ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — Outside of Tampa Bay, the money flows freely.
Some might say recklessly; others would argue gloriously. Whichever side of baseball’s economic fence you land on, there is little doubt that the divide continues to grow wider.
The top 10 spenders in the majors shelled out a little more than $3 billion for free agents this offseason, while the other 20 teams combined for less than $700 million. That works out to about $300 million each for the big shots, and $35 million per team for everyone else.
So what’s a low-revenue team to do?
If you’re the Rays, try staying one step ahead.
Tampa Bay has gone on a spending spree of its own in the past week, although that’s a relative term. Yandy Diaz, Jeffrey Springs and Pete Fairbanks have all signed multi-year deals in recent days, and that’s on top of previous contracts given to Tyler Glasnow, Manuel Margot, Brandon Lowe and Wander Franco.
If you don’t count players who will have contracts renewed in the coming weeks, the Rays actually have more money committed to the 2024 roster than the current team because of all the multi-year deals.
Is this a change in philosophy? Not really; current ownership has been doing this since signing Evan Longoria to a nine-year deal during his first month in the big leagues in 2008.
The difference is the current roster is top heavy with players entering their arbitration years, and the Rays are being aggressive when it comes to locking down salaries before the marketplace gets even more expensive.
Essentially, the Rays are offering players guaranteed income in the short term in exchange for buying out a free-agent season or two.
Springs’ deal bought out two free-agent seasons at $10.5 million each with an option for another season at $15 million. Diaz is also giving up one free-agent season with an option for another. Margot gave up two years and an option. Fairbanks gave up one option season.
Because free agents were so costly this winter, the Rays were less active than expected, which gave them more salary flexibility than they might otherwise have had.
“This is a really good team, this is a really good roster,” said baseball operations president Erik Neander. “We didn’t have our best year last year and won’t make excuses for that, but the potential for this roster is to play well above what we did last year.
“There wasn’t a whole lot of transactional activity this winter as it played out and, perhaps because of that in a sense, it afforded us the opportunity to give the group we have a chance to stick together a little longer. We’re fortunate that we’ve had players that have been interested in making that happen.”
The Rays also had a lot of money coming off the books with Kevin Kiermaier, Mike Zunino, Corey Kluber, Ji-Man Choi, Ryan Yarbrough, Brooks Raley and David Peralta leaving via trades or free agency, which lopped $45 million off the payroll and allowed the Rays to sign Zach Eflin to a three-year, $40 million deal and keep some of their arbitration candidates.
The trick to these deals is making it beneficial for both sides. The Rays typically have these type of contract discussions before players start making big money in arbitration. By offering multi-year deals, they give young players tens of millions that will set them up for life even if their careers are cut short.
On the flip side, the Rays likely get them for a below-market salary for a year of two of free agency.
Even if the player does not stay for the length of the contract — and the Rays have dealt Blake Snell, Chris Archer, Matt Moore, James Shields, Ben Zobrist and Longoria in those situations — the contract makes them more valuable on the trade market.
“You open up a conversation and listen in an attempt to best understand what’s most important to the player. What considerations are most important,” Neander said. “I think there’s a lot of different ways you can structure and balance things.
“Figuring out if any particular path or concept is more desirable than the status quo. That’s really how we go about these. They don’t always work out, they don’t always get to this point. But that’s the approach. It’s no more fixed or rigid than that, just trying to best understand one another and go from there.”
So Aaron Judge will make $40 million a year until reaching the edge of 40. Good for him. And good for Yankees fans, at least for a handful of those seasons.
That’s the cost of doing business for a generational talent in a big market. Around here, the circumstances are different. The price is, too.
And yet, over the last three seasons, the Rays have won 226 games. The Yankees have won 224.
