Inside the MLB Offseason with Ken Rosenthal | Blue Jays, Cubs, Tigers & More

Inside the MLB Offseason with Ken Rosenthal | Blue Jays, Cubs, Tigers & More

do want to start with offseason freshness and we didn’t get to Shane Bieber yet. So your thoughts on Bieber returning to the Blue Jays for $16 million. You just covered him in the World Series. I was surprised. People with the Blue Jays were surprised. People in the industry were surprised. And you just don’t see this kind of decision very often. He could have declined the option, taken a $4 million buyout. So he’s at $4 million ahead. And then in free agency, I would think 350, something like that. Three years, 50 million, maybe even more. But for whatever reason, he wants to be in Toronto one more year. Now, maybe the rehab is part of this. Maybe he feels that they treated me really well. He’s comfortable with their medical staff. He’s still only 18 months removed from Tommy John surgery. And my initial thought also was, well, okay, perhaps an extension is coming. But my understanding is that there is no extension as part of this. It really hasn’t even been discussed. It has not been a motivator for him in making this decision. So, it’s curious. I don’t exactly know what Shane Bieber was thinking. Obviously, he liked it there. We know that all people like it there. It seems like all players and even their wives and girlfriends based on what we’ve heard the last few days, but he still could have leveraged that into ah one or two more years, guys. Let’s do it. And at least to this point, he hasn’t done that. Ken, this is your time to shine. If you ever had a time to shine, now is your time, Ken. So, it’s time to step up your game and remember who you are. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Okay. But, well, the book behind you, that’s why you have the book behind you that reminds you every time you look back there. Remember who you are. Ken, here’s my question. Pedro Gomez, by the way, the late Pedro. I love Pedro. I love making fun of that. I’m not making fun of that at all. I love Pedro. Now, my question is Shane Bieber opts in. Is there any of these that are more surprising surprising? Trevor Story two years 55, right? Jack Flity one year 20. That seemed like a no-brainer kind of with the qualifying offer thing and what he went through last year. But any of the optouts, I mean, Sha was the biggest one that was like, wait, they didn’t get this done with SHA, but the other ones, it’s almost seems like chalk, right? Like it’s chalk and like these are pretty easy to predict going to the off seasonason. I would agree, AJ. And even Shota to me was kind of an obvious one. The Cubs were not going to do three years 57.5 million. That’s the option they would have had to have picked up. I think it was 57 and a half in that range. And then at that point, Shod gets the right to decline his option in that deal. And he knows that he could do better with a qualifying offer, which I assume he’s going to get from the Cubs. One year 22.05 million. To me, this is kind of check by the Cubs to Shota because if he gets the qualifying offer, then he is saddled with that in free agency. It’s always more difficult with the qualifying offer than without. And maybe it’s best for him just to come back on a one-year deal, 22 and a half, 22.05 million, and then the Cubs are happy because they’d always rather have a player on a one-year deal than a three-year deal when that player had some questions about him this season. So none of those that you mentioned were a surprise. Trevor Story on the open market. Could he have done better than 55 million in total guarantee? Maybe. But he certainly wasn’t going to do better in average annual value. And with regard to Jack Flareity, as you mentioned AJ, he had a really difficult free agency last year. Now he wouldn’t have had the qualifying offer on him this year. Okay. But if I’m him, I understand why he did that. I think it drives players crazy to a certain degree. certain players when they linger on the market and it’s endless and it goes into February and they still don’t know what they’re doing. This way he knows what he’s doing. It’s on him. He’s on a one-year deal. If he has a good year, go back in the market. And if he doesn’t have a good year, well, he’s back in the market anyway. But he kind of in is in control of this situation during these decisions. I know you’re not an agent and you’ve never been a free agent, but you have inside inside info. Is there some tampering in the sense of very mild tampering and maybe I’m not even using the right word like hey you know what if we take this opt out what does it look like for you? I do expect and think that when agents are surveying the market, it’s not necessarily tampering, but maybe they’re calling around the team and saying, “Hey, what do you think of my guy? What would he get on the open market?” That’s not tampering. That’s perfectly within the rules as far as I know. And yeah, that I would expect happens to some degree or at least their feel for the market talking to people that is something that does take place. Now, with regard to teams tampering, my answer to that would be I don’t know that anything totally illegal goes on, but is contact made at times between teams and players and agents? Come on, it’s baseball. People are always looking to get an edge. Something’s going on at all times. And I don’t know the extent, Eric. I couldn’t tell you that. I’ve never actually witnessed it or kind of experienced it as a reporter understanding what might be going on out there. But do I think it goes on? Yeah, I think it goes on. All right. Well, again, you couldn’t break a big story for us of who was going to be the Braves manager until a long time. We had nothing. Alex Anthopoulos didn’t let us know anything about it. What do you feel like or what do you know took so long? Because we’re obviously it came out that Danny Layman was probably going to be there. Hey, he’s still playing. He’s still coaching in the World Series. And it comes out that as Walt Weiss, which on this show we felt like was a great hire for the Braves. I don’t know what took so long to be perfectly honest. And as Walt Weiss said yesterday, Alex Anthopoulos, their president of baseball operations, he likes to operate in the shadows. He likes it when people don’t know what he’s thinking. And I actually said this on my show yesterday before the hiring was announced that when it came out that Danny Leman was maybe the front runner, this was reported by MLB.com and other outlets as well. I was immediately skeptical because with Anthropolis, I’ve come to learn that if you hear a name and there’s something going on and gets public, that’s usually not the guy. Now, what took so long? I imagine from just an outside perspective, he was surveying all of his options. probably Lehman included and in the end decided you know what I’ll just stick with Walt Weiss but I don’t know and maybe I’m just speculating here maybe ownership stepped in maybe there was a difference of opinion in that front office with ownership or within who knows but this is where they ended up and to me Walt Weiss is one of these guys like Brandon Hyde like David Ross who deserves another chance now is he going to be a great manager I have no idea But in all of his years managing the Rockies and then being the bench coach for the Braves for what, eight years now, should he be in a better position to succeed than he was before? Absolutely he should. So, we’ve seen a couple of hires here kind of off the radar, right? Vital and Blake But in Washington. I get it. And hey, those guys might really be successful. We don’t know that. But to me, when you overlook men who have done the job, who have proven they can do the job and do it pretty well, I have a little bit of a problem with that. Okay, that’s fair. That’s fair. Ken, we we at the top of the show, we had a discussion what what was the biggest thing in this off seasonason that we’re going to be watching and I said Detroit and TKO. And we had Jim Bowden on the other day and he said, “Yeah, absolutely. The Tigers are going to trade Terrick Scooble.” What are you hearing? And what are your thoughts on this? because he could get I mean I don’t know what he could get but I’m assuming he could get a nice package coming off two time two Sai Youngs in a row one year away you get a full year of him he’s been healthy he could bring back a monster package for the Tigers but let’s go back to Corbin Burns a couple of years ago Corbin Burns was in the same situation that Scooble is in now entering his free agent year the return for Corbin Burns was the shorts stop Joe Ortiz the reliever maybe starter DL Hall and a high draft pick. I think it was the number 37 pick overall. That was a good return for one year of Corbin Burns. So, would Scooble be better than that? Probably a little bit better than that. Okay. If you’re the Tigers, do you want to take a step back and deal with that when you have Schooable for one more year and maybe you can win by building around him in that one year? Understanding that an extension is extremely unlikely unlikely with Scott Boris as his agent and understanding that he’s going to walk for a draft pick. Do you do that and take that road instead of the one where you’re making a trade and taking a step back? I just talked with an executive this morning who made the point and a good one that school has masked a lot of the Tigers ills the last couple of years. Every fifth day they know they’re getting a really competitive start and probably winning. So if you trade him, you don’t have that anchor. You don’t have that stability that he gives you and you’re taking a step backwards. Do they want to do that after making the playoffs two years in a row? I don’t know. My friend Joel Sherman of the New York Post has written that they should keep him for the reasons I just stated. At the same time, man, I would definitely dangle him. I would definitely see what’s out there because you’re not going to keep him longterm most likely. And who knows, maybe you get something as appealing as what the Brewers ultimately got for Burns or even better. The return for Burns in my mind was not bad, but we’re talking a two-time Sai Young winner, as you said, most likely he’ll win that award. It’s tough to trade that without getting a monster return back. All right. What teams are lined up for that? What teams are in a position? Obviously, you never had any idea if AJ Prowler is going to say, “You know what? We’re giving you all 30 of our next prospects for Teroo.” But what teams are lined up for it and in the position to say, you know what, we’re willing to, it’s time to make a move like this like the Red Sox did this year. The Mets would be the obvious team. They need starting pitching. They have young starting pitching that they could include in a trade. They are completely a team that would seem to be obvious in this regard. You can look at any team that is a big market team or even a team like the Orioles, right? The Orioles took that chance with Corbin Burns. They acquired him and it worked out well. He was good for them. So, I’m not exactly sure which teams are lined up, but the Mets do stand out. I would basically say all the usual suspects would be involved. Ken, how mad would the Tiger fans be if they made this trade instead of signing him? Would you know because you hear about this and you know, listen, Corbin Burns was Corbin Burns, but this is Ter School. This is the guy every fifth day that loves being in Detroit. He they when he pitches, it’s a different atmosphere and everything. How big of a deal would this be for Tiger fans if they had to make this move? I would expect it would be a big deal, but at the same time, when Boris is the agent and we know that he prefers to take his clients to the open market and Tercoel could be, who knows, the first $400 million pitcher, you know, as a Tiger fan, it’s unlikely that you’re going to sign him long term. Maybe the Tigers do that. I don’t know. I don’t think so. But, you know, as a fan that that is the logical outcome that he hits the open market and then ultimately he signs with another team. If you’re a Tigers fan, maybe you’re thinking, you know what, let’s get what we can right now. And while I would prefer, if I’m a Tigers fan, to take a shot at the World Series this year, we all know how difficult it is to win a World Series. I would understand it. I would not like it as a Tigers fan just as I would not like it as a Pirates fan at the ultimate time that they trade Paul Sk. But you’re looking at what is the best move for your franchise for this season and going forward. And it’s an interesting debate, guys. I’m not sure where I stand on honestly because I understand what Joel Sherman was writing. They should keep him and try to win. Definitely understand that. But I also see that what’s the endgame here? A draft pick for Terk Scooel when you can get that much more. I don’t know. One other element here that’s worth mentioning. Let’s say they keep him and let’s say for some reason they’re out of contention in July. The return they would get in July is probably not much different than they would get right now. So there is that incentive to keep him as well. Ken, you know what you just did? You just made the argument that all the fans are saying for salary cap, Ken, because they’re going to say, “Why can’t the Tigers keep him? If we had a salary cap, the Tigers could afford to keep him.” Which I disagree with. But can Rob Manfred is online too and he says thank you for making his argument for him. I’m not making an argument for a salary cap. In fact, if there were a salary cap, TK school might decide to become a free agent anyway. Who’s to say that he wouldn’t want to test the open market and do it that way? It’s not a guarantee the Tigers would keep him, just as it’s not a guarantee that players wouldn’t want to play for the Dodgers under a salary cap system. They still would. So, I know this is the conversation we’re going to have for the next 12 months, unfortunately. But at the same time, my position has been, and it will remain until I’m shown otherwise, that there are ways to improve this system without imposing a salary cap. And those are the things that the owner should be working on. And I’m going to add one more thing here. We’re coming off a World Series that got great ratings, not just in the United States, but around the world. We have at this moment a little bit of momentum with this sport, maybe even a lot of momentum with this sport. And it’s partly due to the rules changes that Banford introduced a couple of years ago. He deserves credit for that. Why would you want to mess with that right now? Why would you go backwards? Why would you have a season in 2027 that isn’t whole? I don’t know the answer to that. I don’t know a reasonable justification for that. And ultimately the owners can play their game and they can go and scream for a salary cap. I’m not even sure they all agree with each other on this particular issue. But they can do that and they can play it out. They will. They always do in these things. But are they really going to compromise the 2027 season? Good luck with that. Yeah. And there are media contracts that’ll be coming up shortly after the lockout that they will impose to some degree. Even if we don’t miss games, there will at least be some type of stoppage. I think we all agree that they’ll put the pressure on. One other point I wanted to make, Ken. MLB would have super teams. I’m thinking about the World Series just now and how much jubilation we saw from Roki Suzaki, Shoi Otani, and Yoshi Nou Yamamoto together. You have to remember they’re coming from Japan. It’s far away. They speak a different primary language. They’ve really bonded and been able to spend a lot of time together. I also do think that most marketing uh situations and deals right now revolve around you playing with show being on Japan’s team, which is the Dodgers. There are a ton of Japanese free agents coming up over the next few week uh years that are really talented. I did some homework on some guys for this class. If there was a salary cap, they would just all sign with the Dodgers. They’d be like, “Cool, I’ll take half the money, maybe even less, because I’ll make it up in sponsorship.” Because that is bigger right now than the contracts for most of these guys. Show makes a hundred off the field. I’m sure Yamamoto is making 20, whatever the number is off the field. A large number from Japan off the field. So, just throwing that out there. They would grab every Japanese player. If you think it’s unfair now that they’re grabbing many of them, they would get all of them. Fans think of a salary cap as a magic bullet. Some fans think this way, and it’s not. And the other advantage the Dodgers would have, and I wrote about this after they won the World Series, they’re really good at player development. They’re really good at drafting. They’re really good at every other way of player acquisition. They are good at getting players on the margins and making them better. None of that goes away with a cap. They’re still going to be really smart and really good. Now, would a cap address some of the inequities? Yeah, of course it would. But, as I’ve said, there are other ways to address those inequities, and it’s never going to be perfect. We all understand that baseball is not football. Baseball revenue is based locally. football revenue is based largely on the national television contract. It’s not on the attendance that you get at your home games. So, it’s inherently different. I don’t know that inherently different is bad. This sport has survived just fine for all this time. And we’ve heard these complaints over the years from fans. Hey, it’s not fair. From a revenue standpoint and from a spending standpoint, I can see what they’re saying. But we’ve also seen teams that have thrived in this environment from smaller markets. just this year, Milwaukee, Cleveland, any number of them. Again, don’t get me wrong here. I don’t want people getting confused. I’m not saying those teams shouldn’t have a better way to compete. They should. What I’m saying is there are enough smart people on both sides of this equation that they should be able to figure out a system that enhances the chances competitively of those small market teams without a salary cap. It shouldn’t be impossible. That’s all I’m saying. All right. Well, then leading into that, what team are you most interested to follow this off season? Well, I’m always interested in all of them, Eric, to be honest, but Philadelphia is really interesting because we’ve heard Dave Dumbrosski, the president of baseball operations, talk about his discontent with some of the things that have gone on. And he didn’t change the manager. He talked about Bryce Harper needing to be better. That caused a stir, of course. And last off seasonason when we thought they were going to do some big things, they really didn’t. They’re going to lose Ranger Suarez as a free agent most likely. Schwarber and Real Muto also are free agents. Yet, they need to refresh their team. So, while I expect them to sign Schwarber and maybe even Real Muto, too, how do they get better? That’s the question. Do you trade Alec Bow and sign a third baseman? Can you take on another monster contract? I don’t know that you can. So, they’re a fascinating team to watch and really we could go through pretty much all the teams and have the same kind of analysis and conversation. It’s always interesting to see how each team reacts. Look at Toronto right now. What do they do? They’ve got Bieber obviously under contract for next year, but Sherzer and Bassid are free agents. Bob Bashette is a free agent. How will they look next season? You can go one through 30. Well, maybe not 1 through 30, but 1 through 25 or so and have pretty interesting talks.

The MLB offseason is officially here, and Ken Rosenthal joins Foul Territory to break down all the early headlines. From Shane Bieber’s surprising decision to stay with the Toronto Blue Jays to Shota Imanaga’s upcoming free agency and the Chicago Cubs next move, Ken gives his insider perspective on what’s driving these choices. He also discusses the Detroit Tigers dilemma with Tarik Skubal, potential blockbuster trade scenarios, the future of a salary cap in MLB, and how teams like the Philadelphia Phillies and Atlanta Braves will approach the winter ahead.

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