In recent years, there has been a growing distrust between the MLB and the MLB Players’ Association. The players’ union does not like the teams to be tanking, reducing their free agent expenses and manipulating the service time of their main candidates, among other things. The collective bargaining agreement expires in December and negotiations are expected to be contentious.
The manipulation of length of service is widespread, but almost impossible to prove. Kris Bryant filed a complaint against the Cubs for manipulating their service time in 2015, and lost the case because he had no evidence. It is an open secret that teams manipulate service time (that is, keep their prospects in minors long enough to delay the free agency). Good luck proving it.
The best evidence is the candid comments made by the other side and Seattle Mariners President Kevin Mather appears to have provided those comments earlier this month. During an event with the Bellevue Breakfast Rotary Club, Mather indicated that the club would not call its top candidates last season for reasons of length of service, no matter what. A video of the February 5 event was posted on YouTube on Friday, but has already been removed. A complete transcript is available at Lookout Landing.
“If our major league team had an outbreak of COVID or injuries and we had to call people from the taxi squad, we were a little short of players, because there was no chance for you to see these young players at T-Mobile Park,” said Mather. “We weren’t going to put them on the list of 40 men, we weren’t going to start the service timer. There were all kinds of reasons. If we had an injury problem or a COVID outbreak, you may have seen my big belly out there in the field. You wouldn’t have seen our young players, our potential customers, playing at T-Mobile Park. “
Later in the video, Mather was asked about Jarred Kelenic and said the club tried to sign a long-term contract similar to the six-year extension they gave Evan White last year, even before White made his MLB debut. Mather then indicated that Kelenic will be called up next season, after a few weeks in the minor (which would delay his free agency). He said the same about the great launcher candidate, Logan Gilbert.
“He is a very good player and, frankly, we think he will be a superstar,” said Mather of Kelenic. “We controlled his career in the major league for six years, and after six years he will be a free agent. We would like him to have a few more hits in the minor leagues, probably in Triple-A for a month, so he will probably be on the left field at T-Mobile for the next six or seven years, then he will be a free agent. He will not commit beyond his free agent years. “
And here’s part of what Mather said about Gilbert: “You won’t see him on April 1st, but in mid-April you’ll see a young man named Logan Gilbert. He’s the real one.”
Manipulating length of service is not technically against the rules, but it is a bad faith tactic that amounts to stealing wages. Handling the length of service is equivalent to delaying the player’s first big payment. George Springer had his length of service manipulated in 2014. How much more does he earn as a free agent 30 years before COVID last season compared to the $ 150 million six-year deal he received at the age of 31 winter? Probably much more. Manipulating length of service took money from him and his family.
For a player with zero MLB service time, such as Kelenic (and Gilbert), it takes just 15 days for minors to delay the free agency by one year. Several teams have chosen not to manipulate the service time of their top candidates in recent years, including the Fathers with Fernando Tatis Jr. and the Mets with Pete Alonso, but they are in the extreme minority.
Kelenic, 21, was acquired in the Robinson Cano / Edwin Diaz trade with Mets. He hit 0.291 / 0.364 / 0.540 on three levels in 2019 and MLB.com ranks him as the fifth best contender in baseball. Spending 2020 at the alternate location paved the way “for him to start reaching his potential as an All-Star very soon,” says the Scouting report.
In addition to comments about length of service, Mather complained about paying Hisashi Iwakuma’s translator and said that Julio Rodriguez’s English “was not tremendous”. He also said that MLB teams lost $ 2.9 billion in 2020.
Rodriguez, a Dominican outfielder ranked second in the Seattle farm system, responded on Twitter shortly after the video circulated on social media.