San Diego Padres: Manny Machado on deciding to opt out after 2023

Last week, San Diego Padres third baseman and NL MVP contender Manny Machado confirmed that after the 2023 season, he will be opting out of the remaining five years of his 10-year contract, leaving $150 million on the table.

Machado, who will be 31 next offseason, would become the best player on the free agent market next season after Angels DH/SP Shohei Ohtani.

On Friday, Machado was a guest of the Ben and Woods Show on Audacy’s 97.3 The Fan in San Diego in Spring Training in Peoria, Ariz. Machado clarified why he will be opting out.

San Diego Padres: Manny Machado on opting out of his contract after 2023

“It’s obviously a hard decision for me and my family but it’s not about myself or anything,” Manny Machado said in Peoria on Friday. “Some people might say ‘he just wants (more) money.'”

In reality, Machado says that he wants to stay in San Diego long-term but things have changed in the baseball market (and in life in general) in the last five years since he signed his contract.

“[W]e love San Diego,” Machado said. “We have a home there, we love this organization … but at the end of the day, business is business. And I think it wouldn’t be in my interest if I — you know, the market has changed in five years. In one year it’s changed. You see it in life, you see it in the real world. Let’s take away baseball. The price of eggs is how much? It’s just life. Things change, a lot of things change. Ultimately, the markets change, right?”

“You see the offers that are being offered out there. I’ll be 36 at the time that my contract will be over, and I’ll still have four, five more years — I want to play until I’m at least 42, like [Nelson Cruz]. At that point, it’s about milestones, it’s about maybe getting into the Hall of Fame, putting up those final numbers. At the end of the day, we play for 20 years, and that’s all we got. After that, we’re 42 years old, and we’ve got a whole life left. What are we going to do at that point?”

You can listen to the entire segment below (starts at 1:40).

If Machado can produce as well as he has in the last three seasons, he should be able to easily get more than the five years and $150 million remaining on his contract.

Since 2020, he has only missed a total of 21 games (some of which was due to ankle injury in 2022) and he has hit .291/.359/.522 with an OPS+ of 147. For the last two seasons (since they are 162-game seasons), he has averaged 30 home runs, 104 RBI with an average rWAR of 5.7.

In the last three seasons, he has finished third, 18th, and second in National League MVP voting.

If Machado does stay in San Diego and Juan Soto is there for the foreseeable future too, they may be able to knock the vaunted Dodgers off their pedestal in the NL West this year and beyond.