Trevor Bauer He became a free agent on Thursday, but the market will be much more hostile towards the 2020 National League Cy Young Award winner than it was two winters ago, when Bauer signed a three-year, $102 million contract with the Dodgers after turning down a lucrative offer from the New York Mets.
“The only guy I’m sure would sign him is Al Davis,” a senior major league executive said, referring to the renegade Oakland Raiders owner who relished his organization’s bad boy image until his died in 2011.
Bauer was Designated for assignment last Fridaythe Dodgers choosing to sever ties with the right-hander – and swallow the $22.5 million remaining on his contract Rather than face the potential public backlash to hold him back.
The Dodgers were unable to trade Bauer on Thursday, at the end of a seven-day window in which they had to deal with him, and the beleaguered pitcher received his unconditional release.
Bauer, 32, is eligible to return this season after his 324 game suspension for a violation of Major League Baseball’s sexual assault and domestic violence policy was reduced by a referee to 194 games on Dec. 12. On Feb. 22, a decision that MLB said it “will respect” despite its belief that “a longer suspension was warranted.”
The Dodgers had 14 days from then to reinstate or release Bauer, and they went through last Friday’s end-of-day deadline, even meeting Bauer in Arizona the day before, to announce in a one paragraph press release that Bauer “will no longer be part of our organization”.
The odds of a deal the week the Dodgers were to trade him were slim given that any team interested in Bauer could sign him for the major league minimum wage of $720,000 and not give up any prospects.
Bauer is now free to pursue work with any team, but is there a team ready to hire him?
The Times contacted 16 front-office executives, most of them team presidents and general managers, to see if they had any interest in signing Bauer, who went 8-5 with an ERA of 2. .59 in 17 starts with the Dodgers in 2021 but hasn’t. Haven’t launched into a professional game in 19 months.
Dodgers starting pitcher Trevor Bauer covers first base during a game against the Texas Rangers in June 2021.
(Alex Gallardo/Associated Press)
Of the eleven who responded, seven were a definite “no”, one said “I doubt it”, one said “We’re probably out”, and two declined to comment, one from those executives saying, “I” I don’t touch on that. »
But that doesn’t necessarily mean MLB has seen the last of Bauer, who has an 83-69 career record and 3.79 ERA in 10 big-league seasons and won his Cy Young award with the Reds. from Cincinnati in the pandemic-shortened 2020 season.
“He’s so affordable, I wouldn’t be surprised if someone signs him and weathers the storm for spring training and the first two weeks of the season and then hopes he calms down,” said one. general manager who was granted anonymity to speak. freely about the situation.
“Maybe it’s not spring training [that Bauer signs]maybe it’s May 1st or June 1st, maybe it’s more strategic for a team to get out of spring training and avoid the noise of the start, but I’d be surprised if he was not playing again.
A San Diego woman who met Bauer in May 2021 sought a restraining order against him, providing medical records that showed she was diagnosed with ‘manual strangulation assault’ and ‘acute head injury’ after the second of two sexual encounters with Bauer.
The restraining order was thrown out by a judge who ruled that Bauer posed no future threat to the woman. Bauer argues that the sex was rough but consensual. He was not charged with a crime but still received the longest suspension in baseball history, imposed under baseball’s domestic violence policy.
Bauer’s case is also the only one with more than one publicly known accuser; Two Ohio women made similar allegations to The Washington Post, which considered the league in determining Bauer’s suspension.
“I asked my wife, I asked the wife [of another team executive], how would you feel if we as an organization signed someone with that type of history,” another GM said. “The answers weren’t adequate.”
The Houston Astros acquired Roberto Osuna from the Toronto Blue Jays at the trade deadline in 2018, while the closest was serving a 75-game suspension following his arrest in Toronto for allegedly assaulting his girlfriend.
Osuna went 4-3 with a 2.63 ERA and 38 saves in 2019 for the Astros, who lost a seven-game World Series to Washington, but missed most of 2020 with a back injury. elbow and was let go after the season.
Osuna pitched in Mexico in 2021 and Japan in 2022, going 4-1 with a 0.91 ERA and 10 saves in 29 games for the Chiba Lotte Marines last season, but he’s struggling to find a other major league jobs.
Bauer will likely face similar roadblocks when he tries to come back.
“Obviously,” said a general manager, “it’s a touchy subject.”
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