Why the Yu Darvish trade is scary for all baseball

Twenty-nine baseball teams had the opportunity to obtain one of the best throwers in the world for just over a handful of lottery tickets, and only one jumped on it. If the frozen market for free agencies this winter was not enough to show that Major League Baseball has a problem with competitiveness, the trade of Yu Darvish to the San Diego Padres sent a clear reminder that lack of action is not just ‘ n -field problem.

The aggressiveness of the Padres in dealing with Darvish and former Cy Young winner Blake Snell over a 24-hour period stands in stark contrast to the vast majority of the rest of the sport, which by a owner class has been hampered and the coronavirus pandemic as an excuse to compare payroll. Money was the contributing factor in the Chicago Cubs, one of the sport’s jewel franchises, that sent Darvish, their best player in 2020, for a year’s starter Zach Davies and four prospects, including three teens who were not a professional at -bat and one a 20-year-old with less than 300 in rookie ball.

Any criticism of the return is empty without a deeper dive into why a Darvish player brings back a relative little one. The answer to the question connects so many issues that the stewards of the game have to worry about: the complacency that too many franchises show; the Pandora’s box with extensive playoff games; the poor appearance of all the teams with the highest incomes practicing a version of austerity at the same time – and the combined effect on labor relations with a collective bargaining agreement less than a year after it expired.