Out of the box thoughts on how to chip away at the Dodgers' unfair roster building advantage over the rest of MLB

[Fear The Chorizo]

The Dodgers have an absurd financial advantage over the rest of the MLB at the moment - even including other huge market teams across the league.  In the absence of any meaningful change in future collective bargaining agreements to level the playing field in terms of how MLB rosters are constructed (salary cap/floor, adjusting how deferred money in contracts is accounted for, more punitive luxury tax penalties, etc), I was wondering what other options the "have nots" organizations across MLB could offset what the Dodgers can do and actually set them up for an extended period of being stuck in the wilderness when a bunch of these high priced veterans start breaking down....

One thought I had was for the rest of MLB, particularly the small-mid market clubs, to essentially avoid making any sort of trades or transactions with the Dodgers - and force them to make some very tough roster decisions without the benefit of trading away unnecessary veterans or prospects to fill in any of their own roster gaps or refresh their minor league talent pool.  The Dodgers have a ridiculous pitching staff who would all need to be added to their 40 man roster currently sitting on the IL - as those arms get healthy there's going to be guys who other organizations would line up to trade for made available.  Instead of competing to give the Dodgers the best package available to acquire those guys, other teams could simply force the Dodgers' hand and make them DFA/release them for nothing in return.  Same goes for a bunch of their prospects who essentially are MLB-ready but are blocked by guys they are paying for many years down the road....don't allow the Dodgers to trade some of those guys for MLB roster improvements or younger minor league talent from other organizations - instead force them to age out of their system and become rule V draft eligible players.

I'm certain the players' union would cry foul if it became obvious the rest of the league was refusing to answer any phone calls from the Dodgers' front office and it would be considered some sort of collusion - but I think over time this sort of strategy could be a pretty effective way to hollow out what is essentially an all star team roster with a deep farm system and who's who of recovering players on IL on top of all that.  I think this would be more fun than MLB sitting on strike for a season or two while hammering out sufficient changes to their financial system that prevents this sort of circus from happening again.

[markedman5]

Tariffs on Japanese born players? 
 

I kid………..sort of…..

[owbc]

I think collusion is going to get shot down right away.

Just make the luxury tax massive and pair that with salary floors for the teams getting the payments. And penalize deferments as part of the luxury tax hit. 

 

 

[Jim French Stepstool]

1 hour ago, Fear The Chorizo said:

The Dodgers have an absurd financial advantage over the rest of the MLB at the moment - even including other huge market teams across the league.  In the absence of any meaningful change in future collective bargaining agreements to level the playing field in terms of how MLB rosters are constructed (salary cap/floor, adjusting how deferred money in contracts is accounted for, more punitive luxury tax penalties, etc), I was wondering what other options the "have nots" organizations across MLB could offset what the Dodgers can do and actually set them up for an extended period of being stuck in the wilderness when a bunch of these high priced veterans start breaking down....

One thought I had was for the rest of MLB, particularly the small-mid market clubs, to essentially avoid making any sort of trades or transactions with the Dodgers - and force them to make some very tough roster decisions without the benefit of trading away unnecessary veterans or prospects to fill in any of their own roster gaps or refresh their minor league talent pool.  The Dodgers have a ridiculous pitching staff who would all need to be added to their 40 man roster currently sitting on the IL - as those arms get healthy there's going to be guys who other organizations would line up to trade for made available.  Instead of competing to give the Dodgers the best package available to acquire those guys, other teams could simply force the Dodgers' hand and make them DFA/release them for nothing in return.  Same goes for a bunch of their prospects who essentially are MLB-ready but are blocked by guys they are paying for many years down the road....don't allow the Dodgers to trade some of those guys for MLB roster improvements or younger minor league talent from other organizations - instead force them to age out of their system and become rule V draft eligible players.

I'm certain the players' union would cry foul if it became obvious the rest of the league was refusing to answer any phone calls from the Dodgers' front office and it would be considered some sort of collusion - but I think over time this sort of strategy could be a pretty effective way to hollow out what is essentially an all star team roster with a deep farm system and who's who of recovering players on IL on top of all that.  I think this would be more fun than MLB sitting on strike for a season or two while hammering out sufficient changes to their financial system that prevents this sort of circus from happening again.

I like the unique thought of this. But the first time a deal is proposed by them that the other team would deem beneficial to their organization, it would be hard for that team to turn it down. It would need to be real, unified stone cold collusion.

Not realistic, but while fantasizing I've always liked the idea of, if a team goes above a particular payroll amount, they forfeit their participation in the amateur draft the next year. No picks. Still over that amount the next year? Sit out another one. Even better if the draft ever includes internationals.

[SF70]

1 hour ago, Fear The Chorizo said:

The Dodgers have an absurd financial advantage over the rest of the MLB at the moment - even including other huge market teams across the league.  In the absence of any meaningful change in future collective bargaining agreements to level the playing field in terms of how MLB rosters are constructed (salary cap/floor, adjusting how deferred money in contracts is accounted for, more punitive luxury tax penalties, etc), I was wondering what other options the "have nots" organizations across MLB could offset what the Dodgers can do and actually set them up for an extended period of being stuck in the wilderness when a bunch of these high priced veterans start breaking down....

One thought I had was for the rest of MLB, particularly the small-mid market clubs, to essentially avoid making any sort of trades or transactions with the Dodgers - and force them to make some very tough roster decisions without the benefit of trading away unnecessary veterans or prospects to fill in any of their own roster gaps or refresh their minor league talent pool.  The Dodgers have a ridiculous pitching staff who would all need to be added to their 40 man roster currently sitting on the IL - as those arms get healthy there's going to be guys who other organizations would line up to trade for made available.  Instead of competing to give the Dodgers the best package available to acquire those guys, other teams could simply force the Dodgers' hand and make them DFA/release them for nothing in return.  Same goes for a bunch of their prospects who essentially are MLB-ready but are blocked by guys they are paying for many years down the road....don't allow the Dodgers to trade some of those guys for MLB roster improvements or younger minor league talent from other organizations - instead force them to age out of their system and become rule V draft eligible players.

I'm certain the players' union would cry foul if it became obvious the rest of the league was refusing to answer any phone calls from the Dodgers' front office and it would be considered some sort of collusion - but I think over time this sort of strategy could be a pretty effective way to hollow out what is essentially an all star team roster with a deep farm system and who's who of recovering players on IL on top of all that.  I think this would be more fun than MLB sitting on strike for a season or two while hammering out sufficient changes to their financial system that prevents this sort of circus from happening again.

Selfishly I don’t want there to be major changes to the financial structure of MLB. The Brewers have figured out how to become a powerhouse organization thru the building-up of their infrastructure to the point that if they continue to stack superior prospect classes they will become a perpetual powerhouse for as far as the eyes can see.

Anyone studying what this organization has done structurally since Stearns/Arnold took over late in 2015 can see that this is absolutely where this thing is going. 

Even if the superior classes stopped today, the last 4 classes have made the farm system the biggest sleeping giant in the game. With the best teenage prospect talent in baseball maturing over the next 3 years merging with a 3-5 years controlled playoff-worthy big-league core, forming the future powerhouse Milwaukee Brewers.

Arem & Jack see it, which is why they picked MKE 3rd in baseball, behind Boston & LAD with the best 5 year future. It’s going to happen, it’s just a question of how long the powerhouse can last. As is said earlier, if they can continue to scout internationally like they currently are doing and continue to stack extra draft-capital gathering extra picks for their drafts, this thing could go on for more than a decade+.

Right now having an elite prospect procurement system favors this team with them getting the competitive balance pick every year and extra international pool money. Going to an international draft could very well hurt this team’s current advantage in that realm. 

Another great draft ahead in 2025 with the team having 5 of the top 68 picks/$17M+ in pool money could give the team a top farm for multiple years after graduating impact to the bigs over the next 3-4 years.

The best SM FO in the game will also have some from this current BL core that will need to be traded to make room for the incredible prospect talent that will be maturing, forcing their way to MKE. What will this team get in return for 1-2 years of Contreras? 2-3 years of Turang? 2-3 years of Ortiz? Maybe we see prospect trades from the best farm in baseball that adds veteran, impact, controllable talent. So many options for this great FO of ours . Hard to have the patience waiting for all this to happen.

 

[brewcrewdue80]

Taking away all of LA's picks sorta encourages the need to spend on absurd contracts to field their teams.  Maybe a max dollar a team can spend in one offseason? Max on deferrals?

The players don't care. No cap equals their contracts can reach $1Billion soon.  Setting a floor is tough too.  A team full of young pre-arbs could argue on a year or 2 being below that threshold. There's no good answer to this because players want to be paid.  

[Fear The Chorizo]

1 hour ago, owbc said:

I think collusion is going to get shot down right away.

Just make the luxury tax massive and pair that with salary floors for the teams getting the payments. And penalize deferments as part of the luxury tax hit. 

 

 

I'd be all for deferred money counting fully towards a team's luxury tax payroll coupled with more significant penalties for staying over it.  In other words, Ohtanis contract is counted as $70m annually per luxury tax payroll accounting instead of the 35ish M it currently is and the actual dollars payment of $2m in 2025 to ohtani's bank account.  Make the luxury tax a realistic accounting for what's on the field now competing against the rest of the league vs the deferral madness

[brewerfan82]

16 minutes ago, Fear The Chorizo said:

Make the luxury tax a realistic accounting for what's on the field now competing

It is.

[Jim French Stepstool]

2 hours ago, brewcrewdue80 said:

 

The players don't care. 

Nor do a healthy % of the owners, I suspect.

[Jim French Stepstool]

2 hours ago, brewcrewdue80 said:

Taking away all of LA's picks sorta encourages the need to spend on absurd contracts to field their teams.  

It does. But if such a rule were ignored & they had no picks that could rot the organization from the inside out. They would have to bat pretty close to 1.000 on their acquisition decisions.

But like I said it's a pipe dream.

[owbc]

8 hours ago, brewcrewdue80 said:

Taking away all of LA's picks sorta encourages the need to spend on absurd contracts to field their teams.  Maybe a max dollar a team can spend in one offseason? Max on deferrals?

The players don't care. No cap equals their contracts can reach $1Billion soon.  Setting a floor is tough too.  A team full of young pre-arbs could argue on a year or 2 being below that threshold. There's no good answer to this because players want to be paid.  

I saw that the entire Marlins starting 9 in tonight’s game is being paid the league minimum, $800K. Less than $8 million for the entire lineup. So I’m pretty sure there is room for a minimum in the current system. 

[wntrtxn21]

4 hours ago, owbc said:

I saw that the entire Marlins starting 9 in tonight’s game is being paid the league minimum, $800K. Less than $8 million for the entire lineup. So I’m pretty sure there is room for a minimum in the current system. 

With revenue sharing there should be a minimum floor in MLB. However, the players' union can't have it both ways, no cap but a minimum floor. 

[Thurston Fluff]

17 hours ago, owbc said:

I think collusion is going to get shot down right away.

Just make the luxury tax massive and pair that with salary floors for the teams getting the payments. And penalize deferments as part of the luxury tax hit. 

 

 

Is it the type of collusion that's illegal though? Colluding against players is illegal but I don't think colluding against an organization is. I could see a scenario where the Dodgers have to essentially  give some players away because teams know they'll have to cut them anyway.

[mtsportsfan]

Treat foreign players pro or amateur the same and they have to go into the draft!Plus a max and floor salary cap , penalties going over or under should be stiff ! 

[brewcrewdue80]

19 hours ago, wntrtxn21 said:

With revenue sharing there should be a minimum floor in MLB. However, the players' union can't have it both ways, no cap but a minimum floor. 

Oh I dunno penalize them no revenue shared to Miami over 2 years. Then that gives the reason to turn that stadium in to a Futbol host city. At least 10yrs ago it was said being given 40mil in revenue sharing and the GM at the time fielded like a 28M team.  Mlb needs to retract to fix this.  They never will due to money they are making overall.  So the product you see the Big markets always put out is skewed in their favor.

[Thurston Fluff]

I have a different idea that's equally out of the box. Subsidized contracts. The basic idea would be teams pay a certain portion of the contracts and an MLB pool funds the rest based on the local TV revenue. For example if the Brewers offered a free agent a contract at $40 million per season and their local revenue is 60% less than the Dodgers only 30% of the money would be paid by the Brewers. The rest would come from an MLB fund every team pays into according to their local tv contracts.

Obviously the specific would need to be worked out so a team like the Brewers don't use up the entire pool signing someone but the basic idea would allow more teams to compete for high end free agents, the money would go to the players and the playing field would be evened out without a salary cap or floor.

[Playing Catch]

21 hours ago, Thurston Fluff said:

I have a different idea that's equally out of the box. Subsidized contracts. The basic idea would be teams pay a certain portion of the contracts and an MLB pool funds the rest based on the local TV revenue. For example if the Brewers offered a free agent a contract at $40 million per season and their local revenue is 60% less than the Dodgers only 30% of the money would be paid by the Brewers. The rest would come from an MLB fund every team pays into according to their local tv contracts.

Obviously the specific would need to be worked out so a team like the Brewers don't use up the entire pool signing someone but the basic idea would allow more teams to compete for high end free agents, the money would go to the players and the playing field would be evened out without a salary cap or floor.

I'm not bright enough to understand the problems this would create, but this is exactly the type of thing I've been mulling over.