Pitchers and catchers report to camp in a few weeks and spring training games begin in less than a month, but baseball fans have yet to see the biggest free agents sign anywhere. Yu Darvish is the big fish left in the pond and he seems to be the number one target for the Chicago Cubs among other clubs. However, there hasn’t been any real traction between Darvish and any team and now we might have a better idea as to why that is.
Besides the Cubs, the Minnesota Twins, Milwaukee Brewers and in recent days the Los Angeles Dodgers and New York Yankees have popped back into the mix for Darvish, but still nothing concrete. There have been reports that the 31-year-old has received offers of at least $100 million, but obviously that hasn’t been enough.
According to Jon Heyman of FanRag Sports it’s because Darvish is still seeking an enormous contract comparable to Stephen Strasburg’s deal with the Washington Nationals.
The Brewers were reported by FanRag Sports to be strongly in the mix for Darvish, who is said by sources to have at least one five-year offer and at least one (and probably multiple) offers for at least $100 million – though he has been seeking something closer to the Stephen Strasburg deal of $175 million for seven.
See, the issue isn’t with the average annual salary of $25 million, it has everything to do with the length of the contract. Of course, the reason this has been reported is because Darvish obviously wants to drive up the offers.
But will this make the Cubs do just that? Again, I said since the original projection of six years for $160 million came out that there was no way the Cubs would pay him that. As of now it seems like the Cubs offer is at four years and Darvish expectedly wants more years. Who’s going to blink first?
There’s also this bit of information from Heyman’s latest MLB notes.
The Cubs are still in the mix for Yu Darvish but for now seem to be hoping that Darvish will choose them for reasons that are not economic. The Cubs are a very attractive team/organization and Chicago is a great city so it is entirely possible they win this, but they appeared to be running behind in terms of the offer, quite likely to at least the Brewers.
If, at the end of this entire ordeal the Brewers end up out-bidding the Cubs for Darvish then Theo Epstein is going to have some hard questions to answer. Under no circumstance should the Cubs be out-bid by the Brewers.
A few days ago Darvish was pinned to three different teams as being his preferred destination, including the Cubs. The intriguing part about that is Jon Morosi reporting that other teams would have to blow the Cubs’ offer out of the water.
.@jonmorosi believes other teams will have to win the Yu Darvish bidding by a "clear margin" to keep him from going to the #Cubs pic.twitter.com/Egk1fyNeCd
— MLB Network Radio on SiriusXM (@MLBNetworkRadio) January 29, 2018
Maybe if the Cubs give in and offer one more year Darvish will finally agree.
So, the waiting game continues. I’m waiting for the Dexter Fowler type entrance to Cubs camp from Yu Darvish. If not, I hope he chooses any other team aside from the Brewers.
