It is! It’s been very prevalent the last few years. Teams can earn the right to be cheapskates if they’re also smart—i.e. the Brewers—it’s also shortening careers for players in their 30s. We should probably readdress how we do service time and arbitration in the league too! - ThreadSky

worstfanspod.bsky.social • 99 days ago

It is! It’s been very prevalent the last few years. Teams can earn the right to be cheapskates if they’re also smart—i.e. the Brewers—it’s also shortening careers for players in their 30s. We should probably readdress how we do service time and arbitration in the league too!

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davidpegram.bsky.social•99 days ago

IMHO, the MLBPA has sold out its younger members. Min salary should be at least $1.2M. A salary floor of $120-150M would likely push even more $ into those players' pockets. Instead, they play for relative peanuts during their prime with a "hope" of making big bucks in their 30s. It's a bad system.

jmesnottweets.bsky.social•99 days ago

Also big agree on this.

IMO, not only is the current system bad for players, it's also bad for teams in the long run.

Sure, you get to pay (relative) peanuts to stars at age 25/26, but the trade-off is paying them tens of millions when they're 39-40 years old and no longer producing like a star.

jmesnottweets.bsky.social•99 days ago

Salaries are always, to some extent, going to be based on past performance. But a system that has teams paying the big $ when guys are actually in their prime instead of paying for the last 2-3 years of that prime and then mostly paying for their declining yrs would be a huge improvement.

worstfanspod.bsky.social•99 days ago

Arbitration could use an overhaul along with service time. Even with those changes it’d be hard to stop teams from service time manipulation, best practice is through reward—supplemental draft picks.

jmesnottweets.bsky.social•99 days ago

Agreed. But at least if we could reduce the number of service years required before FA (from 6 to 4, maybe), it'd still be a significant help. Teams would still try to manipulate of course, but you'd see more guys hitting FA at ages 24-28 instead of 28-32.

jmesnottweets.bsky.social•99 days ago

I'd be much more willing to go 10-12 yrs on a contract for a superstar when that contract ends at age 34-36 instead of age 40+.

worstfanspod.bsky.social•99 days ago

Yes, that would be more ideal. Baseball’s arbitration process would, in my mind, benefit more by getting rid of the winner-take-all ruling. It’s there to encourage compromise, but I think it serves ownership moreso than the player. The NHL’s arbitration ruling is something that could be copied.

worstfanspod.bsky.social•99 days ago

HEY! We agree on that, a salary floor should be implemented, especially with MLB’s current revenue sharing system—which will change as orgs move away from RSNs. And yeah, players are often called up later than when they should and spend their prime years making minimum and arb dollars!

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