Texas Rangers 2024-2025 Offseason Thread

[saddles]

Personally, I think the mefia is making too big of a deal about the lack of a TV deal limiting the budget. I think the limiting factor is the luxury tax threshold. They want to keep from going over the threshold for the third year in a row, so that can be reset.

At this point, they probably have a pretty good idea about how much revenue they can get for TV rights. The negotiations have to be really far down the road by now.

 

[Kelleyman]

Personally, I think the mefia is making too big of a deal about the lack of a TV deal limiting the budget. I think the limiting factor is the luxury tax threshold. They want to keep from going over the threshold for the third year in a row, so that can be reset.

At this point, they probably have a pretty good idea about how much revenue they can get for TV rights. The negotiations have to be really far down the road by now.

Did you see that the Cards took a pay cut but they can now stream?
LAD looks like they could care less about the luxury tax

But yeah the media has been known to be off at times

 

[saddles]

Did you see that the Cards took a pay cut but they can now stream?
LAD looks like they could care less about the luxury tax

But yeah the media has been known to be off at times

Yeah, the top few teams don't care about paying the tax.

 

[saddles]

Yeah, the top few teams don't care about paying the tax.

I think that tjeir streaming is only through the company that has the TV rights. They are still owned by the Diamond group, the ex-Bally's and now FanDuel group. If they have FanDuel already, they can stream through them.

 

[WastinSomeTime]

From Evan Grant:

It’s natural to think Sasaki already has the Los Angeles Dodgers in mind. If you believe he’s a follower. He could join Shohei Ohtani, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and the world champions and blend right in. It’s the Kevin Durant school. Although the Japanese media contingent that would follow that team might be bigger than one covering the White House.

If, however, he wants to blaze his own trail, then it’s going to come down to who can present him the best vision.

Enter Chris Young.

“Vision,” particularly connected with Young, is a word every big-time free agent the Rangers landed in the last three years has mentioned in explaining why they came to a team that lost 102 games in 2021. Young sold them on his “vision” first. It worked with Corey Seager and Marcus Semien. Worked again on Bruce Bochy. And then Jacob deGrom and Nathan Eovaldi.

When he gets going on the vision thing, Young’s passion for winning is palpable. His delivery is earnest, energetic and focused. His drive is singular: Winning. He is not about the college recruiting pitch, which may have been the biggest weakness, if there was one, in the presentation to Ohtani back in 2018. Young was a player and a pitcher. He’s won a World Championship as both a player and an executive. Even with a language barrier, he can reach a player. He went to see Sasaki pitch in person at the end of the Rangers’ season, so he’s not simply relying on others.

But the others in his orbit on this have strong ties in Japan. Assistant general manager Josh Boyd has spent more than a decade building and maintaining strong relationships in Japan. Pacific Rim Operations director Joe Furukawa was instrumental in building the initial relationship with Yu Darvish and has spent the last 15 years in Japan.

And if Sasaki wants to win a world championship, well, the Rangers do have a still relatively shiny one. It’s only a year old. The core of that team remains. Seager’s presence alone makes a pretty good argument.

Just don't see the Rangers getting him unless they go big money wise and even then he might take a little less to play in LA or SD.

 

[saddles]

From Jamey Newberg:

I the Rangers wanted to max out their 2025 bonus pool, meaning their available dollars to throw at Sasaki, 60 percent of the base amount would be another $3,756,960, which if acquired would bring their total to $10,018,560.

Again, though, you can only trade for international cap space during — and for — the period when it’s acquired. So teams can’t increase their pools for the January 15-December 15 international period until January 15.

Could the Rangers, or any team, identify another team that doesn’t believe it can win on Sasaki and doesn’t have big plans for its international bonus pool otherwise and work on a trade for cap room that they can formally submit on January 15? Not easy; if there is a team or a few that fit that profile, they’ll be chased by a dozen teams, if not more.

But, hypothetically, could the Rangers offer the A’s (a team that historically hasn’t been a big player internationally) Adolis Garcia, Morel, and Castillo for, say, 1B/C Tyler Soderstrom, RHP Austin Adams, and $3.75 million of their bonus pool? It would leave the A’s nearly $4 million in their bonus pool — and if they weren’t going to spend all $7.5 million internationally anyway, the bonus pool portion of the deal would only be a paperwork conveyance that would functionally cost the A’s nothing.

But it would give the Rangers $10,011,600 — about $7,000 short of maxing out, but remember that you can only acquire pool money in $250,000 increments — which would rocket them past the rest of the league, assuming of course others teams don’t make their own cap-expanding trades.

 

[saddles]

Just don't see the Rangers getting him unless they go big money wise and even then he might take a little less to play in LA or SD.

No team can go very big, moneywise.

 

[saddles]

More from Jamey Newberg:

We can certainly assume there will be baseball factors. Does he want to be a Dodger — as most media outlets have already penciled in (not ESPN’s Jeff Passan, though: “Los Angeles will be linked strongly to Sasaki, but assuming he will go to the Dodgers is premature”; or USA Today’s Bob Nightengale: “While executives still believe that Japanese pitching sensation Roki Sasaki is planning to sign with the Dodgers after the season, one executive who knows him says that Sasaki's soft-spoken, unassuming personality could lead him to a smaller market like Seattle, San Francisco or San Diego”) — so he can play with Ohtani and Yamamoto? Or would he prefer not to be in their shadow? Does he want to pitch in New York, with both teams certain to be interested and more than able to extend him at the top of the market when that time comes?

Or would he perhaps have a team atop his list “whose past success with Japanese players still resonates,” Passan suggests, citing the Rangers’ success in bringing Darvish along as he started his MLB career? On top of that, the Rangers, it is believed, were runners-up to the Angels in the chase seven years ago to land Ohtani.

President of Baseball Operations Chris Young and GM Ross Fenstermaker scouted Sasaki in person this year. So has international scout Hajime Watabe, who just completed his 16th season with the organization. Assistant GM Josh Boyd, who (then the organization’s Director of Pro Scouting) was instrumental in the Darvish scouting and acquisition effort 13 years ago, has long had a formidable presence in Japan. Pacific Rim Operations Coordinator Joe Furukawa, the Rangers’ Scout of the Year in 2021, was big in the Darvish process, too.

And Young, the former big-league pitcher and the man who helmed the 2023 World Champions, famously convinced Bruce Bochy to pause his retirement and come to Texas. As GM alongside Jon Daniels, Young played a huge role in the Corey Seager and Marcus Semien recruitment and negotiations. A year later, he convinced Nathan Eovaldi and Jacob deGrom to move their careers to Arlington, and this month he did the same with Skip Schumaker.

Bochy and Seager and Semien and Eovaldi and deGrom and Schumaker had two things in common: zero past ties to the Rangers, and a belief in the vision that Young laid out for why this place was exactly right for them.

There’s a lot of track record there. And not just on the field.

 

[saddles]

From Mark Feinsand:

One source said the teams most likely to have a shot at Sasaki are West Coast clubs and those that have signed Japanese players in the past. Aside from the Dodgers and Padres, the Giants, Yankees, Mets, Blue Jays, Cubs and Rangers were among those mentioned by executives.

 

[WastinSomeTime]

No team can go very big, moneywise.

Not sure I am understanding that statement.

 

[saddles]

Not sure I am understanding that statement.

I think this part of the MLBTraderumors article explains that part best:

MLB classifies players who sign out of a foreign league before they turn 25 as amateurs. Those players can only sign a minor league contract and are subject to a hard-capped bonus limit. Whichever team signs Sasaki is allowed to add him to the MLB roster by Opening Day — he isn’t going to start the season in Triple-A even though his first contract will be a minor league deal — but he won’t be able to sign for huge money.

After he signs, Sasaki will be subject to the same six-year control window that applies to any player called up from the farm system. He’ll play the next three seasons on roughly league minimum salaries before going through arbitration three times. Sasaki would not return to the open market until the 2030-31 offseason. He would be eligible to sign an extension during his team control window, but MLB has the ability to block a contract that it deems a circumvention of the bonus pool limits. There’s no set criteria for what might cause MLB to intervene, but it’s safe to say that Sasaki won’t be signing a massive extension within a few weeks of agreeing to a modest signing bonus.

 

[Kelleyman]

I guess the mystery ahead is when Sasaki posts so we know which pool period he can pull from.
Have to think it is after Dec15

 

[scotsman#1948]

Rangers are close to major league deal with Luis Curvelo RHP

 

[saddles]

Rangers are close to major league deal with Luis Curvelo RHP

It sounds like he will be better AAA reliever depth than some of the ones we have.

 

[saddles]

From Jamey Newberg:

• The Rangers’ Top 20 Prospects, according to Grant Schiller and Jeffrey Paternostro of Baseball Prospectus:
  • 1. Sebastian Walcott, SS
    2. Kumar Rocker, RHP
    3. Alejandro Rosario, RHP
    4. Emiliano Teodo, RHP
    5. Malcolm Moore, C
    6. Jack Leiter, RHP
    7. Winston Santos, RHP
    8. Echedry Vargas, IF
    9. Yolfran Castillo, SS
    10. Cam Cauley, SS
    11. Dylan Dreiling, OF
    12. Kohl Drake, LHP
    13. Jose Corniell, RHP
    14. Alejandro Osuna, OF
    15. Paulino Santana, OF
    16. Jesus Lopez, C
    17. Izack Tiger, RHP
    18. Jonathan Ornelas, UT
    19. Justin Foscue, IF
    20. Mitch Bratt, LHP
• The BP guys identified OF Anthony Gutierrez, OF Braylin Morel, RHP Brock Porter, Stephan, and White as “Persons of Interest” outside the top 20 — and interestingly ranked the Rangers’ top talents at age 25 or under as follows:
  • 1. Langford
    2. Walcott
    3. Rocker
    4. Carter
    5. Rosario
    6. Teodo
    7. Leiter
    8. Santos
    9. Duran
    10. Vargas
  • Rocker ahead of Carter, Teodo ahead of Leiter, and Santos ahead of Duran all raised an eyebrow for me.

 

[saddles]

Both BP and MLB have Malcolm Moore as our #5 prospect. If there are GMs around the league that agree with that accessment, I sure hope we can work out a trade.

 

[saddles]

From Jamey Newberg:

• Jon Morosi (MLB Network) reports that the Rangers are close on a 40-man roster deal with RHP Luis Curvelo, a minor-league free agent who was “(quietly) one of the most popular free agents at the GM Meetings.” A career-long reliever in the Mariners system, Curvelo reached Double-A for the first time in 2024, striking out 81 in 72 innings while scattering 42 hits and 22 walks — for an eye-opening .168/.247/.272 (.519 OPS) slash line. The 24-year-old’s splits against left-handed hitters were even better this year than his right-on-right numbers.

 

[saddles]

From Jamey Newberg:

• Jonathan Mayo (MLB.com) adds some clarity to the question I raised yesterday on whether Sasaki could be signed during the December 16-January 14 “dead period” for international free agents if posted beforehand. Mayo makes it clear that he’d have to sign by December 15 (even though that would be fewer than 45 days) if he's formally posted by the Chiba Lotte Marines between now and December 1 — but of course that would make only teams’ 2024 bonus pools available, and as we discussed yesterday, 26 of the 30 teams don’t even have $1 million left — the Dodgers lead with $2,502,500, which is less than every team will be able to spend starting January 15, when 2025 international bonus pools are activated.
• Mayo cleverly points out that if Sasaki is posted between December 2 and December 15, he could sign during either period — by December 15 if he’s willing to take a 2024 bonus, or starting January 15 (as long as it’s within 45 days) to take 2025 money — but it’s fairly obvious which way he’d go.

 

[WastinSomeTime]

I think this part of the MLBTraderumors article explains that part best:

MLB classifies players who sign out of a foreign league before they turn 25 as amateurs. Those players can only sign a minor league contract and are subject to a hard-capped bonus limit. Whichever team signs Sasaki is allowed to add him to the MLB roster by Opening Day — he isn’t going to start the season in Triple-A even though his first contract will be a minor league deal — but he won’t be able to sign for huge money.

After he signs, Sasaki will be subject to the same six-year control window that applies to any player called up from the farm system. He’ll play the next three seasons on roughly league minimum salaries before going through arbitration three times. Sasaki would not return to the open market until the 2030-31 offseason. He would be eligible to sign an extension during his team control window, but MLB has the ability to block a contract that it deems a circumvention of the bonus pool limits. There’s no set criteria for what might cause MLB to intervene, but it’s safe to say that Sasaki won’t be signing a massive extension within a few weeks of agreeing to a modest signing bonus.

Do teams still have to put out bids for him in order be able to sign him? Not sure if that has changed. If not that is where it will cost teams.

 

[saddles]

Do teams still have to put out bids for him in order be able to sign him? Not sure if that has changed. If not that is where it will cost teams.

Teams can offer him up to the total they are allowed to spend on international prosoects along with the amounts of international money they have traded for. I think the max is around $12 million or a little less. All teams won't have nearly that much though.