At the time of this writing, two of Major League Baseball’s (MLB’s) biggest names remain free agents. Despite being two of the game’s best pitchers, both Dallas Keuchel and Craig Kimbrel remain unsigned. And the baseball season is starting in a few days.
No doubt, both will accept deals in the coming days, probably one-year contracts with high annual values or laden with incentives. But, like Manny Machado and Bryce Harper before them, as well as many less famous names, these two have taken their own sweet time (months of it) before signing deals. Baseball’s free agent market has dragged on forever this year.
In contrast, we just watched most of the National Football League’s (NFL’s) free agent period come and (mostly) go within a matter of days. It’s safe to say that the majority of free agent deals were over and done with in a matter of hours. The instant the calendar turned, it was 'wham bam thank you…bam' (forgive my political correctness there).
At the same time, we’ve witnessed the National Basketball Association (NBA) struggle with keeping players happy in their choices of teams. Suddenly, everyone thinks they are LeBron James with the ability to call their shots on where they want to play, with whom, and with which coach.
NFL football and baseball teams have huge rosters in comparison to the NBA. With so few active players in basketball, so fewer who are playing meaningful minutes in games, and even fewer who are star quality with the ability to make a team better, impact games, and sell tickets and T-shirts, those few marketable stars are running today’s game. Coaches, GMs, and supporting casts are nothing to a team compared with players who are earning guaranteed contracts worth millions of dollars; those are the real GMs and coaches. They call the shots. And social media pressures each of them 24/7, 365 days per year, in a way that few other athletes experience.
But let’s get back to these MLB players for a moment. On October 28, 2018, the Boston Red Sox won a decisive Game 5 over the Los Angeles Dodgers, becoming champions of baseball. That day also marked the end of the season. That was the moment that then Boston closer Craig Kimbrel became a free agent, along with many other baseball players who were not under contract for the following (2019) season. In the days that followed, there were whispers that he would be seeking the richest free agent contract ever awarded to a relief pitcher, perhaps more than $100 million on a six-year deal.
Oops. Overshot that one. JUST a bit outside. Fast forward to March 15, 2019. Kimbrel has been a free agent for some four and a half months. Not days, not weeks, but MONTHS. Dallas Keuchel and others are right there with him with similarly inflated expectations of a market that never came close to fulfilling their lofty expectations of their own values. Are these guys better than most other pitchers? Yes, they are. But in the mind of today’s analytics-minded General Managers, is it worth paying that much of a premium cost for the difference between a good replacement player and what a Craig Kimbrel gets you? No, concepts of value have changed in the sports, especially with older players and long term deals, which basically are not a good combination anymore (if they ever were).
So let’s imagine one of these guys (I'll use Craig Kimbrel as my example), changing sports and walking into an NFL team’s headquarters. He’s there on a free agent visit, checking out the team’s practice facility, but really there with his agent with an eye towards the team’s ownership and executives to see how deeply they are willing to open their checkbooks. And have you noticed a trend with some of these teams which host NFL free agents on visits?
These teams bar the door. They lock the players in. A visit expected to last a couple of hours turns into a full day. And by the time the player has left the practice facility, there is news all over TV and the Internet that that player and the team have agreed to a new contract. Yes, that’s what I call ‘wham bam’. They don’t let you leave the building without signing you! That same day! Not half a year or weeks or days later; they don’t even want to wait hours. And NFL teams are routinely breaking the bank during this free agent period by going above and beyond expectations when it comes to signing free agents to big money deals.
If you don’t believe me, ask quarterback Nick Foles. He’s won a Super Bowl championship, but only as a backup QB because the starter was injured. Yet he represents that rare commodity in the NFL: a QB who can play.
He’s proven it, probably not at the level of a Top 10 athlete at the position (and maybe not past the level of doubt of other richly rewarded backups that underperform later, like a Matt Cassell or Brock Osweiler) but the big dividing line for QBs in the NFL is whether they can play or not. There are a lot of them who cannot play well, which teams like the Cleveland Browns and even the Denver Broncos have experienced in recent years. Nick Foles can play and he’s proven it. Therefore, someone threw money at him. Lots of money. The team that did so, the Jacksonville Jaguars, badly needed a QB who can play because it’s had many of the other pieces of a successful team for several years now, but was lacking that one key piece of a good QB.
So how much is that worth? How about $88 million over four years? I’ll bet Craig Kimbrel would have taken that deal, too, even though less of the money is guaranteed in football than in baseball ($50 million guaranteed for Foles is still an awful lot). Would Kimbrel have signed that deal in one day rather than waiting four and a half months?
The difference in football right now is that, while top baseball and basketball players have inflated visions of their own values or egos (not many are truly as special difference-makers as LeBron James, Manny Machado, or Bryce Harper), the NFL is so awash in money that it’s actually playing players more than anyone thinks they are worth. Maybe more than some of them think they're worth. Nick Foles was about to give up and RETIRE a few months ago. That’s a long way from $50 million guaranteed, and there were no other teams reportedly bidding against Jacksonville for his services. Dude can play the QB position, so throw him the money.
Yes, Craig Kimbrel probably would have taken that money, too. As long as the team locked the door and made him sign on the dotted line before he left the building. An offer he couldn't refuse.
References: Images all public domain. I didn't honor the named athletes in this post with pictures of themselves. Instead, just for fun, I included other athletics pictures that were far from their own sports.