2018 AL Cy Young Winner Blake Snell Only Got a $15,000 Raise This Year And Is NOT HAPPY With The Rays
The Rays decided there was nothing else they could do, that even winning a Cy Young Award wasn’t reason enough to make an exception to their salary structure.
And they made that official Sunday, renewing Blake Snell’s contract for $573,700, thus giving him only a $15,500 raise — or arguably just $5,500, as $10,000 is built into an increase in the major-league minimum — as a reward for his historic season.
And Snell made clear to put the blame on the Rays since they could have done more.
“The Rays have the right under the collective bargaining agreement to renew me at or near the league-minimum salary,’’ he said in statement to the Tampa Bay Times from Adam Karon and Tripper Johnson, his agents at Sosnick, Cobbe & Karon.
“They also have the ability to more adequately compensate me, as other organizations have done with players who have similar achievements to mine. The Rays chose the former.
Blake Snell is hands down one of the best young pitchers in the game of baseball today. So much so that last year he was given the Cy Young award in the American League after going 21-5 with a 1.89 ERA. He’s unreal, and a guy I never want to see facing the Yankees, even if they hit him shockingly hard last year.
The way rookie deals are set up in baseball is fucked and there’s no other way to put it. You make diddly squat until you’re eligible for arbitration, after three years of service time, and certain teams, like the Rays, take full advantage of it. In the normal world, if you’re an average worker and then have an amazing year at a company, arguably the best you can possibly have out of anyone at your company, you’re going to get a big time raise. Now translate that over to a professional sport. You’d think you’re going to cash in huge right? Nope. Blake Snell’s raise from 2018 to 2019 is $15,500. Actually it’s more like $5,500 because you automatically get $10k with an increase in the league minimum. Blake Snell was not happy.
“The Rays have the right under the collective bargaining agreement to renew me at or near the league-minimum salary. They also have the ability to more adequately compensate me, as other organizations have done with players who have similar achievements to mine. The Rays chose the former.”
That’s just great for player-team morale isn’t it? The man who was a giant reason you over-achieved last year and won 90 games is getting less of a raise than Johnny “Lasagna” Loaisiga got from the Yankees. For those not familiar with Lasagna, he’s going to be really good, but still had a 5.11 ERA in just 24.1 innings last season in the big leagues (h/t River Ave Blues). I think the guy who won the AL Cy Young award is deserving of a bigger raise than him, but that’s just me.
The Rays kindly decided to waive their bizarro world fee for players who don’t agree to terms. Very big of them. I’ve never heard of a policy like that, but coming from the cheap Rays it makes perfect sense. I expect the Mets have a similar thing going.
If you want to really get a grasp of how baseball’s system is fucked, Matt Harvey is making 73 times what Blake Snell is this upcoming season. Greg Bird got a million dollar raise after last season for Christ’s sake.
Seeing it from the Rays point of view, they don’t care about player morale. They’re going to do what they always do and trade Snell away before they have to give him an significant amount of money. They couldn’t care less what he thinks about getting underpaid. I would do anything for Snellzilla to be in pinstripes. ANYTHING.