The non-tender deadline is tomorrow evening. Teams need to decide whether they want to offer contracts to their arbitration-eligible (and pre-arbitration) players. Those who are not tendered contracts are sent directly into free agency without exposing them to waivers.
As is the case each winter, MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz has projected salaries for the arbitration class. Teams have already made a few cuts among that group — either at the beginning of the offseason when players returned from the injured list or prior to Tuesday’s deadline to keep prospects out of the Rule 5 draft. The Cubs, for instance, have already taken Adbert Alzolay and Patrick Wisdom off the 40-man roster and could officially non-tender them tomorrow.
Not everyone who is tendered a contract will know their salary this week. Some players will sign “pre-tender” deals that lock in guaranteed money. Many of them are borderline non-tender candidates who will take salaries below their projection to ensure they stay on the roster at all. (Scott Kingery and Seth Brown have already signed deals of that ilk.) Those who don’t sign but are tendered a contract could have a few months of uncertainty. They’re free to continue negotiating with their clubs to find a mutually agreeable salary until the date of their arbitration hearing.
As we do each offseason, we’ll take a look at arb-eligible players we believe have a realistic shot at being let go. To be clear, this is not a list of players we think are likelier than not to be non-tendered. These are players we consider to have at least a 10-20% chance of being cut — a broad group who wouldn’t strike us as completely surprising.
At least a few of these players will likely be traded, as some teams will have more willingness than others to accommodate various projected salaries. MLBTR covered a few candidates for that kind of deal in a post for Front Office subscribers yesterday.
Onto the list, with Matt’s projected salaries:
Catchers
First Basemen
Second Basemen
Third Basemen
Shortstops
Center Fielders
Corner Outfielders
Starting Pitchers
Right-Handed Relievers
Left-Handed Relievers
* Have avoided arbitration since the list was published
