The Miami Marlins want/need to cut their payroll.
Giancarlo Stanton makes the most money on the roster.
Thus, trading Stanton is the easiest way to cut payroll without blowing up the team’s entire core.
However, Stanton is also the face of the franchise, their best player, and will presumably be announced as the NL MVP on Thursday. Miami can’t trade him just to cut payroll, because they would be a much worse team in 2018 and would anger a fanbase that has been given the short end of the stick numerous times in recent years.
On Wednesday at MLB’s GM meetings, new Marlins owner Derek Jeter said that trading Stanton wasn’t a given, which opens up a whole new set of questions.
“There are some financial things we have to get in order,” Jeter said. “That’s the bottom line. It’s an organization that’s been losing money for quite some time, so we have to turn that around. How we do that is not clear. It’s easy to point the finger at [Stanton] because he makes the most money, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that’s the move that’s going to be made.
“I understand the assumptions. I do. But we have not come out publicly and said we are trading any particular player. I’ve been a player. You don’t like to see your name constantly in the rumors that are going back and forth with every organization. You can drive yourself crazy. So we have not come out and pointed the finger specifically at any one player.”
Last month, I broke down the silliness of trading Stanton just to cut payroll. Sure enough, teams interested in Stanton aren’t keen on giving up a bounty of prospects *and* taking on his entire contract.
Some rival execs view the Marlins' prospect asking price for Giancarlo Stanton as shockingly high and somewhat out of touch with reality, and not discounted nearly enough given the whopping $295 million he's owed (with the forthcoming out clause after the 2020 season).
— Buster Olney (@Buster_ESPN) November 14, 2017
If Jeter holds firm in not wanting to trade Stanton just to trade him, that’s good! But that also means that if he and the Marlins really want to cut payroll, they’re going to need to do it elsewhere. Unfortunately, their other high earners (Wei-Yin Chen, Dee Gordon, Martin Prado, Edinson Volquez) don’t have a ton of value, meaning they wouldn’t get much of a return if they looked to unload the full contracts of those players via trade.
In baseball, it’s not often that the highest-paid player on a team is also the best player, the most marketable player, and the player that could bring back the best return.
The Marlins find themselves with three options in regards to a Stanton trade, if all of these reports have some truth to them.
- Trade Stanton, don’t eat money, get a disappointing return of prospects
- Trade Stanton, eat money, get an impressive haul of prospects, still need to cut payroll elsewhere
- Don’t trade Stanton, still need to cut a lot of payroll
It’s a rough situation, especially if teams continue to play hardball with Miami in regards to a trade because of Stanton’s contract.
Giancarlo Stanton trade development: Sources say multiple teams told #Marlins that Stanton’s contract (10 years, $295 million) is roughly what he’d receive on open market. Thus, #Marlins would need to include cash in order to obtain high-level prospects. @MLB @MLBNetwork
— Jon Morosi (@jonmorosi) November 15, 2017
In other words: If an @MLB team believes Stanton’s proper value is indeed 10 years and $295 million, its GM will argue team shouldn’t have to pay a prospect price on top of that — unless a salary discount is given. There’s a sliding scale for value. @MLBNetwork
— Jon Morosi (@jonmorosi) November 15, 2017
Key takeaway: #Marlins’ dream scenario of complete $295 million salary relief *and* multiple high-end prospects is probably unrealistic. One rival exec estimated Marlins will need to include ~$5 million per year in order to receive good prospect value. @MLB @MLBNetwork
— Jon Morosi (@jonmorosi) November 15, 2017
What a mess. I can see any of those situations end up happening, and if the Marlins deal Stanton for a middling return, Miami fans have a right to be pissed off at their ownership. Giancarlo Stanton is not Vernon Wells. Trading him is not a salary dump, and the Marlins can’t look at it that way.
