2022-23 free agent signings tracker

[SteveA]

16 minutes ago, ShoelesJoe said:

2 years @$86 million. 

$265,000 per game. Zowie. 

That includes the 80%+ of the games he doesn't start.     More like $3 million per start.   So if there are 30,000 fans at a game paying an average of $35 bucks a ticket, the entire attendance take for the game only pays for about the first 3 innings of a Verlander start.

There's also a vesting clause for a 3rd year in 2025, when he would be 42, that would kick in automatically if he reaches some innings/start milestones.   Which I expect would be set pretty high.

[NCRaven]

18 minutes ago, SteveA said:

There's also a vesting clause for a 3rd year in 2025, when he would be 42, that would kick in automatically if he reaches some innings/start milestones.   Which I expect would be set pretty high.

140 innings in 2024 makes gives Verlander a player option for 2025 at $35 million.

[SteveA]

Trea Turner to Phillies

11 years, $300mm

Full no trade clause

[Frobby]

4 hours ago, NCRaven said:

140 innings in 2024 makes gives Verlander a player option for 2025 at $35 million.

I think that’s fair enough.  

[Tony-OH]

17 hours ago, SteveA said:

Trea Turner to Phillies

11 years, $300mm

Full no trade clause

Say what you want about the Phillies, their owner invests in their team.

[Frobby]

5 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

Say what you want about the Phillies, their owner invests in their team.

He has spent a crapload of money the last few years, for sure.  I think it may come crashing down on him in a few years when the stars start to get old, but the next 2-3 years should be fun for Philly fans.  

[Tony-OH]

7 minutes ago, Frobby said:

He has spent a crapload of money the last few years, for sure.  I think it may come crashing down on him in a few years when the stars start to get old, but the next 2-3 years should be fun for Philly fans.  

But if he gets a World Series win out of it, do you think the fans will care? 

He knows he's on the cusp of winning a World Series and Turner makes them better than they were. Whether it works out or not will depend on winning a World Series, but you have to give him credit for trying.

The Phillies now have Bryce Harper and Trea Turner with contracts at $300 million or more.

Meanwhile the Angelos-owned Orioles are out here signing 4th/5th starters for 1 yrd $10 million contracts.

So yes, I'm going to give the Phillies their props for trying to put a legitimate World Series caliber team on the field.

[Frobby]

11 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

But if he gets a World Series win out of it, do you think the fans will care? 

They won’t care at the time they win the WS.  And it’s definitely possible they will say it was all worth it, even if they suck in 3-4 years.  (By the way, I’m not saying they will suck, just hypothesizing.)

It’s very interesting watching all this from the Washington DC suburbs.  The Nats were an excellent team from 2012-19 and got their WS ring.  Now they’re paying the price and you wouldn’t believe the amount of “woe is me” going on among their fan base and their press corps. They spent a ton of money, got some great early results from some of their long term deals (including nearly miraculous performance from Scherzer) and got their ring.  Their fans seem to have forgotten that already.  Their contract with Corbin, which yielded decent results in the first year (which was the WS year) has turned into an utter fiasco.  Their renegotiated deal with Strasburg (who had an opt-out after the WS year) is an even bigger fiasco.   They clearly had more holes than they could patch and so they traded Scherzer (now making $43 mm/yr with the rival Mets) and Turner (now making $27 mm/yr with the rival Phillies).   Soto saw the handwriting on the wall and forced his way out of town. And now the Nats are where the O’s were in 2018, more or less.  You should hear the fans bitching about it.  World Series?  What World Series?

[Frobby]

By the way, I’m not criticizing Middleton. My post above is just a commentary about the short memory of fans.  

I do think Elias is trying to build an organization that can contend on a constant basis rather than having cycles of competing and then crashing.   And hopefully it will come with intelligent spending.
 

[Tony-OH]

42 minutes ago, Frobby said:

They won’t care at the time they win the WS.  And it’s definitely possible they will say it was all worth it, even if they suck in 3-4 years.  (By the way, I’m not saying they will suck, just hypothesizing.)

It’s very interesting watching all this from the Washington DC suburbs.  The Nats were an excellent team from 2012-19 and got their WS ring.  Now they’re paying the price and you wouldn’t believe the amount of “woe is me” going on among their fan base and their press corps. They spent a ton of money, got some great early results from some of their long term deals (including nearly miraculous performance from Scherzer) and got their ring.  Their fans seem to have forgotten that already.  Their contract with Corbin, which yielded decent results in the first year (which was the WS year) has turned into an utter fiasco.  Their renegotiated deal with Strasburg (who had an opt-out after the WS year) is an even bigger fiasco.   They clearly had more holes than they could patch and so they traded Scherzer (now making $43 mm/yr with the rival Mets) and Turner (now making $27 mm/yr with the rival Phillies).   Soto saw the handwriting on the wall and forced his way out of town. And now the Nats are where the O’s were in 2018, more or less.  You should hear the fans bitching about it.  World Series?  What World Series?

Well we are talking Washington DC sports fans. lol

I like the way Elias has built the organization and besides basically ignoring top talented pitching in heir drafting, I think they've done a very good job. 

But, the question is whether ownership will spend when the time is ready. I think that is a question we don't have a solid answer to but so far the answer as of this date is no with John Angelos no matter what anyone says.

I fear that this will not change with all the legal stuff going on so until the team is sold, I'm concerned that they will be in the 33rd percentile or less when it comes to payroll and that's going to hinder the "Houston model" that Elias has been using.

Tony

[Frobby]

7 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

Well we are talking Washington DC sports fans. lol

I like the way Elias has built the organization and besides basically ignoring top talented pitching in heir drafting, I think they've done a very good job. 

But, the question is whether ownership will spend when the time is ready. I think that is a question we don't have a solid answer to but so far the answer as of this date is no with John Angelos no matter what anyone says.

I fear that this will not change with all the legal stuff going on so until the team is sold, I'm concerned that they will be in the 33rd percentile or less when it comes to payroll and that's going to hinder the "Houston model" that Elias has been using.

Tony

Well, I don’t necessarily disagree with you here.   First of all, we need to face the fact that the Orioles have a far lower revenue base than some teams.  The Astros had $388 mm in revenue in 2021. The Phillies had $323 mm.   The Orioles had $251 mm.  We are not going to spend as much on a consistent basis as the Astros, the Phillies and numerous other teams, because we don’t have the revenue base to do it and the owners are not going to subsidize the team.   At the same time, they clearly can spend a lot more than they have the last 3-4 years and still turn a nice profit.  I expect them to be opportunistic when it comes to spending, and be willing to throw a bit more into the pot in years when that spending might put them over the top.  But they’ll need to pick their spots and be smart about it.   

[Tony-OH]

45 minutes ago, Frobby said:

Well, I don’t necessarily disagree with you here.   First of all, we need to face the fact that the Orioles have a far lower revenue base than some teams.  The Astros had $388 mm in revenue in 2021. The Phillies had $323 mm.   The Orioles had $251 mm.  We are not going to spend as much on a consistent basis as the Astros, the Phillies and numerous other teams, because we don’t have the revenue base to do it and the owners are not going to subsidize the team.   At the same time, they clearly can spend a lot more than they have the last 3-4 years and still turn a nice profit.  I expect them to be opportunistic when it comes to spending, and be willing to throw a bit more into the pot in years when that spending might put them over the top.  But they’ll need to pick their spots and be smart about it.   

What is the Nationals revenue?

[Frobby]

37 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

What is the Nationals revenue?

$322 mm, per Forbes.  

[Tony-OH]

11 minutes ago, Frobby said:

$322 mm, per Forbes.  

Wow, so they are on par with the Phillies? I'm not sure even I realized how much the Nationals affected the Orioles revenue and where they stand compared to the others around us. 

[Frobby]

6 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

Wow, so they are on par with the Phillies? I'm not sure even I realized how much the Nationals affected the Orioles revenue and where they stand compared to the others around us. 

The Nats had $90 mm in gate receipts in 2021, while the O’s had $20 mm.   That’s almost the entire difference.   It’s not just that the Nats had better attendance, but ticket prices are a lot higher and they get much more luxury box revenue than the O’s do.  Philly’s gate receipts were only $55 mm, despite overall attendance within 50,000 of the Nats.