Category: Media

Rafael Devers’ crime was speaking his mind

Rafael Devers could have been reasoned with, but the Red Sox never bothered with any of that, and now they don’t have to.

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The Red Sox have traded Rafael Devers, their highest-paid player, and they didn’t even wait for the smoke to clear to start telling the press that they did it because they felt like Devers wasn’t a team player. His refusal to move to first base after Triston Casas’ season-ending injury was a poor portent, you see, and it was time to move on, as the player on the 10-year, $313 million deal had certain responsibilities they felt he was not fulfilling.

What of the responsibilities the Sox had to Devers, though? Per Devers himself, the team had promised him that, as part of his signing a contract with a franchise that had traded Mookie Betts to clear salary and had let Xander Bogaerts walk after yet another insulting offer for a homegrown player on the way out, that third base was his position now and into the future. After Devers spoke to ownership over the winter about their need to bring in some help — “I’m not saying the team is not OK right now, but they need to be conscious of what our weaknesses are and what we need right now” — they went out and signed free agent Alex Bregman… to put him at third base. Without consulting Devers on it.

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Rob Manfred is denying there are plans for a lockout, again

Rob Manfred is contradicting the words of Rob Manfred once again.

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For some reason, people keep asking MLB commissioner Rob Manfred about the looming threat of a lockout after the expiration of the current collective bargaining agreement. It’s so weird how this happens after you use an interview at the New York Times (by way of the Athletic) to say that there will be a lockout after the expiration of the current collective bargaining agreement, but that’s just how the media works, am I right?

Manfred has spent the first half of 2025 pretending he didn’t say that lockouts should be considered the new normal, as just part of the process of negotiating a new CBA, that he didn’t liken them to “using a .22, as opposed to a shotgun or a nuclear weapon.” In February, Sportico relayed that Manfred had “tampered down his rhetoric” by saying that, “I’m not going to speculate how we’re going to negotiate with the PA. We’re a year away. I owe it to the owners to coalesce around our bargaining approach. And quite frankly I owe it to our fans not to get into this too early. It’s bad enough when you’re doing it and bargaining, and everyone is worried about it. We’re just not there yet.” Attempt number one at putting the cat back in the bag, basically.

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On MLB’s potential MLB.tv, MLB Network plans

The latest in MLB’s ongoing cable replacement saga.

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Sports broadcasting is in a state of flux, and not just when it comes to Major League Baseball games. For decades now, cable has been at the forefront, and it has paid dividends for leagues to align themselves with cable companies, literally, thanks to the carriage fees that every customer — sports-watching or not — were saddled with. With cable subscriptions trending down, though, and streaming and cable alternatives having taken hold, a new future is needed, to provide new revenue streams. Or, at least, ones that aren’t headed in the wrong direction.

This, in a general sense, is old news with MLB — I wrote about their problems with the regional sports network (RSN) model and the kinds of complaints and negotiating tactics that the Players Association would have to deal with from management back in 2021 for Baseball Prospectus, and it wasn’t necessarily new then, either. It’s reared its head in some new ways of late, however, such as with the end of the ESPN/MLB partnership looming, and MLB’s pretty open desire to switch to a different revenue-sharing model that’s more akin to that of the NFL.

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Notes: Rizzo on the Rockies, NCAA women’s tournament, Vladimir Guerrero Jr.

Someone else dislikes Dick Monfort as much as I do, why the women’s version of March Madness needs its own TV deal, and why the Jays were right to re-sign Vladimir Guerrero Jr.

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Before last weekend’s series between the Phillies and Dodgers, Philadelphia’s Bryce Harper made a perfect little statement. When asked about the Dodgers’ spending habits and all the complaining that’s been going on regarding said habits, he said, “I don’t know if people will like this, but I feel like only losers complain about what they’re doing. I think they’re a great team. They’re a great organization.” He’s right, in that this is some loser mentality stuff at work, but the thing is, we need more of that energy out there from players and the media to hammer home just how big that loser energy is.

Alanna Rizzo, formerly part of the Dodgers’ broadcast team but now back at MLB Network, apparently agrees. While speaking to Patrick Saunders of the Denver Post about the Rockies, she did not mince words when it came to owner Dick Monfort and his thoughts on the Dodgers and spending:

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Notes: ESPN deal, Rob Manfred talks salary cap again

ESPN doesn’t seem to believe that the MLB relationship is over after 2025, and Rob Manfred is trying to put the cat back in the bag again.

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ESPN opted out of the final three years of their national broadcasting deal with MLB, which wasn’t a surprise, necessarily, especially given the league’s devaluing of their own product in deals with (arguably) Apple and (inarguably) Roku. Over at Sports Business Journal, though, comes sourced word from ESPN that they don’t see this as the end of the relationship between the two after 2025.

Someone might want to let MLB know about that, since the league has been publicly airing its grievances with the worldwide leader and its coverage — or lack thereof — of MLB’s games. You’ll also find plenty of fans who aren’t broken up about ESPN ending things, since they, a little too regularly, act like they’re embarrassed to be covering baseball games. Which doesn’t do much for growing the game, no?

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Notes: Fay Vincent, Sacramento A’s, SABR Awards

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Fay Vincent, former Major League Baseball commissioner, passed away on Saturday at the age of 86. He had been receiving treatment for bladder cancer, according to ESPN, but complications in that treatment led to his death. MLB released a statement announcing Vincent’s passing on Sunday.

Vincent took over as MLB commissioner for Bart Giamatti in 1989, following his sudden death just five months into his tenure. Vincent has had his name come up in this digital pages on more than one occasion, as he was the commissioner during the 1990 lockout, and the stepping stone then-owner Bud Selig used to grab the commissionership for himself.

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Orioles’ owner publicly wishes for salary cap

David Rubenstein spoke up about his wishes for a salary cap, which signals we should be watching to see if other owners start bringing it up, too.

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There’s been all kinds of talk in MLB lately about the need for a salary cap. There is no need at all, of course, given it’s attempting to solve a problem that doesn’t actually exist in more ways than one: there’s what Rob Mains pointed out last week at Baseball Prospectus, in that the competitive imbalance cited as evidence of the need for a salary cap doesn’t actually exist, and there’s also what I’ve been harping on for some time now, where the problem is not the teams like the Dodgers that are outspending everyone, but the huge chunk of the league that wasn’t spending enough years ago and isn’t spending more now even as other clubs do increase spending.

It keeps coming up, though, so let’s dive in again. Jeff Passan, over at ESPN, wrote a piece last week that included this bit that I want to highlight:

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The A’s have to spend now, or else

The A’s have to spend, due to increased revenue-sharing, and oh, they also aren’t projected to spend more than they did in 2024, so maybe relax the “dawn of a new era” reactions.

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The A’s publicly said, quite awhile ago, that they planned on increasing their payroll in the future. They also stated that the expectation was that this would begin in the 2024-2025 offseason — it was clear that signing players might be difficult for them, given convincing anyone to intentionally play for them in a minor-league stadium in Sacramento for a few years was going to be a tough sell, but trades were always an option, too.

They’ve recently added a couple of expensive — for them — players onto the roster, which of course implies that it truly was Oakland holding them back, or that their ways have changed, or whatever positive interpretation they hope you take away from this for their benefit; MLB’s own website is of course happy to promote a “new direction” for the franchise. The truth of the matter is much simpler, however: the A’s have to spend, or else a grievance will be filed against them.

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Time skip

More teams are spending the resources they have even as others run in place, the next CBA is Manfred’s last, with his final major act likely being a landscape-altering broadcasting deal. Pieces are starting to come together that will still be in play at the end of the decade.

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The Juan Soto deal has me thinking about the future a bit. Not Soto’s future, but what’s going on in MLB. You’ll have to excuse me for using this space to get some thoughts down and further organize them, but it’ll end up resulting in another piece or two down the line once that’s all done.

Event: The Dodgers spend and spend some more, deferring even more money, and are projected for a $279 million Opening Day payroll after kicking off 2024 at $267 million — please recall that Shohei Ohtani was paid just $2 million in 2024, with the other $68 million in the deal deferred until the playing time portion of the contract expires for 2034. The Dodgers ranked third in payroll, but second for luxury tax implications, as more of Ohtani’s deal counts towards that figure in the present than in the figure calculated with actual dollars.

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Notes: Tony Clark on pitching, RSN viewership, Those Two Yankees Fans

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With the World Series starting, MLB Players Association executive director Tony Clark had some time for the assembled reporters. A number of topics were brought up, such as the Rays’ and A’s stadium situations — one caused by a natural disaster and the other by a manufactured one — but the thing I want to focus on is his comments on the state of pitching in MLB:

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