idea of broke owners. I always come back to the idea that the sport needs a salary floor more than a cap.

I did a search and based on 2024 numbers, the lowest team revenue was $257M. 24 teams had payroll less than $257M.Only 9 teams had a revenue/payroll ratio of over 50%. The money is there to spend on payroll to improve the team if they want to.  

And moreso I don't think these "small market" owners can cry for a cap when they gladly accept their welfare checks from the luxury tax & other revenue sharing splits.

My thoughts are you can have a cap and still have small market teams collect these "welfare checks"(that's funny btw).

The problem is those small market teams don't care about actually winning.  They'll need lightning in a bottle to make it to a WS.  Sometimes they can sniff the wildcard but that's about it.

Wobbie said:

there's easy fix....I believe tempo is way more of an NBA fan than I....I won't pretend to understand the NBA's luxury tax>first apron>second apron thing but I believe there are much more punitive measures if you "overspend"...loss of draft picks, restrictions on trading, etc...the luxury tax in baseball doesn't work. it's only money to the d*dgers.

BTW, the d*dgers TV deal gives them $334M annually; the brewers get 1/10th that.

Do u remember when they signed that deal? 25 years for 8 Billion dollars!

Loss of draft picks in baseball is a minor offense.  You have 22 rounds of drafting then an international draft where they are signing 12year olds...

Remember the Braves getting popped and having to let go of their picks.  Maitan, a highly touted prospect they drafted, got picked up by the Halos.  he never panned out and the Braves still won a WS a few years afterwards.

Wobbie said:

there's easy fix....I believe tempo is way more of an NBA fan than I....I won't pretend to understand the NBA's luxury tax>first apron>second apron thing but I believe there are much more punitive measures if you "overspend"...loss of draft picks, restrictions on trading, etc...the luxury tax in baseball doesn't work. it's only money to the d*dgers.

BTW, the d*dgers TV deal gives them $334M annually; the brewers get 1/10th that.

Poncier said:

Johnny Abruzzo said:

Wobbie said:

pjhawks said:

No one can argue Kyle Tucker getting 60 million per year is good for the game.  

 

he earned it….22 HR, 73 RBI, .266 BA in 2025. a modern day Willie Mays!

What was his WAR?

Korean War I think, but maybe WWII.

The War of the Roses 

Kellerman and Bill Simmons had a good conversation on the yankees and all the labor stuff a couple months ago. A couple things in the labor situation that I thought was good...

The way to incentivize the the smaller market teams to spend and to be competitive is giving them a similar approach to the NBA where only the original team has the ability to pay them the most amount of money giving them a better chance of retaining stars. There's no incentive for them to pay big bucks for one guy which it might get them a few extra wins or make them a bit more competitive but is going to hurt the business. Having the ability to retain stars will give them a better chance at being competitive and more incentive to spend than just having a floor.

Also made the point that the Yankees are actually a poor team now with Dodgers and Mets being owned by the people they are and that this is a hobby for them and not where they actually made their money. For the Steinbrenner's the Yankees are their business. That said, F Hal.

That said, we're not seeing baseball next year. No shot.