Welcome to State of the Union, a weekly column covering the commissioner's office, the players' union and all the forces shaping the future of our national pastime.
We're in the midst of what's shaping up to be an instant classic of a World Series between the Toronto Blue Jays and Los Angeles Dodgers, one that deserves everyone's undivided attention. But that doesn't change the fact that 28 other teams have already started making preparations for the offseason, and just about as soon as the final out of 2025 is recorded, Hot Stove season will begin.
It should, by all rights, be a fascinating one. Sure, there won't be the sort of $700 million sweepstakes we've gotten in each of the past two years, but there's still a top-10 hitter up for grabs in Kyle Tucker — and what it might lack in quality at the top it more than makes up for in sheer depth of big names. From Alex Bregman to Kyle Schwarber, Pete Alonso to Bo Bichette, Dylan Cease to Framber Valdez, there are tons of players looking to cash in and reshape the landscape of the sport moving forward.
Or it would, if this were a normal offseason. But unfortunately, we live in Rob Manfred's world. And in Rob Manfred's world, the biggest story of the winter won't be who signs where and for how much; it will be the looming specter of a lockout. Sure, the current CBA doesn't technically expire until the end of the 2026 season. But the public posturing has already begun, and if Manfred and the owners he works for are really serious about holding firm on the idea of a salary cap, they're going to take this free agency hostage.
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Salary cap speculation could put a damper on MLB free agency
It's still very much up in the air whether MLB institutes a salary cap or not. The MLBPA has long viewed the issue as a non-starter, and understandably so. There's still a long way's to go until next December, with plenty of time left to negotiate and plenty of alternatives available in order to fix what's obviously broken about the economics of the sport.
Right now, though, it sure seems like ownership has honed in on a salary cap as the necessary fix. And it's not just the Bob Nuttings of the world; when you have the likes of Hal Steinbrenner and Tom Ricketts — owners of two of the most lucrative franchises, in two of the largest media markets, in the country — open to the idea, you know it's got legs. Never mind that a salary cap won't actually cure what ails the sport; it's taken on a life of its own at this point, and it seems like many of MLB's 30 owners won't accept anything less, even if it costs a year or more of baseball to get it.
But before we get to that, we could start feeling the effects as soon as a few weeks from now. Every front office will have to approach this offseason with the knowledge that the ground could shift out from under them in 12 months' time. Sure, even if a cap is instituted, it will almost certainly be done gradually. These are five-, six- and seven-year deals we'll be talking about though — even longer in Tucker's case — and that makes long-term planning particularly difficult.
Let's say the San Francisco Giants want to pay some $400 million over 10 years for Tucker's services. How can they confidently sign off on a $40 million annual expense when they have no idea how much money they'll actually have available even two years from now? What if that salary were to suddenly become, say, one sixth of San Francisco's cap? Tucker and his agent are going to be basing their ask off of the current paradigm, but every team they negotiate with will be looking a year down the road and trying to thread a very fine needle.
Who knows how that tension might resolve itself. Teams still want to win, after all (well, most of them do), and there's still a 2026 season up for grabs. Tucker, Bregman and Co. are too talented and too impactful to simply languish on the market. But that doesn't change the fact that I have no idea how any lead executive is supposed to square this circle, especially when their ownership group is banking on a cap coming sooner rather than later. It could be a very long winter.