Is the Dodgers' Spending a Problem for Major League Baseball

The Los Angeles Dodgers have attacked another offseason by dishing out big contracts and a lot of deferrals, which has made some fans believe that the Dodgers are ruining baseball.

Since Los Angeles signed Tanner Scott to a 4-year $72 million contract, with deferred payments when money is moved over until after the player’s contract has expired to open space on payroll to sign other players, many fans have been outraged over the Dodgers' near-abuse of deferring payments to sign the top free agents. There is another point of view, however, as other teams could be spending more to give themselves a better shot at competing at the pinnacle of baseball.

The Dodgers are Ruining Baseball- Ian

I have been a diehard baseball fan my whole life. When Tanner Scott signed with the Dodgers this past Sunday, it was the first time I questioned whether I should still be a baseball fan.

It wasn’t just this signing that led me and many other baseball fans to this point, It was the fact that the Dodgers now have a $378 million payroll for 2025 and have a total of $1.375 billion in deferrals on active contracts.

The Dodgers abusing deferred payments is a major loophole in baseball and it is allowing them to sign whoever they want in order to win now. They did it to sign Shohei Ohtani to a 10-year $700 million deal ($680 deferred) last offseason while only paying him $2 million per season thanks to the contract being pretty much all deferrals.

Ohtani also was a key influence in Japanese superstar flame-thrower Roki Sasaki’s decision to sign an international free-agent contract with The Dodgers.

LA abused this loophole to sign Blake Snell ($66M deferred), Freddie Freeman ($57M deferred) and of course Tanner Scott ($21M deferred). They also used deferrals to extend Mookie Betts ($115M deferred) and Will Smith ($50M deferred) as well as retain key free agents Teoscar Hernandez ($23.5M deferred) and Tommy Edman ($25M deferred).

What is even more mind-boggling is how the Dodgers will essentially have a varsity and junior varsity rotation.

The Dodgers’ rotation has five aces when healthy. Shohei Ohtani, Yoshinobu Yammamoto, Blake Snell, Roki Sasaki and Tyler Glasnow. Any one of these guys could be the ace for one of the other 29 teams in MLB. Ohtani, Snell and Glasnow all have all-star appearances, and Snell has also won two Cy Young awards.

Los Angeles’ JV rotation would consist of Bobby Miller, Tony Gonsolin, Dustin May, Gavin Stone and Clayton Kershaw (if he returns to LA). Each of those guys can go start for any of the other 29 teams, too.

The projected lineup for LA next year is slated to have seven out of nine players who were all-stars at some point in their career, and two of those have won MVPs (Ohtani and Freeman).

The Los Angeles Dodgers are a super team and have taken the fun out of baseball by abusing deferred payments to sign whoever they want.

Teams are being cheap- Dom

The thing about deferred payments, in my opinion, is that any team in baseball can choose to sign a player to a contract with deferrals. I don’t believe that it’s necessarily a loophole if the option to do this is open to any team.

Sure, the Dodgers have far more financial flexibility than, say, the Marlins. Still, there’s no excuse for the Marlins being one of five teams who have not spent even a single penny on a free agent so far this offseason.

Milwaukee is considered to be the smallest market in Major League Baseball. They are one of those teams who haven’t signed a free agent. However, their owner, Mark Attanasio, has a net worth of approximately $700 million. Even the teams that cry poor have millionaire or even billionaire owners. There is not one team out there who could not afford to spend $100 million this offseason, yet these same supposedly poor teams get upset when teams spend money in the manner the Dodgers do.

The solution to this issue is not a salary cap, as someone who believes the Dodgers are ruining baseball would likely believe. I see a salary floor as a more realistic fix. Teams should not have to be limited in making their teams stronger in free agency via a salary cap, they should instead be forced to spend a certain amount of money each offseason in order to force these mega-millionaire owners to spend their wealth.

Even though the Dodgers won the World Series last year, they most certainly had breaches in their roster. Their starting pitching rotation was banged up, and of that group, Bobby Miller and Walker Beuhler vastly underperformed. For much of the playoffs, their bullpen was patchwork, and there was a hole at shortstop.

All the Dodgers did this offseason was assess their needs and fix the holes on their roster. That’s not “ruining baseball”; that’s just what every team does after the season concludes. The Dodgers have the payroll flexibility to fill these holes with established players, and free agents want to play for successful teams. The Dodgers have a decades-long history of success and want to build a dynasty.

In baseball, there is so much that could go wrong. No team has won back-to-back World Series titles since the Yankees’ threepeat in the late '90s. For all we know, the Dodgers could win 130 games in the regular season and get swept by an 87-win team in the NLDS. That’s just how the sport works sometimes.

There’s no use in getting frustrated by the Dodgers spending a lot of money when every single Major League Baseball team has the financial ability to do the same.

Ian Rothenberg is a first-year majoring in broadcast journalism. To contact him, email imr5327@psu.edu.

Dominick Pizzelanti is a second-year dual majoring in broadcast journalism and Spanish. To contact him, email dqp5565@psu.edu.