MLB Free Agents: Will a shortened season really hurt the market?

Fewer games and smaller revenues, a shortened 2020 season is bad for everyone… especially MLB free agents going forward.

Recently, I started looking at next year’s MLB free agents, tackling 2021’s pool of players in each division. The series is still in process, with only the NL East covered thus far (currently working on the AL East), but going into this project the sentiment seemed quite simple: a shortened 2020 season will certainly hurt the free-agent market.

I think we can all agree that fewer regular-season games will easily create a domino effect when it comes to MLB’s financial bottom line, which in turn, directly dictates the behavior of all 30 teams. And if you ever had any doubt as to how concerned MLB and its team owners can get when it comes to even the thought of losing money, just look at the tactics they’re using right now as they attempt to strong-arm the game’s players into leaving even less money on the table.

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And even though the players and the MLBPA have every right to refuse the numerous concessions the league continues to push on them (like more pay cuts), the fact of the matter is a lost 2020 season, or even a substantially shortened one, is bound to hurt them during next winter’s hot stove. In a sense, it’s a lose-lose situation for the very people that make MLB what it is — the players.

Now, stars like outfielder Mookie Betts and catcher J.T. Realmuto — the top names of the 2021 class — shouldn’t have as much to worry about. Betts is considered one of the top-three overall players in the game, while Realmuto the top catcher (plus, the latter is also looking at a potential extension with the Philadelphia Phillies once the roster freeze is lifted).

Even guys perhaps a tad lower on the star scale — starting pitchers Trevor Bauer and Marcus Stroman, as well as hitter Marcus Semien — should be fine next offseason. Bauer has already made it known he isn’t interested in a long-term deal and Stroman will garner a ton of interest regardless of what the 2020 season looks like.

Sure, Semien probably wishes he was hitting the market under different circumstances next year, but there aren’t many shortstops in the game with a recent 7.6-WAR season (no matter how much of an outlier his 2019 was).

As usual, it’s the mid-tier players that will undoubtedly suffer going forward, especially those trending as possible bounce-back candidates (whether from injury or bad performance), where now the potential upside no longer seems to match the cost. Guys like shortstops Andrelton Simmons and Didi Gregorius, and outfielders Marcell Ozuna and Jackie Bradley Jr. are just a few that more than likely would’ve hit it big next year but now very well may not.

Gregorius fits both the scenarios above, as he’s coming back from injury and a bad season during his walk-year, hence him agreeing to a one-year, $14 million deal with the Cincinnati Reds this past winter.

Ozuna is somewhat in the same boat (without the injury), as he signed a one-year, $18 million deal with the Atlanta Braves with hopes of at least showing flashes of his days in Miami as a more well-rounded player. And there are several more examples of players that were counting on a full 162-game 2020 season, but will now need to prove their worth in a campaign, at the most, half that size.

In a recent report by ESPN, commissioner Rob Manfred announced total losses for team owners could creep up to $4 billion if there’s no 2020 season. Granted, the proposed 50/50 revenue split with the players, and of course, a successful return for the sport, will help alleviate a big chunk of that, but we’re still talking about — and this a best-case scenario — a half-seasons worth of revenue that features zero fans.

A team like the Boston Red Sox, who’s already at its limit financially (I mean… they traded Betts for crying out loud), stands to lose almost $200 million alone just in gate receipts.

It all goes back to the lose-lose situation mentioned above. Whatever hurts the teams financially will inevitably hurt the players, perhaps even twice as much (which is exactly why the MLBPA is so against sharing the league’s losses through a split revenue this season).

For 2021 MLB free agents, perhaps the best course of action is to either accept a qualifying offer next offseason or settle for a one-year deal with a plan to shoot big on the market in 2022; maybe by then, everything will have recouped.

One thing’s for sure, though, it may be a few years before the market for MLB free agents is as exciting and deep as it was this past winter when three players signed deals worth over $200 million in just a span of three days, including 11 players total scoring pacts worth over $50 million (2019 featured just five such contracts).

We’ll see how the league does when it returns, but all current signs point to a slow and maybe even unexciting market in 2021, which is unfortunate given the surprising one we had just 5-6 months ago.