If it looks like collusion, and walks like collusion …
Newly signed Cubs reliever Brad Brach talked Friday morning about his “stressful” experience with free agency during a winter that last month eventually landed him a one-year, $4.35 million deal with a mutual option for 2020.
“You hear about interest the first week and don’t get any offers until late December or January, and you’re just kind of wondering what’s going on,” the right-hander said, then described a process that from the outside looks suspiciously like league cooperation:
“Teams say they like you but they’re not making offers,” he said. “And then you finally get offers and six or seven teams are giving you the same offers. It’s just kind of a weird process and nobody really know what’s going on right now.”
For two winters, the free agency process has moved at less than a snail’s pace, the slowest markets in more than 30 years. This time around, it’s even more conspicuous – or suspicious, depending on the vantage point – because two 26-year-old perennial All-Stars remained unsigned as camps opened across Florida and Arizona this week.
With 10 All-Star appearances and an MVP award combined and at such relatively young ages, Bryce Harper and Manny Machado are among the rarest of free agents, but neither has experienced anything close to a bidding war for their services – a few teams engaging in serious talks for each.
Meanwhile, industry revenues and franchise values — driven by the players who double as labor and product — have risen dramatically in the past decade while salaries have stagnated, even dipping last year for the first time since 2010.
Last month, Cubs’ union rep Kris Bryant said players around the league are getting upset and that the system has to change. Cubs pitcher Jon Lester – who was part of one of the last hearty free agent markets in the 2014-15 winter – called it “a sad time that we’re in” and that “something has to give.”
Three decades ago a paper trail of evidence led to owners being found guilty of collusion after strikingly similar offers were made to free agents – many of whom wound up re-signing with their original teams. Owners were held liable for damages.
What about these similar offers this time around, and similar timelines for making them?
“We talked to certain teams, and they told us we have an algorithm,” Brach said, “and here’s where you fall on the scale.”
Algorithm. The new word for collusion?
“I don’t know,” Brach said, with a chuckle. “You guys can make of that what you want. It’s just kind of weird that all offers are the same, and they come around the same time, and everybody tells you there’s an algorithm, but you figure teams would have different ones. I don’t know. It’s definitely a weird process, and you just can’t figure it out.
“Luckily, the guys in the bullpen have been the ones that haven’t been hurt as bad,” he said. “I think if you’re at the top of the class you’re fine, but if you’re somewhere in the middle you’re going to get hurt, and that’s where they’re kind of taking advantage of us.”
