The Sunday Ramble

Free agency follies, Pasquantino's favorite swing, the commissioner has thirst for a lockout and an umpire exercises some extremely poor judgement.

Wednesday. We just have to survive until Wednesday. That’s when pitchers and catchers officially report to Surprise, Arizona and the Royals’ spring training camp opens. It’s been a long winter. The end is in our sights.

A reminder that I’ll roll out a Sunday post from time to time that doesn’t focus on the Royals but instead on recent baseball stories that I’ve found interesting. We can talk about roster construction, position battles and how Matt Quatraro will utilize his bullpen during the week. Sunday is for general baseball fun.

I am strangely intrigued by the Alex Bregman free agency saga. It’s not that I’m a fan of his or have any real interest in where the guy ends up playing in 2025 and presumably beyond. (Because I don’t believe it’s going to be with the Royals.) Although I do enjoy the level of red-assery one must possess to decide to wear the number two for his career because he was the second overall pick in the 2015 Major League Baseball draft. And he’s not wearing it because he’s celebrating being the number two pick. He views that as a slight that he wasn’t the top selection and chooses to remember that every single time he puts on his jersey. I can respect that level of psychosis.

Maybe that brand of red-assery has impacted Bregman’s free agency. It would appear that the value he places on his own talents is perhaps larger than what bidding teams believe. And that has led to something of a stalemate.

Recent reporting had Bregman sitting on a six-year, $156 million offer from the Astros. That’s an average annual value of $26 million which is pretty much in line with how the industry was looking at a potential Bregman contract when the offseason started. So…what’s the problem? Well, for starters, Bregman apparently views that as a pay cut. Really. He previously signed a five-year, $100 million deal with Houston that was back-loaded, so he was paid $28.5 million in each of the last two seasons. Yep. It is true that $26 million is less money than $28.5 million…so pay cut.

Then there were reports that Bregman has another “lucrative” six-year offer on the table from a mystery team. The Cubs, Tigers and Red Sox are all thought to have been in the hunt. Oh, cannot forget the Blue Jays. They’re in on everybody.

If Bregman truly has two six-year offers in hand, what the hell is he waiting for? I can’t help but think he’s playing a dangerous game of contractual chicken. Can he squeeze a few extra million out of a team? Or will a team (or teams) pull their offer, leaving him with fewer (or no) options? Will Bregman even have a team when camps open to position players in about a week? Or will he ultimately have to take a one-year deal to prove himself?

Yes, I am entertained.

Could the Royals be in on Bregman? If I believe the chatter coming from One Royal Way that the club was prepared to spend more this winter (which I do), it’s possible. Although it should be obvious at this point in the offseason that the Royals were looking to do shorter-term deals.

Still, the Royals could certainly benefit from adding Bregman to their lineup. I’ve written quite a bit about projections this week, but here’s a fun one. From Dan Szymborski at FanGraphs, the Royals would improve their playoff odds more than any other team if they added Bregman and made him their everyday third baseman.

The Royals would get a 14 percent bump, moving from their current 40 percent to just over 54 percent. What team would get the second-most benefit? That would be the Tigers who would gain 12 percent. Yes, those Tigers who are allegedly still in the mix. If Detroit were to land Bregman, their odds would jump to 44 percent which would put them in a better position than the Royals. Projectively speaking, of course.

Pete Alonso returning to the Mets was the easiest free-agent call of the winter. That it took so long was a bit strange, but this is the market for slugging first basemen in the year 2025.

Alonso’s deal is for two years and $54 million, with an opt-out after the season. He just turned 30 and saw his power production dip precipitously last year. I don’t think it’s a fait accompli that he will be hitting the market again next winter. And if he does, I think he will end up in the exact same situation.

He reportedly turned down a seven-year, $158 million extension in June of 2023. I’m thinking if that’s the case, Alonso may have made a mistake.

The Alonso drama makes me think about the future of Vinnie Pasquantino. They’re different hitters, obviously, but both are larger humans who are anchored to first base.

Speaking of Pasquantino, there was an exchange he had with Tom Tango on the bad site that Alex Fast brought over to Bluesky:

If you click on the post you can enlarge the screenshots.

The first question that comes to mind is, don’t the Royals have this data already? The answer is, yes. Pasquantino pointed out later that he has, in fact, looked at this. It was just a hitter talking to an analyst to get his perspective. Kind of fun to see something like that play out.

I think this is the swing Pasquantino is referring to:

I can see why it would be his favorite.

If all this talk about money in free agency is making you dizzy, don’t despair. The owners got together in Palm Beach this week and discussed introducing a salary cap. Death, taxes and owners crying poor.

From Evan Drellich at The Athletic:

Whether to pursue a salary cap has been a central topic for Major League Baseball’s owners this week during meetings in Florida, people briefed on the discussions said. No decisions are to be made by the time the meetings wrap Thursday, but the league office and owners are taking “a hard look” at where they want to go in economics and labor, one person briefed on the meetings said.

…

In a vacuum, all owners would likely back a salary cap for the cost control it provides. Some owners are deterred in practice, however, by the lengthy work stoppage expected to be required to achieve one. The Major League Baseball Players Association has long opposed a cap, and many missed games could ensue if the owners aggressively seek one. Not all owners agree that’s a reason to back down, however.

Plus ça change…You know where this is going. The smaller market owners want some cost control. The larger market owners are spending as if they have a printing press in the boardroom. The way franchise values increase year over year, I tend to think that, yes, MLB owners do actually print money.

Of course, a work stoppage of any kind would border on the catastrophic. Of course, the owners and the commissioner don’t give a rats ass about you, the fan. It’s all about making more money. Even if that means a lockout.

Are you prepared for a lockout ahead of the 2027 season? It sure feels like Commissioner and noted hater of baseball, Rob Manfred, is angling for one.

Regardless of the exact bargaining priorities owners settle on, another lockout appears likely when the CBA expires at midnight entering Dec. 2, 2026. Manfred said offseason lockouts should be considered a new norm.

“In a bizarre way, it’s actually a positive,” he said last month. “There is leverage associated with an offseason lockout and the process of collective bargaining under the NLRA works based on leverage. The great thing about offseason lockouts is the leverage that exists gets applied between the bargaining parties.”

A lockout is only a “positive” for the owner class. As Manfred himself says, it’s about creating leverage. It’s a cudgel for the owners. A means to strong-arm the opposition into making concessions.

Anyway, enough doom and gloom about the future of the game. There’s plenty of time left on the current CBA, but the owners almost shut down the game for an extended period of time in the last round of negotiations. The appetite for a longer stoppage is palpable. The owners can jabber all they want about a salary cap. I can’t see the players ever agreeing to one.

Last week, Major League Baseball fired umpire Pat Hoberg for violating their gambling policy. The gist of the situation was Hoberg and a buddy—a professional poker player who both live in Iowa where sports gambling was legalized in 2019—shared two sports betting accounts and placed bets on a range of events. Hoberg isn’t accused of gambling on baseball, but it appears his pal did place bets on baseball via these shared accounts. Including games where Hoberg was working.

Yeah, that’s not great. What’s also not great is the two communicated via Telegram where they kept tabulations on wagers and then arranged to make payments when they saw each other. Once Hoberg learned he was under investigation, his buddy scrubbed the messages from his account and Hoberg completely deleted his account. So Hoberg effectively obstructed the investigation.

Even though Hoberg isn’t alleged to have placed wagers on baseball himself, having access to an account where bets were placed on games—even ones where he worked—is extremely problematic. Hoberg can apply for reinstatement a year from now, but I would imagine with the gambling on baseball that was happening with that account and with the fact he basically destroyed evidence, that’s going to be a difficult path.

Every time a story breaks like this involving gambling and players or officials, I think we’re just beginning to scratch the surface here. Sports gaming has become so pervasive we are careening towards some kind of spectacular scandal. And as gambling becomes more and more intertwined with sports leagues, it’s going to get ugly.

We have been warned.

Finally, let’s end on a positive note. Here’s one for you data nerds out there.

Statcast at Royals Cactus League games? Why, thank you very much. Vinnie and I appreciate the data.

It’s close, friends. Very close.