MLB Free Agency Opens Monday With the CBA Expiring in 29 Days: What the December 1 Deadline Means for Tarik Skubal

Major League Baseball free agency opens Monday at 5 p.m. ET, five days after the Milwaukee Brewers finished off the Tampa Bay Rays in five games for the first title in franchise history. Normally that sentence is the start of a three-month shopping season.

Not this winter. The collective bargaining agreement expires December 1 at 11:59 p.m. ET, and a lockout is widely expected. That gives this market about four weeks to do what usually takes until February.

The Clock Is the Story

Monday is also the deadline for clubs to issue qualifying offers, set at a record $23,150,000 for this cycle, up 5.1 percent from last offseason. Players have until November 17 at 4 p.m. ET to accept or decline. The winter meetings are scheduled for San Diego on December 7 to 9, which is to say a week after the CBA runs out.

Reuters reported that MLB’s opening proposal would install a 2027 salary cap of $245.3 million, a number that would force eight clubs, the Dodgers, Mets, Yankees, Blue Jays, Phillies, Red Sox, Padres and Braves, to shed a combined $578 million. The union’s lead negotiator, Bruce Meyer, was blunt about it.

“This would be a tough negotiation even without their demand for the nuclear bomb of the salary cap,” Meyer told Reuters. On the owners’ competitive balance argument, he added: “It makes no sense at all.”

Rays manager Kevin Cash put the mood more plainly. “I guess the best I can say is I hope I’m managing next year.”

Boras Is Telling Teams to Spend Now

Scott Boras has been making the case that clubs should sign players before the rules change rather than wait to find out what the rules are. “They can react later,” he told Andy McCullough of The Athletic. “Now they can get the talent. They can get what they want.”

He is right, and it is the smart read. A team that waits for labor certainty will be bidding against 29 others in a compressed window with less supply. A team that moves this week sets the price.

Tarik Skubal Is the Test Case

Skubal is the clear top free agent, and the market has never had to price a pitcher like this against a deadline like this. He turns 30 on November 20. Split between Detroit and Los Angeles after an August 2 trade, he went 12-7 with a 2.72 ERA, 186 strikeouts and a 0.96 WHIP across 158.2 innings, with a 2.61 ERA in 10 Dodgers starts. He has won the AL Cy Young twice.

Matthew Pouliot of NBC Sports projects seven years and $400 million. The record guarantee for a pitcher is Yoshinobu Yamamoto’s $325 million and the record average annual value is $43.33 million. Mark Feinsand of MLB.com has reported Skubal could pass both. Jeff Passan of ESPN has noted that barely a handful of teams want to pay roughly $50 million a year for anyone.

What Has Already Happened

The option window has done most of its work. Bo Bichette exercised his $42 million player option to stay with the Mets rather than opt out, a reversal of what most expected. Atlanta exercised club options on Ronald Acuna Jr. at $17 million and Ozzie Albies at $7 million.

Going the other way: Michael King declined a $28 million player option with San Diego after a 12-10, 3.21 ERA season across 32 starts. Boston declined its half of Sonny Gray’s $30 million mutual option, making him a free agent days before he turns 37. Gray tied for the major league lead with 18 wins and posted a 2.72 ERA over 29 starts and 169 innings, and because he already received a qualifying offer years ago, Boston gets nothing back if he leaves.

The Associated Press counted 155 new free agents in the two days after the World Series, with roughly 40 more possible once Monday’s option decisions land. Almost none have signed anything. The only transaction on the board is a minor league deal.

Four weeks from Monday, the rules of the sport may be unwritten. Teams that treat this like a normal offseason are going to lose this offseason.

Carlos Garcia

A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.