Inside the MLB pay gap and how It's affecting the Colorado Rockies
When you look at the ten largest free agent contracts in Major League Baseball history, you find a repetitive similarity.
Juan Soto, New York Mets ($765m/14rs)
Shohei Ohtani, Los Angeles Dodgers ($700m/10 yrs.)
Aaron Judge, New York Yankees ($360m/9 yrs.)
Bryce Harper, Philadelphia Phillies ($330m/10 yrs.)
Corey Seager, Texas Rangers ($325m/10 yrs.)
Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Los Angeles Dodgers ($325m/12 yrs.)
Gerrit Cole, New York Yankees ($324m/9 yrs.)
Manny Machado, San Diego Padres ($300m/10yrs.)
Trea Turner, Philadelphia Phillies ($300m/11yrs.)
Xander Boegarts, San Diego Padres ($280m/11 yrs.)
Over four trillion dollars of the biggest contracts in sports history are split among six teams. The recent spending sprees of the MLB offseasons have grown exponentially and climaxed in 2024 with Juan Soto’s shattering $765 million dollar deal going through 2038.
Of course, we thought the climax was last winter when Shohei Ohtani committed to the Dodgers for $700 million over a decade. The MLB stands alone when it comes to colossal contracts in a free-agent market that is dominated by eight rich teams each year continuously out-bidding each other.
A salary cap in baseball might reach a point where it could save the sport as a whole. Soto’s $51,000,000 he’s receiving in 2025 alone currently out-pays six team’s entire active payroll. Keep in mind there are 26 players on an MLB roster.
The Athletics just signed their biggest contract in team history, landing right-handed ace Luis Severino for $67 million over two seasons. The A’s are infamous for cheap baseball, and even created the “Moneyball” strategy, which focuses on only paying young, unknown players with “solid” upside so they can get them for cheap.
With the A’s largest free agent contract of their 123-year history coming last December, it’s just the ninth biggest contract this offseason.
One team that struggles in the market every year is the Colorado Rockies. They currently have a $79 million dollar 26-man payroll, which is seventeenth in the majors. Fans of the Rockies will see the seventeenth-highest payroll in MLB and be baffled, trying to remember the last time Colorado made a splash and signed a free agent that translated into wins.
Their biggest free-agent landing ever was 30-year-old Kris Bryant two years ago, signing for $182 million over seven years. Bryant’s career has been an interesting journey, as he’s chasing the numbers he put up in his first two seasons when he was 23 years old.
He won National League Rookie of the Year and followed it up with his prime in 2016 winning NL Most Valuable Player posting a 7.3 WAR and a 146 OPS+. Injury has plagued Bryant’s time with Colorado, and as every season passes the city regrets the paycheck more and more.
This move felt like something the front office needed to do to please the fans. At the spot the Rockies were in the 2022 offseason, a decaying MVP was at the bottom of their needs. Colorado is facing back-to-back 100-loss seasons and is overdue for self-reflection on how the organization is run.
The biggest sign that is stopping the owners from spending money is home attendance. Last season Coors Field held an average of 31,361 fans per game, which is fifteenth in the league. 2023 was higher with 32,196 and fourteenth. A consistent home crowd for a team that has lost 204 games in two seasons.
Last year’s attendance had a higher average than six playoff teams. Twelve teams make it after the regular season, and the 61-101 Rockies bested half of them, including the Mets who made it to the National League Championship Series.
There is one glimmer of hope in this growing pay gap era of MLB. That is how beautifully unpredictable the sport of baseball is. Out of the top twelve active payrolls in the league, only seven made the postseason last year. That gives room for a team like the Detroit Tigers, who had the third-smallest payroll in the league, to beat the $174 million dollar Houston Astros in a playoff series. Or the Kansas City Royals, who in 2023 finished 56-106 just to complete a 180-degree turnaround and win 86 games, sending them to the playoffs the very next year. The Royals and Rockies have a small five-million-dollar difference in their active payroll.
All in all, the Rockies are a primary victim of MLB’s plutocracy. All of the premier free agents want to go to teams that will give them the most money, and without a salary cap, it allows teams like the Mets to hand out a contract $235 million dollars shy of a trillion.
It’s a waiting game for Colorado right now. They have a top-ten farm system in the league with exciting prospects on their way up the ranks. But for now, all they can do is sit idly by and watch trillions of dollars get spent every winter.
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