At approximately 2 p.m. CST on Thursday, Feb. 22, avid baseball fans will crowd into the Peoria Sports Complex to watch the Los Angeles Dodgers and the San Diego Padres play to open the Cactus League, kicking off MLB Spring Training in the Arizona sunshine. And although the Dodgers just signed him to a $700 million contract in December, two-time MVP Shohei Ohtani will not be playing.
For the Dodgers — as for each of the 30 teams that have flown out to Florida and Arizona for the month and a half of warm-up season — Spring Training represents a proving ground for the choices the team made during the offseason, putting to the test the new trades and contracts. Yet even for teams that have not — or have not yet — signed on a new star pitcher or designated hitter, Spring Training will still provide an opportunity for players to fight for spots on the roster and starting lineup.
Casual fans, or those who may not keep up with the sport throughout the year, may be wondering what stories to follow during this year’s Spring Training. And although there are as many interesting stories as there are teams in the Cactus and Grapefruit Leagues, one narrative question is consistently referenced in the media surrounding Spring Training: The Dodgers and Yankees have spent a lot of money on big name players. Will it be enough to upset the existing MLB power balance?
The Dodgers And Yankees Make Money Moves
As already discussed above, the Dodgers in December dished out $700 million to sign Shohei Ohtani for a ten-year contract. To be completely fair, Ohtani seems to be well worth it: the 29-year old is a designated hitter and pitcher, and he has won the American League MVP unanimously twice, the first major league player to do so. For at least this year, however, the Dodgers will not be able to use Ohtani’s full capacity, since he will not be pitching due to an elbow surgery that took place in September. He will still be batting, though his debut in the Spring Training arena is uncertain. The Dodgers, however, were not done buying pitchers, as they also signed Japanese pitcher and three-time Pacific League MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto to a 12-year, $325 million contract. They also traded for former Tampa Bay Rays pitcher Tyler Glasnow.
There is a lot of momentum building for this Dodgers team, as they are now favored to win the World Series even over the formerly favored Atlanta Braves. Unfortunately for the Dodgers, purchased championship-caliber teams win the offseason more often than they win championships. Spring Training will likely give us a hint as to which this Dodgers team is going to be. Don’t get me wrong, Ohtani and Yamamoto have the firepower to be championship winning pitchers. But baseball promises victory to no one, and especially not those who show how much they want it.
In all, the Dodgers promised roughly $1.2 billion this offseason.
The New York Yankees are attempting similar moves. After finishing the worst season for the team since 1995 — barely scraping to a record above .500 with an 82-80 season — the Yankees are seeking to increase their lineup’s power by adding outfielders Juan Soto and Trent Grisham in a seven player trade with the San Diego Padres. Soto — who the Yankees promised $31 million for a one-year contract — is causing particular excitement in the Yankees’ camp, since he is one of best hitters in the MLB right now, something the Yankees sorely need. The Yankees also completed an unusual trade to rival Boston Red Sox for outfielder Alex Verdugo, who is scheduled to make about $9 million in his last year of arbitration, and signed on starting pitcher Marcus Stroman for a two-year, $37 million contract.
The final piece of the puzzle for the Yankees — as hinted by Yankees’ Captain Aaron Judge — could be free-agent Blake Snell. If that is the Yankees intention, it will be impossible to make it reality without a competitive salary. Previous offers by the Yankees have fallen short of Snell’s asking price of $270 million. The Yankees’ salary problem is compounded by the fact that they are already projected to surpass the $297 million luxury tax threshold based on their payroll, resulting in a 110% tax on every dollar spent above the threshold. It is unlikely that the Cy Young Award-winning pitcher will settle for what the Yankees will pay. Even so, the talent that the Yankees have already acquired for this season is nothing to sneeze at.
Will It Change Anything?
The short answer is, yes. There is a reason that teams spend the amount of money that they do on star players: excellent players can make a good team even better and can even cover a multitude of wrongs. The Dodgers and Yankees will likely be better than last year, even though free-agent and trade spending has been a consistent strategy for the Yankees and has not seemed to help them in the past.
Even if they are good teams, they are paying a far steeper price to be good than some of the teams that they are up against, like the miraculous Baltimore Orioles. What the Yankees have spent in dollars, teams like the Orioles have spent in time, building their team around drafting and promoting minor league players. It has been a long time coming, but this strategy has begun to work, since the Orioles won 101 games last season with the second lowest payroll in MLB. The Orioles are likely to get better, since they now have a team to support ace pitchers like Corbin Burnes — their new trade acquisition from the Milwaukee Brewers.
The Dodgers and Yankees will continue playing the negotiation table. The Orioles will be playing baseball. Time will tell which approach works.
