the Los Angeles Dodgers they had been moving in the shadows for much of the offseason, while other teams like the Parents were throwing the house out the window by getting Blake Snell and Yu Darvish. But hey, in recent weeks they have left everyone again with a square eye in spending more than $ 150 million on three MLB free agency players Blake Treinen, Trevor Bauer and Justin Turner.
The former, who served as coach and at times shutout for the Dodgers in 2020, was given a two-year, $ 17,500,000 contract to return to the team.
On the other hand, Bauer, this year’s bombshell firm, received three years for $ 102 million with exits after each year and in years one and two he would break the record for money earned in a year with 40 and 42 million dollars per year, respectively.
Eventually, the Dodgers and their captain Turner both had to give their arm a twist, as while one wanted to award only a one-year contract, the other wanted three years or more. In the end agreed in two years for 34 million.
When most teams have limited their spending a bit since the start of the pandemic, the Dodgers have done the opposite. Let’s not forget Mookie Betts ’contract. In fact, so far they are the only team to have passed the luxury tax barrier, the Red Sox being the closest with 208 million.
Dodgers before those last counts were still below the $ 210 million pre-luxury tax cap. Now, according to Roster Resource and Cot s sites, the team is between $ 254 million and $ 256 million for the 2021 season. Going through that more than $ 40 million limit, that’s important.
Because? The MLB luxury tax has three levels and each costs a little more.
- First level: 20% in the amount above the limit up to 20 million
- Second level: 32% in the amount between 20 million and 40 million
- Third level: 42.5% in the amount above 40 million, but they also have to go down 10 places in the Draft.
This is only for the first year that you are in the luxury tax, every year you repeat you have to pay a higher amount.
That means the Dodgers, if they keep their payroll like this, will have to pay $ 4 million for the level, $ 6.4 million for the second, and $ 2.9 million for the last level. In total, the Dodgers payroll with everything and luxury tax would hover around $ 270.2 million.
The Dodgers could make a change to release a few million to lower the tax, such as switching to David Price although he doesn’t draw much attention to teams right now because at any moment he may decide not to play this year as the 2020.
We’ll see if it works out for the 2020 champion team.