Many MLB fans are upset that the Los Angeles Dodgers are entering uncharted territory when it comes to payrolls. MLB commissioner Rob Manfred thinks the sport has bigger problems.
Speaking with reporters Tuesday in Phoenix, Manfred addressed what has turned into the dominant narrative of the offseason: the Dodgers signing basically every player they wanted not named Juan Soto and building up what would be the largest payroll in MLB history in the process.
The commissioner basically said he isn’t upset about it, but he understands why some are upset, via Jack Harris of the Los Angeles Times:
[The Dodgers] have gone out and done everything possible, always within the rules that currently exist, to put the best possible team on the field. I think that’s a great thing. That type of competitive spirit is what people want to see.”
“It’s clear we have fans in some markets that are concerned about the ability of the team in their market to compete with the financial resources of the Dodgers. If we’ve been consistent on one point, we try to listen to our fans on topics like this. And I have heard people, believe me.”
As things currently stand, the Dodgers’ competitive balance tax payroll — the 40-man payroll number used by MLB to determine luxury tax payments, adjusted for deferral inflation — sits in the neighborhood of $400 million. Baseball Prospectus projects it at $402.3 million, while Spotrac believes it’s $392.5 million.
Either number would easily be the highest the league has ever seen, and that’s not the end of the spending. Because Los Angeles is more than $150 million above the luxury tax line, it is also facing a record $142 million tax bill at the end of the season.
The Dodgers didn’t have baseball’s most expensive offseason — that title belongs to the New York Mets, whose $765 million Juan Soto contract is actually twice as big as every Dodgers contract this offseason combined — but the impact feels greater because a) the Dodgers just won the World Series, b) they just had a $1 billion offseason last year, thanks to the Shohei Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto deals and c) they got Roki Sasaki this winter at an outrageous discount.
On the flip side, 10 MLB teams are currently projected to have CBT payrolls lower than the Dodgers’ tax bill, per Spotrac. That includes the Athletics and Tampa Bay Rays, who will be playing in minor-league stadiums this year after longstanding disputes about their future homes (the A’s made the move voluntarily, the Rays not so much). The Chicago White Sox are also in that group after losing an MLB-record 121 games and then trading their best remaining player.
Manfred seems more concerned about MLB’s non-competitive teams and other issues, again via Harris:
“If I’m going to be critical of something, it’s not going to be the Dodgers. It’s going to be the system.”
In case you need a recap, here are all nine MLB free-agent contracts the Dodgers have signed since winning the World Series (returnees are italicized):
That doesn’t include Sasaki’s $6.5 million international free-agent bonus or the five-year, $74 million extension Tommy Edman signed. All together, the Dodgers arguably walked away with two of the four best starting pitchers on the market in Snell and Sasaki, three of the best relievers in Scott, Treinen and Yates and the second-best outfielder in Hernández.
All of this has made the idea of a salary cap, long taboo in MLB, more attractive to fans, though that would probably limit player salaries league-wide more than it would hurt the Dodgers. As the Sasaki deal showed, the Dodgers have leveraged their resources in many areas beyond payroll and would be an attractive destination for any free agent not getting what he wants on the open market.
This season’s outcome isn’t a foregone conclusion, either. Yes, the Dodgers are the clear World Series favorites, at +250 odds with BetMGM, but that works out to Vegas giving them a 28.6% chance to win the title. On a mechanical level, the sport of baseball has been quite unwelcoming in recent years to teams that think they can spend their way to a title.
