$3.265 billion?! Making sense of MLB’s biggest free-agent frenzy ever

With nearly all of the top MLB free agents signed, the clearest takeaway from this winter is that not even a 99-day lockout could preclude the most lucrative offseason in baseball history. For all the questions about baseball’s present and future, all the hand-wringing about where the game is headed, money talks — and it says baseball is doing just fine, thank you very much.

Opening Day is a little more than two weeks away, spring games are in full bloom and even with Fernando Tatis Jr. out for three months because of a broken wrist and Ronald Acuña Jr. still on the mend from an ACL tear, the excitement for the 2022 season is palpable. Both East divisions are stacked. Both West divisions loaded up this offseason. And the Central divisions have plenty of talent to be interesting.

Here are five more things to consider as the lockout-shortened spring winds down and the return of baseball around the corner.

1. Major league teams have spent more than ever in free agency — and it isn’t close.

The previous record for money spent on free-agent contracts in one offseason was around $2.4 billion in 2016. This year, 130 players have signed major league contracts for $3.265 billion. That’s a 36% increase.

Here’s a breakdown of where that money has gone:

• The highest-spending team was the Texas Rangers, who lavished two of the three largest contracts on players: Corey Seager’s 10-year, $325 million deal and Marcus Semien’s for seven years and $175 million. Sandwiched between them: The shocking Kris Bryant deal from Colorado for seven years and $182 million. The teams behind the Rangers’ $580.7 million in overall guarantees: Los Angeles Dodgers ($266.2 million), New York Mets ($258.5 million), Detroit Tigers ($235.5 million) and Philadelphia Phillies ($204.15 million).

• The lowest-spending teams: the Milwaukee Brewers ($12.9 million), Baltimore Orioles ($7.9 million), Cincinnati Reds ($5.5 million), Cleveland Guardians ($900,000) and Oakland A’s, who, amid their fire sale, haven’t spent a penny, making them the only team yet to sign a major league free agent.

• The Chicago Cubs top the list of most free-agent signings with 12. They guaranteed $85 million to outfielder Seiya Suzuki, $71 million to right-hander Marcus Stroman and another $44.5 million to 10 others.

• There were a record 11 deals of nine figures or more: Seager, Bryant, Semien, Freddie Freeman ($162 million), Javier Baez ($140 million), Trevor Story ($140 million), Max Scherzer ($130 million), Robbie Ray ($115 million), Kevin Gausman ($110 million), Carlos Correa ($105.3 million) and Nick Castellanos ($100 million). And it wasn’t just one big spender: The 11 players went to 10 teams. A full third of major league clubs went nine figures on a player. In total, those players received $1.684 billion, more than half of the total spent this winter.

• The American League West, propelled by Texas, led divisional spending with $863.55 million. The National League West was second at $653.25 million. Behind them: NL East ($636.65 million), AL Central ($429.18 million), AL East ($391.6 million) and NL Central ($291.23 million). Before Story’s deal with Boston on Sunday, the AL East was last in spending. The four non-Cubs NL Central teams have committed just $90.73 million combined.

• There is a clear bifurcation in spending this winter. Thirteen teams guaranteed more than $100 million to players; 13 teams guaranteed less than $50 million. Even among the low spenders, there are teams with clear playoff aspirations: Houston, San Diego, Tampa Bay, Milwaukee and the New York Yankees.

2. Both New York teams are still projected to be contenders.

Yes, the Yankees’ biggest free-agent signing this offseason was Anthony Rizzo at $32 million — the 27^th-biggest commitment in the free-agent class — and their other two free-agent pickups were a mop-up reliever and backup outfielder. They eschewed the five marquee shortstops (largely because Anthony Volpe, No. 6 overall on Kiley McDaniel’s top 100 prospect rankings, is a star in the making and maybe only a year from the big leagues), passed on Freeman, watched Scherzer go crosstown and were never deeply involved with any of the other nine-figure guys. Their most impactful move was reshaping the left side of their infield through a trade with Minnesota, taking on $50 million for two years of Josh Donaldson and fetching shortstop Isiah Kiner-Falefa and catcher Ben Rortvedt for catcher Gary Sanchez and third baseman Gio Urshela.

And even after all that, Baseball Prospectus’ PECOTA system still has the Yankees pegged to be the best team in the AL with 99 wins. Dan Szymborski’s ZiPS system has them at 91 — the second most in the AL, behind Toronto — and ESPN’s Bradford Doolittle has them at 94 wins, two back of the Blue Jays.

Are the 2022 Yankees better than the team that won 92 games and lost to Boston in the wild-card round last year? Probably not. On the plus side, Luis Severino will return to their rotation, joining Gerrit Cole, Jordan Montgomery, Jameson Taillon and one of a grab bag of other arms — or perhaps one of the Oakland starters who could be traded: Sean Manaea or Frankie Montas. Their bullpen looks solid but could get hit by regression. Their lineup remains a strength, based on the way it’s projecting out: DJ LeMahieu, Rizzo, Aaron Judge, Giancarlo Stanton, Joey Gallo, Donaldson, Aaron Hicks, Kyle Higashioka, Kiner-Falefa.

With MLB’s third-highest payroll at around $245 million, the Yankees are one of five teams currently projected to exceed the new competitive-balance-tax threshold of $230 million. The Mets are far ahead of them, with a CBT payroll of nearly $280 million, even though their only signing since the lockout ended was reliever Adam Ottavino on a one-year, $4 million deal. Their trade for starter Chris Bassitt didn’t quite keep them up with the NL East Joneses — since the lockout, Atlanta has added Matt Olson, Kenley Jansen and Collin McHugh and re-signed NLCS MVP Eddie Rosario, while Philadelphia has brought in Castellanos and Kyle Schwarber (four years, $79 million) — but again, in all three projection systems, the Mets remain a playoff team.

3. It’s too early to say definitively what sort of role the new CBA is playing in the game.

Of all the changes in the new basic agreement, there were two that were going to be tested immediately post-lockout: the expansion of the playoffs from 10 to 12 teams and introduction of a draft lottery that allows the 18 non-playoff teams to receive a top-six pick.

While it’s too early to say anti-tanking measures won’t have a demonstrable effect in the long run, they certainly didn’t dissuade Oakland and Cincinnati from trading away players this spring. The Reds were 83-79 last year and went into this winter with only Castellanos set to leave via free agency. Rather than trying to improve to fight for a sixth NL playoff spot, they dealt Sonny Gray to Minnesota and sent All-Star outfielder Jesse Winker to Seattle — dumping third baseman Eugenio Suarez and the $35 million remaining on his contract along with him, leading to an underwhelming return from the Mariners for a player of Winker’s caliber. The A’s, 86-76, were set to lose Starling Marte, Mark Canha and Jake Diekman. On top of that, they dealt Bassitt, Olson and Matt Chapman and have spent precisely $0 in free agency. Both teams punted — perhaps with an eye on the future, but certainly not with one on 2022.

With an additional team making the postseason in each league, especially coming off a year that the 88-win Atlanta Braves got hot and won it all, the hope for MLB is that there would be more incentive for teams in the middle, like the Reds and A’s, to go for it instead of electing not to compete — and in doing so, flooding the available player market. Like in years past, their moves had a tangible effect on the free-agent market. The Braves, Yankees, Mariners and Blue Jays, each in at some point on either Freeman or Story, pivoted after getting offers from the A’s or Reds. That meant fewer teams in the mix to bid against one another, or raise free agents’ asking prices. In the end, Freeman chose between just two teams: the Dodgers and the Rays. Story’s market picked up but only because he was the last elite shortstop standing and teams saw a potential bargain for a top-end player.

In reality, what has happened is closer to what the MLB Players Association feared: that teams would see that 40% of the league is now playoff-bound, realize that the baseball playoffs are even more of a crapshoot and not press ahead with significant spending (it’s why the union fought hard for a 12-team postseason instead of the 14 MLB sought). It’s certainly not an unfounded fear. The hope was that the higher CBT would balance it out, and indeed the spending of the Dodgers, Mets, Yankees, Red Sox and Phillies — all currently over the threshold — is promising for players.

We’ll learn more about the effects of the expanded playoffs in July, when we could see a trade deadline that’s quieter than usual. Adding only two teams shouldn’t have an enormous impact, but if, say, 22 teams find themselves at least in the hunt for one of the 12 spots, the demand will far outweigh the supply, and that would mean a greater return required for teams dealing players and fewer trades executed because fewer quality players are available.

4. The proliferation of one-year contracts is going to flood next offseason’s market.

At the dawn of free agency, Oakland A’s owner Charlie Finley proposed making every player a free agent every year. Though other owners scoffed at the idea, Finley’s explanation illustrated that he understood the consequences would be significantly better for the owners: If a market is flooded with players, he reasoned, it makes it far easier to pay them less. All teams ever want is options, and annual free agency would ensure that.

Though baseball isn’t exactly there, a grim future for a specific segment of players could await after this offseason’s financial success. Of the 130 free agents signed this offseason, 80 are on one-year deals. Four multiyear pacts — to Correa, Rizzo, Carlos Rodon and Jorge Soler — include opt-out clauses after the first season. That’s 84 potential free agents on top of another 150 or so players whose service time puts them on pace to reach the open market. Add in non-tenders and the available-player list could top 250. And remember, as the offseason winds down, only 130 players this season have signed free-agent contracts.

Here’s the reality: The best players always will get paid. Judge, Trea Turner, Xander Bogaerts and Jacob deGrom could headline next year’s free-agent class and they’re going to get paid regardless of who else joins them.

It’s baseball’s long-disappearing middle class that will bear the brunt of the deluge of free agents annually. If you’re not clearly better than the rookie who’s going to make $700,000, the market these days says you’re just a guy.

The desire of teams to do shorter-term deals has always been clear. Most would rather pay a higher average annual value on a one-year deal than go for more guaranteed over two. It’s a trend we’ve now seen two consecutive winters with the top free agents whose markets collapsed: Trevor Bauer and Correa. Teams being stingy with years is here to stay.

5. Even if free agency is almost done, the possibility of big deals isn’t.

The best remaining free agent is outfielder Michael Conforto, who is still hunting for a big deal despite a bat that had helped him slug nearly .500 over the previous four seasons combined. (That delay is not a huge surprise to many in the industry, because Conforto is coming off a season in which he hit .232/.344/.384 and he’s also saddled with a qualifying offer.) Options exist in the starting-pitching market, too, with Brett Anderson, Chris Archer, Johnny Cueto, Zach Davies and J.A. Happ available.

If there’s money to be spent, though, it’s most likely going to come via contract extensions. In the spring of 2019, Mike Trout, deGrom, Acuña, Nolan Arenado, Chris Sale, Paul Goldschmidt, Alex Bregman, Blake Snell, Eloy Jimenez, Whit Merrifield, Brandon Lowe and more than a half-dozen others signed extensions. Though 2022 won’t come close to that standard, there should be some movement in the coming days and perhaps weeks.

Why the urgency in the next few days? The deadline to agree to a deal that avoids salary arbitration is Tuesday at 1 p.m. It’s a soft deadline, of course; there will still be time during the season to make a deal after the hearings, which typically take place during spring training but were postponed because of the lockout. Those talks don’t always lead to anything substantive, but every once in a while, extensions — such as the six-year, $70 million deal announced Monday between infielder Ryan McMahon and Colorado — can germinate from them.

For this year to approach the heights of 2019, extension season will need more starpower, but gaining traction with bigger-name, bigger-dollar players is more difficult. The Yankees should be motivated to work with Judge this week; they’ve made clear their desire to keep their star outfielder, but it’s expected that, without a pre-Opening Day deal, he’ll commit to free agency. Boston could pursue something with third baseman Rafael Devers and Bogaerts. San Diego would do well to keep Joe Musgrove, and the same goes for the Phillies and Aaron Nola.

For many stars, watching teams dole out money out this winter has undoubtedly made their own requests steeper. The number for Jose Ramirez to stay in Cleveland almost certainly went up with Bryant’s deal. Trea Turner would need a megadeal to stay in Los Angeles after seeing Seager, Tatis and Francisco Lindor get $300 million-plus in the past year.

In the “wouldn’t-it-be-nice” category, Toronto would love nothing more than to lock in Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Bo Bichette and Teoscar Hernandez as the long-term centerpieces of its already-excellent core. And then there’s the prize of all prizes: Shohei Ohtani, who signed a deal last season to cover 2022 but is set to hit free agency after the 2023 season.

The hot stove, on hiatus for three-plus months, has roared back with a vengeance, capping this historic offseason of spending. And there’s still plenty of time between now and Opening Day to make it even more memorable.