Let's talk 2024 Payroll

[Bertz]

This morning, MLB Trade Rumors released their arbitration projections. These are historically extremely accurate, so we now can put together a good snapshot of the team's payroll ahead of what we expect to be a very active winter.

A few notes before we lead off:

- I sourced data primarily from Roster Resource, with 2024 arb #s from MLBTR and some details on Hendricks/Gomes' options from Cot's contracts. I'm just one dude though so I may have fat fingered something along the way (edit: TT also caught a few process errors I initially made and have now fixed)

- I'm only looking at luxury tax dollars. Now that Marquee is fully stood up and attendance is back at pre-pandemic levels I assume LT dollars matter much more than actual cashflow like it did from 2015-2019

- I'm not assuming any non-tenders, even if they may seem obvious 

- I used the aforementioned MLBTR arb projections that just came out for 2024, and then assumed a 50% annual raise for each guy's subsequent turns through arbitration (its a rough estimate, but works well in the aggregate)

- I also looked ahead to 2025 and 2026. It seems very likely that the team is going to pass the luxury tax this winter, however based on what happened at the tail end of the last competitive window it's almost a certainty that Jed won't be allowed to exceed the luxury tax three years straight. Given that 2026 is also the last year under the current CBA, I think it's likely that Jed will plan to dip under in '26, so you want to be mindful of how many dollars you add to that year this early

Without further ado:

2024 Payroll

2024 Players Definitely under contract: $100.8M (6 players) - Dansby, Seiya, Nico, Taillon, Happ, and Smyly are all written in stone

2024 Players in Arb: ~$16M (9 players) - No one is slated to make a ton, though I do wonder if Steele's projected number is a bit low. Guys who do well in awards/all star consideration tend to get paid handsomely

Filling out the Roster: ~$34M - 11 league min guys at ~750k each, 7 IL spots at ~750k each (i.e. when you put someone on the IL, you have to call up a minor leaguer.  Both guys are making MLB salaries during that time), 14 minor leaguers on the 40 man getting ~150K each, player benefits at ~$17M, and ~$1.7M to the pre-arb bonus pool

Additional commitments: $13.3 - Paying Mancini, Barnhart, and Bote to stay home

All told we are looking at a total of $164.1M before option decisions on Stroman (player, $23.7M), Hendricks (Club, $15M after the buyout), and Gomes (Club, $5M after the buyout).  

Since all three of those guys look likely to be retained, our estimated total before trades or non-tenders is about $207.8M, leaving $29M in payroll room before the first Luxury Tax threshold of $237M

 

2025 Payroll

The club has a ton of commitments coming off the books prior to 2025:

Stroman - $23.7M

Hendricks - $16.5M

Smyly - $9.5M

Mancini - $7M

Gomes - $6M

Barnhart - $3.5M

Bote - $3M

Total - $69.7M

Arb raises for guys already in arb for 2024 shouldn't be crazy, maybe with the exception of Steele if he keeps it up. Using my 50% arb estimate and subtracting out the FA's and dead money above puts the starting 2025 payroll at approximately $145-150M, plus whatever multi-year commitments Jed makes this winter

 

2026 Payroll

Codi Heuer is currently the only FA heading into the 2026 offseason (and frankly given his gruesome injury I'd be surprised if he's not nontendered well before that point). That means payroll opening the 2026 offseason will be more or less 2025 payroll plus/minus any changes to arb commitments. The arb bill in '26 currently looks pretty hefty, probably something like $15M on top of where the 2025 nets out? That'd put the projected the payroll to open the 2026 offseason at something like $165M plus whatever multi-year commitments are made between now and then, though obviously the error bars are super wide this far out

Edited October 7, 2023 by Bertz
Fixed a few things TT caught

[Bertz]

Some immediate reactions/takeaways:

- It seems pretty likely the team exceeds the LT this year. $34M is not a ton to play with given how much action is being floated. If Stroman gets traded early in the offseason though, that'd be a canary in the coal mine for Jed planning to stay under

- The threshold where payroll starts directly impacting the draft is $277M for '24. For this reason, I'd say that the max payroll you should reasonably expect heading into this season is ~$265M (Jed, and Theo before him, likes to leave $10Mish for in season and TDL moves)

- Based on where '25 and '26 net out right now, I'd be very shocked if there are more than two long term (i.e. 3+ year) signings this winter. If Jed commits more than $50-60M in long term deals this winter, doing a luxury tax reset in the medium term gets really tough, and unfortunately based on PTR's history we know the team is not going to be a perennial luxury tax payer

- I wonder if we see any attempt to extend Steele this winter/next spring. He's the only guy on the current roster slated to make all that much in arb over the next few years. If you lock him up, even without buying a ton of FA years, you mostly insulate yourself from rising arb commitments locking down your payroll like what happened during the last window

[Transmogrified Tiger]

Pedantry first: I'm never 1000% confident about this stuff but I believe the real amount under the tax is less than that.  The payment into the pre-arb bonus pool adds 1.7 million, and the pro-rated MLB minimums of various callups/IL replacements tacks on more too(JeffH mentioned a while back the assumption is roughly a 33 man roster of at least the min, and that matches closely to Roster Resource's calcs).  On the other hand I'm fairly sure the buyouts do not matter, they're a part of the AAV in previous seasons.  If Hendricks doesn't come back he is $0 towards the 2024 LT.  From my napkin mathing, it would leave you around 26 million under the tax line if all 3 of Gomes, Stroman, and Hendricks are back on their original deals.

That aside, I really wish I knew roughly where they were aiming to go payroll wise.  I'd handicap it roughly like this:

• 20% chance they stay under the tax again.  I would normally have this lower, but I'm conservative on it by nature, and Jed has called out how aggressive ownership was with payroll *last* offseason as if it's already at a high point.  This would also ensure they don't get to the 50% overage rate since even if they go into it post-2024 they have so much money freed up after 2026 they'd be able to reset almost no matter what.
• 50% chance they go into the tax but stay within 20 million, including room for deadline moves.  This gives them room to make substantive improvements but also allows room to grow above the tax prior to the 2025-2026 period where very little comes off the books.  Yes, a lot does shake free next year, but that's also half of the planned rotation and a starting catcher, so counting all of that as found money doesn't seem like Jed's style.
• 25% chance they go into the tax above 20 million but less than 40 million.  This is where Ricketts doesn't care about the specific overage on a team winning and filling Wrigley, and Jed sees Amaya/Horton/Wicks/Brown ready to backfill next year's freed up money and decides to go for it given the unusual amount of *young* talent potentially available(Bellinger, Yamamoto, Soto). He does this knowing 2026 gives a release valve that he'll either have an easy way back under the line or be fired anyway.
• 5% chance they exceed the 40 million overage.  This is the 'F it, Ohtani pays for himself' outcome, and even then he's so valuable that you probably can get him and put a real good team together without hurting your draft pipeline in the process.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

1 hour ago, TomtheBombadil said:

Sounds like bringing in two of Bellinger, Soto, and Yamamoto  is as unlikely as just signing Ohtani (and Reynaldo Lopez/Robert Stephenson/Yuki Matsui) with so little cap space 

You can possibly do 2 AAVs of that size and a reliever of quality(lots of options across the cost spectrum), but if Hendricks and Stroman are back the problem is you probably can't do much else.  Puts a lot of pressure on Morel, PCA, and the catchers.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

Just now, TomtheBombadil said:

That’s *with* Stroman and Hendricks?!? All that from just not paying Ohtani? Sounds a little far fetched or sus, no? Shot in the dark but that guy’s not make more than two top 5 FAs (or 1 + Soto extension) combined, let alone + a reliever? Or am I missing something? 

I don't follow.  The TL;DR of what I was getting at is that if you bring Hendricks back and don't lose Stroman, you likley can do 2 big AAVs(20M+) and probably one other cheap move to add a couple million(in this example, a reliever), but probably not much else.  You could also do one Ohtani if you prefer, it wasn't a value judgment on one v. the other.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

5 minutes ago, TomtheBombadil said:

Still seems like these numbers are fudgy? What tippy top FAs are coming in at $20 million? $25+ is more the min per on two, especially if two from Soto, Yamamoto, and Bellinger

The long version read like two of that pool + a reliever was a tier below Ohtani in spending which…I would disagree. Apologies if I read it wrong! Should be sleeping! 

I almost typed 25+, I was less trying to say very specifically this is what the budget is, but more highlight the general dynamics as far as I can tell.  I would love 2 very good bats and a very good SP out of the offseason(a good reliever too, but again cost is less of a concern with them).  If you bring back Hendricks(who doesn't meet my criteria for that SP), then in order to go 3 for 3 on the wishlist one of them would need to be cheaper in AAV than the names we've been throwing around most often

[UMFan83]

Dumb question but on some of the payroll sites I see a note about a deferred payment of $5m to Jason Heyward for 2024. Assuming that’s legit does that count for any luxury tax calculations?

Edited October 7, 2023 by UMFan83

[thawv]

18 hours ago, Bertz said:

This morning, MLB Trade Rumors released their arbitration projections. These are historically extremely accurate, so we now can put together a good snapshot of the team's payroll ahead of what we expect to be a very active winter.

A few notes before we lead off:

- I sourced data primarily from Roster Resource, with 2024 arb #s from MLBTR and some details on Hendricks/Gomes' options from Cot's contracts. I'm just one dude though so I may have fat fingered something along the way

- I'm only looking at luxury tax dollars. Now that Marquee is fully stood up and attendance is back at pre-pandemic levels I assume LT dollars matter much more than actual cashflow like it did from 2015-2019

- I'm not assuming any non-tenders, even if they may seem obvious 

- I used the aforementioned MLBTR arb projections that just came out for 2024, and then assumed a 50% annual raise for each guy's subsequent turns through arbitration (its a rough estimate, but works well in the aggregate)

- I also looked ahead to 2025 and 2026. It seems very likely that the team is going to pass the luxury tax this winter, however based on what happened at the tail end of the last competitive window it's almost a certainty that Jed won't be allowed to exceed the luxury tax three years straight. Given that 2026 is also the last year under the current CBA, I think it's likely that Jed will plan to dip under in '26, so you want to be mindful of how many dollars you add to that year this early

Without further ado:

2024 Payroll

2024 Players Definitely under contract: $100.8M (6 players) - Dansby, Seiya, Nico, Taillon, Happ, and Smyly are all written in stone

2024 Players in Arb: ~$16M (9 players) - No one is slated to make a ton, though I do wonder if Steele's projected number is a bit low. Guys who do well in awards/all star consideration tend to get paid handsomely

Filling out the Roster: ~$29M - 11 league min guys at ~750k each, 14 minor leaguers on the 40 man getting ~150K each, player benefits at ~$17M, and ~$1.7M to the pre-arb bonus pool

Additional commitments: $15.8 - Paying Mancini, Barnhart, and Bote to stay home, plus the buyouts/guaranteed portions of Gomes and Hendricks' options

All told we are looking at a total of $161.6M before option decisions on Stroman (player, $23.7M), Hendricks (Club, $15M after the buyout), and Gomes (Club, $5M after the buyout).  

Since all three of those guys look likely to be retained, our estimated total before trades or non-tenders is about $203M, leaving $34M in payroll room before the first Luxury Tax threshold of $237M

 

2025 Payroll

The club has a ton of commitments coming off the books prior to 2025:

Stroman - $23.7M

Hendricks - $16.5M

Smyly - $9.5M

Mancini - $7M

Gomes - $6M

Barnhart - $3.5M

Bote - $3M

Total - $69.7M

Arb raises for guys already in arb for 2024 shouldn't be crazy, maybe with the exception of Steele if he keeps it up. Using my 50% arb estimate and subtracting out the FA's and dead money above puts the starting 2025 payroll at approximately $140-145M, plus whatever multi-year commitments Jed makes this winter

 

2026 Payroll

Codi Heuer is currently the only FA heading into the 2026 offseason (and frankly given his gruesome injury I'd be surprised if he's not nontendered well before that point). That means payroll opening the 2026 offseason will be more or less 2025 payroll plus/minus any changes to arb commitments. The arb bill in '26 currently looks pretty hefty, probably something like $15M on top of where the 2025 nets out? That'd put the projected the payroll to open the 2026 offseason at something like $160M plus whatever multi-year commitments are made between now and then, though obviously the error bars are super wide this far out

Nice work!  Stroman's salary is already in their payroll.  It doesn't get added if he doesn't opt out.  It gets removed if he does opt out. 

[Bertz]

15 hours ago, Transmogrified Tiger said:

Pedantry first: I'm never 1000% confident about this stuff but I believe the real amount under the tax is less than that.  The payment into the pre-arb bonus pool adds 1.7 million, and the pro-rated MLB minimums of various callups/IL replacements tacks on more too(JeffH mentioned a while back the assumption is roughly a 33 man roster of at least the min, and that matches closely to Roster Resource's calcs).  On the other hand I'm fairly sure the buyouts do not matter, they're a part of the AAV in previous seasons.  If Hendricks doesn't come back he is $0 towards the 2024 LT.  From my napkin mathing, it would leave you around 26 million under the tax line if all 3 of Gomes, Stroman, and Hendricks are back on their original deals.

That aside, I really wish I knew roughly where they were aiming to go payroll wise.  I'd handicap it roughly like this:

• 20% chance they stay under the tax again.  I would normally have this lower, but I'm conservative on it by nature, and Jed has called out how aggressive ownership was with payroll *last* offseason as if it's already at a high point.  This would also ensure they don't get to the 50% overage rate since even if they go into it post-2024 they have so much money freed up after 2026 they'd be able to reset almost no matter what.
• 50% chance they go into the tax but stay within 20 million, including room for deadline moves.  This gives them room to make substantive improvements but also allows room to grow above the tax prior to the 2025-2026 period where very little comes off the books.  Yes, a lot does shake free next year, but that's also half of the planned rotation and a starting catcher, so counting all of that as found money doesn't seem like Jed's style.
• 25% chance they go into the tax above 20 million but less than 40 million.  This is where Ricketts doesn't care about the specific overage on a team winning and filling Wrigley, and Jed sees Amaya/Horton/Wicks/Brown ready to backfill next year's freed up money and decides to go for it given the unusual amount of *young* talent potentially available(Bellinger, Yamamoto, Soto). He does this knowing 2026 gives a release valve that he'll either have an easy way back under the line or be fired anyway.
• 5% chance they exceed the 40 million overage.  This is the 'F it, Ohtani pays for himself' outcome, and even then he's so valuable that you probably can get him and put a real good team together without hurting your draft pipeline in the process.

Definitely good call on budgeting several extra MLB salaries to account for people on the IL.  Maybe call that another $5M?  I think you're right about the buyouts too.  I wonder if that changed with this CBA, because I swear it used to go the other way.  But regardless browsing a couple Roster Resource pages I don't see them added, and it certainly helps so can't complain.  I did remember the Player Benefits money, so we don't need to add that again.  So we're looking at something a little closer to $30M under the tax.

And yeah I think trying to put on my Jed hat I can see him reasoning his way to a pretty wide range of payrolls.  I do imagine like you hit on it's player specific?  E.g. he'll pass $277M but only for Ohtani.  $257 but only for two of the primo guys or if he's able to nab several guys on 1 year deals.  etc.

Looking at it more and more I do think there's a pretty good chance Stroman gets dealt.  He should still have modest surplus value, and freeing up his salary makes a lot of the scenarios we could dream up a lot less tight to pull off.

[Bertz]

2 hours ago, thawv said:

Nice work!  Stroman's salary is already in their payroll.  It doesn't get added if he doesn't opt out.  It gets removed if he does opt out. 

Yeah if you look at Cots or RR he's already in there.  That's part of why I did the exercise like I did because I wanted to build payroll from the ground up and not have to try and keep someone else's assumptions straight while making my own.

8 hours ago, UMFan83 said:

Dumb question but on some of the payroll sites I see a note about a deferred payment of $5m to Jason Heyward for 2024. Assuming that’s legit does that count for any luxury tax calculations?

Correct, from a luxury tax standpoint it's more or less considered that they already paid that money.

[CaliforniaRaisin]

22 hours ago, Bertz said:

Definitely good call on budgeting several extra MLB salaries to account for people on the IL.  Maybe call that another $5M?  I think you're right about the buyouts too.  I wonder if that changed with this CBA, because I swear it used to go the other way.  But regardless browsing a couple Roster Resource pages I don't see them added, and it certainly helps so can't complain.  I did remember the Player Benefits money, so we don't need to add that again.  So we're looking at something a little closer to $30M under the tax.

And yeah I think trying to put on my Jed hat I can see him reasoning his way to a pretty wide range of payrolls.  I do imagine like you hit on it's player specific?  E.g. he'll pass $277M but only for Ohtani.  $257 but only for two of the primo guys or if he's able to nab several guys on 1 year deals.  etc.

Looking at it more and more I do think there's a pretty good chance Stroman gets dealt.  He should still have modest surplus value, and freeing up his salary makes a lot of the scenarios we could dream up a lot less tight to pull off.

Yeah, I think Stroman gets dealt. Hopefully he has decent value.

[LBiittner]

Stroman and his agent are probably smart enough to realize the possibility of opting in and being a trade commodity for Jed. I'd bet he'd like to control his playing destination. My nightmare would be Stroman opts out and signs with cardinals and he along with Willson lead the horsefeathers cardinals to division championship. And Jed, with the stroman dollars saved, buys the 2024 versions of mancini, Barnhart, etc al.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

BBTV has Stroman slightly underwater on his contract, but I think his floor of production and not needing a long term commitment might edge things to the positive side of the ledger in the current environment.  The bigger problem is the number of teams willing to pay 20+ million even for one year isn't an insanely long list, and finding a decent match to solve a problem outside of being a pure salary dump is even harder.  Maybe something based around Stroman to Baltimore for Santander, or to the Phillies for Jeff Hoffman?

[Stratos]

I agree with payroll estimates in the OP, similar to my estimates from data from sportac & BR.

If I were to bet I'd say they stay under the tax with year, but hopefully i'm wrong.  It's possible they go over this year and go slightly under next year to reset since they have a lot of money off the books next year.  Bellinger + Yamamoto + some pen guys would be amazing for this winter, but wishful thinking I guess.  A bit more do-able if they don't bring back Hendricks, but I think they will.

Steele, Yamamoto, Horton, Taillon, Wicks/Brown would be a very nice rotation for 2025.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

I think the other thing that will make a difference is how much of their spending is long term v. not.  They are not going to add 3 different 5+ year contracts, it creates too much inflexibility going forward.  But considering the number of options that are potentially only one year(Hendricks' option, Alonso, Soto, any short term FA), that isn't necessarily limiting.  Especially if it's part of the reason they can exceed the tax line.

[Stratos]

If Stroman and Hendricks and Gomes come back they probably won't even be able to afford Bellinger without going over the tax line.  They'll have 29m to spend, they'll keep at least 5m under the line if they want to stay under.  So 24m to spend, and they still will add a couple of FA pen arms for around 7-8 million total.  So we're talking 17m to spend.

I really hope Jed is done with signing these borderline replacement FA's to multimillion contracts.  Just get the Wisdom's, Tauchman's, Mastobuoni's, Hosmer's instead for dirt cheap.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

1 hour ago, Stratos said:

If Stroman and Hendricks and Gomes come back they probably won't even be able to afford Bellinger without going over the tax line.  They'll have 29m to spend, they'll keep at least 5m under the line if they want to stay under.  So 24m to spend, and they still will add a couple of FA pen arms for around 7-8 million total.  So we're talking 17m to spend.

I really hope Jed is done with signing these borderline replacement FA's to multimillion contracts.  Just get the Wisdom's, Tauchman's, Mastobuoni's, Hosmer's instead for dirt cheap.

Feels questionable to assume that both the tax line is a hard limit AND they'll use half of their available capacity on Hendricks and 2 relievers.

[Stratos]

4 hours ago, Transmogrified Tiger said:

Feels questionable to assume that both the tax line is a hard limit AND they'll use half of their available capacity on Hendricks and 2 relievers.

Well I never said the tax line is a hard limit or that they won't spend over the line, I'm just stating the fact that they don't have a lot of room under the line.  They will spend several million on some vet relievers, they always do and they need them badly, they can't just ignore a pen that was their #1 weakness this past season.  It also seems likely Hendricks comes back, though they probably negotiate a deal cheaper than his team option.

They're going to have a lot more cheap surplus in the coming years with all the prospects starting to come up, so going over the tax line in 2024 and then dropping back down for to brief reset in a year or 2 seems like a logical thing to do for a team that doesn't want to consistently stay above the line.  They didn't have to go over the line in 2016 because of all the cheap talent.

[Jason Ross]

If Stroman opts in, then I think the Cubs will probably have to make a hard decision on Hendricks. I'm not sure they will let him go, but I don't think the Cubs should be bringing back both Hendricks and Stroman personally. Hendricks is a player who is probably better than his xFIP because of the kind of contact he creates, but he's going into his age 34 season fresh off an xFIP in the 4.40 range with a K/9 that is touching the low 6s. That's a razor thin margin to success, and the Cubs have players like Wicks/Assad who can fill a rotational spot today. 

At some point the Cubs need to improve the rotation, and the spot that Hendricks creates will help give you that opportunity. Whether it's Nola, or Yamamoto, or a trade for a controllable-younger-arm, I'm not sure, but the $16m you clear with a decline of Hendricks option would likely go a long way into helping do just that.  I'd love to believe we live in a world where Taillon can be shipped out to save money, but I don't think we live in that world, so he's going to be here.  It doesn't have to be an either or, but we probably have to accept that the Cubs will not blow past the LT line enough where it realistically can be. Based on how Ricketts has operated in the past and his recent comments, I'm not entirely sure the Cubs will go above the LT, but even if they do, I'd expect no more than $10m or so above. If the Cubs are really looking to improve in 2024, than I think it's likely we'll need to do the following things:

1. Improve on one spot in the rotation

2. Replace or resign Bellinger 

3. Upgrade at 3b/1b/DH with a heavy emphasis on them being a hitter over a defender

4. Add a few more BP arms. They'll probably be more of the same concept we've gone with, but based on their history, this should be doable fairly cheap-ish

I'm not sure they can make it all happen, but that'd be my blueprint.  It creates a strong bench, a pretty solid rotation/lineup combination, and the Cubs would have a few players who would be capable of helping July on from the system (who those players are would probably be hard to determine today because that blueprint above almost assuredly requires the Cubs to make one significant trade, if not two).  And why I'm not sure the Cubs can keep both Hendricks and Stroman if they're going to accomplish #1.

Edited October 9, 2023 by 1908_Cubs

[Bertz]

16 hours ago, Transmogrified Tiger said:

I think the other thing that will make a difference is how much of their spending is long term v. not.  They are not going to add 3 different 5+ year contracts, it creates too much inflexibility going forward.  But considering the number of options that are potentially only one year(Hendricks' option, Alonso, Soto, any short term FA), that isn't necessarily limiting.  Especially if it's part of the reason they can exceed the tax line.

Yeah this was the biggest takeaway from putting this together.  My guess is that the median offseason is one long term deal, one trade of major consequence, and then bench/relief help on 1-2 year deals.  Something like Nola, Alonso, Robertson, and Candelario (if he can be had for two years, someone like Urshela if he can't).  

There's probably a plan or two where Jed does two long term deals. Like Yamamoto and a Soto trade/extension would be pretty hard to pass up.  As would essentially anybody with Ohtani.  But I'd guess Jed wants to be able to add someone substantial every winter while still leaving an avenue to reset the tax in '25 or '26.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

6 minutes ago, Bertz said:

Yeah this was the biggest takeaway from putting this together.  My guess is that the median offseason is one long term deal, one trade of major consequence, and then bench/relief help on 1-2 year deals.  Something like Nola, Alonso, Robertson, and Candelario (if he can be had for two years, someone like Urshela if he can't).  

There's probably a plan or two where Jed does two long term deals. Like Yamamoto and a Soto trade/extension would be pretty hard to pass up.  As would essentially anybody with Ohtani.  But I'd guess Jed wants to be able to add someone substantial every winter while still leaving an avenue to reset the tax in '25 or '26.

The age component is a pretty heavy consideration too.  Bellinger (or Soto)  + Yamamoto on long term deals is going to be easier to sell(both to ownership and to himself) than giving big deals to Nola + Alonso.  Jed's 3+ year contracts have had final season ages of 31 (Suzuki), 33(Stroman), 34(Taillon), and 35(Swanson), so while it's clear he's gotten a bit more aggressive as the team gets closer to playoff caliber, I wouldn't be surprised if he was unwilling to go much past that age with big commitments.

[chibears55]

If Hoyer smart and wants to upgrade his talent on the field, he won't bring Hendricks back and he'll trade Stroman if he opts back in, even if he has to eat some salary.

Of the 9 Arb guys, Steele, Merryweather and Alzolay should be the only ones to return. 

Bellinger has a mutual option for 25M, hopefully both sides can work something out and he returns.

Hoyer should look to trade Taillon, Smily,  and Happ. Even if he has to eat money, he'll still be saving some. 

I would love to see Hoyer be more proactive and bring in good young talent either from within or outside to the major league roster, over basically staying with mostly what he has already and adding veteran washouts on 1 or 2 year deals.

 

[Transmogrified Tiger]

15 minutes ago, chibears55 said:

If Hoyer smart and wants to upgrade his talent on the field, he won't bring Hendricks back and he'll trade Stroman if he opts back in, even if he has to eat some salary.

Of the 9 Arb guys, Steele, Merryweather and Alzolay should be the only ones to return. 

Bellinger has a mutual option for 25M, hopefully both sides can work something out and he returns.

Hoyer should look to trade Taillon, Smily,  and Happ. Even if he has to eat money, he'll still be saving some. 

I would love to see Hoyer be more proactive and bring in good young talent either from within or outside to the major league roster, over basically staying with mostly what he has already and adding veteran washouts on 1 or 2 year deals.

 

This is aiming for financial flexibility for financial flexibility's sake, making the team worse just to avoid having slightly inefficient contracts is not how teams should operate.  I mean in this example we're eating some of Taillon's money just to try to inevitably need to pursue this year's version of Taillon because you need 3 SP after dumping him, Stroman, and Hendricks.  Also, Happ just signed an extension and has an NTC, he's not going anywhere.

[Tim]

1 hour ago, chibears55 said:

If Hoyer smart and wants to upgrade his talent on the field, he won't bring Hendricks back and he'll trade Stroman if he opts back in, even if he has to eat some salary.

Of the 9 Arb guys, Steele, Merryweather and Alzolay should be the only ones to return. 

Bellinger has a mutual option for 25M, hopefully both sides can work something out and he returns.

Hoyer should look to trade Taillon, Smily,  and Happ. Even if he has to eat money, he'll still be saving some. 

I would love to see Hoyer be more proactive and bring in good young talent either from within or outside to the major league roster, over basically staying with mostly what he has already and adding veteran washouts on 1 or 2 year deals.

 

Wait...you want to get rid of:

• Stroman
• Hendricks
• Taillon
• Smyly
• Happ
• Heuer
• Madrigal
• Leiter
• Wisdom
• Tauchman

I'm confused on your "9 arbitration guys" - are you counting some of these?

• Keegan (same pre-arb status as Steele)
• Hughes (also pre-arb)
• Wesneski (also pre-arb)
• Morel (also pre-arb)

You make no mention of retaining these free agents / guys with options:

• Gomes
• Fulmer
• Candelario
• Boxberger

The only people left in this scenario are:

• Steele
• Merryweather
• Alzolay
• Swanson
• Nico
• Suzuki
• Amaya
• Mastrobuoni
• Assad
• Bellinger (hopefully he's re-signed)

Even with the extra cash, that's a whole lot of players to replace. I can't see that as being realistic for one offseason

[chibears55]

2 hours ago, Tim said:

Wait...you want to get rid of:

• Stroman
• Hendricks
• Taillon
• Smyly
• Happ
• Heuer
• Madrigal
• Leiter
• Wisdom
• Tauchman

I'm confused on your "9 arbitration guys" - are you counting some of these?

• Keegan (same pre-arb status as Steele)
• Hughes (also pre-arb)
• Wesneski (also pre-arb)
• Morel (also pre-arb)

You make no mention of retaining these free agents / guys with options:

• Gomes
• Fulmer
• Candelario
• Boxberger

The only people left in this scenario are:

• Steele
• Merryweather
• Alzolay
• Swanson
• Nico
• Suzuki
• Amaya
• Mastrobuoni
• Assad
• Bellinger (hopefully he's re-signed)

Even with the extra cash, that's a whole lot of players to replace. I can't see that as being realistic for one offseason

Yes get rid of the group you have there if he can, and If Hoyer wants to keep Madrigal and Tauchman for depth in AAA that fine.

The 9 ARB guys are Steele, Alzolay,  Wisdom, Madrigal,  Leiter, Merryweather,  Tauchman, Burdi, Heuer 

I wasn't breaking down the whole roster of who to keep or not, that why I didn't mention the others, just a couple of option players and the ARB players.

Amaya, Cuas, Morel, Wicks, Assad, Wesneski etc they're not ARB eligible yet.

Gomes will likely be back..

Fulmer a FA, they can do better there

Candelario, id like for him to be back if they can't add someone better

Boxberger gonna be 37, they can add someone better and younger

Edited October 10, 2023 by chibears55