UPDATE: Let’s not call the new collective bargaining agreement a success just yet

By Nov 22, 2011, 12:37 PM EST
12 Comments

UPDATE:  I need to walk this one back quite a bit, as many new details emerged about the new CBA after I posted it.  Here are some of those details which change my assessment of this quite a bit.

12:37 PM: At 1PM Eastern the MLB Network will have the news conference announcing the new CBA.  MLB.com is probably streaming it because they tend to do that. Go check it out if you’d like. If not, read this.

As we’ve noted several times, there aren’t CrazySexyCool changes afoot here. Very little in the new CBA is going to impact the lives and baseball-viewing enjoyment of the casual fan.  The realignment of the Astros to the AL starting in 2013 and the addition of a wild card team are both big obvious changes, but beyond that it’s a lot of inside baseball.  UPDATE:  Ken Rosenthal is reporting now that the new CBA will have some expanded replay for fair/foul calls and “trapped” balls.  We’ll have a post on that when we see the details.

The most comprehensive treatment of these changes I’ve seen can be found over at Bless You Boys, where Tigerdog1 — I think that’s a German name — breaks them down item-by-item.  I thought about just plagiarizing his work and calling it an homage or a remix, but that would be wrong.  Go check his post out for the nitty gritty.

The larger takeaway: while the advent of HGH testing and the realignment stuff will get the most attention, the most significant changes occur with respect to the amateur draft and international free agent signings.  In each case, a luxury tax was implemented, penalizing teams — fairly sharply, it appears — who choose to go over bonus limits set by the league. This will effectively serve as a salary cap for amateur signings, even if it’s not a hard cap.  And it will really change the way teams with low big league payrolls build.  Before they could plow money into the draft even if they couldn’t snag a big free agent.  Now: it won’t be easy.

I still don’t understand why Major League Baseball pushed so hard for that. Overall costs associated with the draft and signings are dwarfed by the main player payroll for each team and thus the savings there will not be dramatic overall, even if they do work pretty significant change in isolated situations.  Oh well. You get what you can get in a negotiation and the owners got it.

Anyway, as we said yesterday, the key here is less the specific changes — we only care about things like free agent compensation picks and Super Two eligibility for a couple cold months of the year — than the fact that the deal is done and it was done without blood on the floor or rancor in the air.

Indeed, by the time this contract expires, you’ll be able to get a legal beer with someone who wasn’t alive the last time baseball had a work stoppage.  And that’s pretty cool.

Jacob deGrom, oft-injured Rangers ace, to have season-ending right elbow surgery

Associated PressJun 6, 2023, 10:01 PM EDT
rangers degrom
Charles LeClaire/USA TODAY Sports
2 Comments

ARLINGTON, Texas — The Texas Rangers signed Jacob deGrom to a $185 million, five-year deal in free agency last winter hoping the two-time NL Cy Young Award winner could help them get back to the playoffs for the first time since 2016 and make a push toward winning a World Series.

They also knew the risks, with the pitcher coming off two injury-plagued seasons with the New York Mets.

Even with deGrom sidelined since late April, the AL West-leading Rangers are off to the best start in franchise history – but now will be without their prized acquisition until at least next year. The team said Tuesday that deGrom will have season-ending surgery next week to repair a torn ulnar collateral ligament in his right elbow.

“We’ve got a special group here and to not be able to be out there and help them win, that stinks,” deGrom said, pausing several times with tears in his eyes. “Wanting to be out there and helping the team, it’s a disappointment.”

General manager Chris Young said Tuesday the decision on surgery came after an MRI on deGrom’s ailing right elbow, but the extent of what is required might not be determined until the operation is performed next week.

Tommy John surgery, in which the damaged ligament is replaced, is often needed to fix a torn UCL, but Young and the Rangers didn’t go as far as saying the pitcher would have that particular procedure. After being drafted by the New York Mets in 2010, deGrom made six starts in the minors that summer before needing Tommy John surgery and missing all of 2011, three years before his big league debut.

DeGrom last pitched April 28 against the New York Yankees, when he exited early because of injury concerns for the second time in a span of three starts. The announcement about surgery came a day after deGrom was transferred to the 60-day injured list.

Young said the latest MRI showed more inflammation and significant structural damage in the ligament that wasn’t there on the scan after deGrom left the game against the Yankees.

“The results of that MRI show that we have not made progress. And in fact, we’ve identified some damage to the ligament,” Young said. “It’s obviously a tough blow for Jacob, for certainly the Rangers. But we do feel this is what is right for Jacob in his career. We’re confident he’ll make a full recovery.”

Young and deGrom, who turns 35 later this month, said the goal is for the pitcher to return near the end of next season. Both said they were glad to have clarity on what was wrong with the elbow.

Texas won all six games started by deGrom (2-0), but the right-hander threw only 30 1/3 innings. He has a 2.67 ERA with 45 strikeouts and four walks. He threw 3 2/3 scoreless innings against the Yankees in his last start before leaving because of discomfort in his arm.

The Rangers went into Tuesday night’s game against St. Louis with a 39-20 record, the first time they were 19 games over .500 since the end of 2016, their last winning season.

Before going home to Florida over the weekend for the birth of his third child, deGrom threw his fifth bullpen last Wednesday in Detroit.

“I’d have days where I’d feel really good, days where I didn’t feel great. So I was kind of riding a roller coaster there for a little bit,” deGrom said. “They said originally there, we just saw some inflammation. … Getting an MRI right after you pitch, I feel like anybody would have inflammation. So, you know, I was hoping that that would get out of there and I would be fine. But it just didn’t work out that way.”

DeGrom spent his first nine big league seasons with the Mets, but was limited by injuries to 156 1/3 innings over 26 starts during his last two years in New York.

He had a career-low 1.08 ERA over 92 innings in 2021 before missing the final three months of the season with right forearm tightness and a sprained elbow.

The four-time All-Star didn’t make his first big league start last year until Aug. 2 after being shut down late in spring training because of a stress reaction in his right scapula.

His latest injury almost surely will trigger Texas’ conditional option on deGrom’s contract for 2028.

The option takes effect if deGrom has Tommy John surgery on his right elbow from 2023-26 or has any right elbow or shoulder injury that causes him to be on the IL for any period of 130 consecutive days during any season or 186 days in a row during any service period.

The conditional option would be for $20 million, $30 million or $37 million, depending on deGrom’s performance during the contract and health following the 2027 season.

“I feel bad for Jake. If I know Jake, he’ll have the surgery and come back and finish his career strong,” second-year Mets manager Buck Showalter said. “I know how much it means to him. He enjoys pitching. It’s certainly sad news for all of us.”