What's the holdup with Alex Bregman and the Astros?

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The Astros reportedly upped their offer to Alex Bregman, but there's been no progress on a deal. Does Bregman even still want to be in Houston? Payne and Pendergast discuss it here.

Transcript

00:00While we were gone, apparently, according to reports, Seth, the Astros may have sweetened

00:07their offer to Alex Bregman.

00:09They've sprinkled a little confectionery sugar on what, at least to this point, appears to

00:13be the best offer out there to Alex Bregman.

00:16Right, which it's leading me to wonder if this report is true, and I was skeptical that

00:22the original offer was on the table, but I gotta be less skeptical now that, I think

00:26Ari Alexander cited two sources that said that they had up to the offer, that Bregman,

00:35it's looking more and more like he just simply doesn't want to be in Houston.

00:38That's what it would appear.

00:39That's what it would appear.

00:40Here's Ken Rosenthal of the Athletic and Fox on his podcast, I believe the Foul Territory

00:46podcast, listing the teams that are in the mix right now for Alex Bregman.

00:49What I've heard consistently are the same teams.

00:52It's the Cubs.

00:53It's the Tigers.

00:54It's the Red Sox, the Blue Jays, and the Astros.

00:56Those are the teams that have had some level, let's go one by one.

01:01The Astros have their offer out there.

01:03It was six years, 156.

01:05It is reported that they went up a little bit and it still wasn't good enough.

01:09Okay.

01:10That's one team.

01:11The Cubs, I don't believe they have the willingness or the financial flexibility from their owner

01:15to go six years.

01:17Tigers, I don't believe they want to go six years because they're sitting on Javi Baez's

01:21contract and it's an albatross, and that is informing their thinking, maybe not the

01:27right way, but it is on Bregman.

01:29The Red Sox, they need a right-handed bat.

01:32They needed a right-handed bat since last year, and I do not know, and I cannot figure

01:36out other than financial restrictions, why they have not been more aggressive on that

01:42front.

01:43They could use Bregman.

01:44The Tigers could use Bregman.

01:45The Cubs could use Bregman.

01:46The Blue Jays, of course, could use him as well, and maybe they're a team that would

01:49go six years, and maybe, like Alonso, like Soto, and like others, he just is not willing

01:55to go there.

01:56I mean, if there is that much interest, then at the very least, okay, he's just playing

02:02the game perhaps, and yeah, the Astros will offer, but he's going to wait and see exactly

02:07how much somebody else offers.

02:09If at any point in this entire process, including if Bregman comes back to the Astros, if he

02:13tries to pull that nonsense where players try to look like they're being noble because

02:18they owe it to the rest of the league to get as much as possible, that'll be the final

02:22straw for me.

02:23Like, okay, you're just, you're doing, you're being a business person.

02:25I get it.

02:26That makes sense, but it's, it's just, you're getting closer and closer to spring training.

02:33Bregman's a guy that typically on average is not good for the first month or so, takes

02:39his toe in the water of playing baseball, and I'm getting just tired, and I'm sick and

02:44tired of it, Sean.

02:45I'm sick and tired of it.

02:46A lot of people are.

02:47I don't think you're, I don't think you're alone.

02:49I think this, this report that they've sweetened the offer, for one, I'm surprised by it.

02:56The one thing I've been tweeting is the Astros are, they're too smart to bid against themselves.

02:59Like this is the offer, and especially when you watch Bregman's market unfolding the way

03:03it is, it's not like it's eBay and everybody's putting their bids in at the last minute trying

03:07to one-up the other guy.

03:09I do think the one thing, regardless of how this plays out, or especially if it plays

03:12out to where Bregman leaves, that Jim Crane will not be subjected to, that he's been subjected

03:17to in the past, is that when a big free agent leaves, that the Astros offer that they made

03:22was just good enough to say that they made an offer, but it was never going to be the

03:27market.

03:28Like for all the great things that Jim Crane has done as an owner here, that is one area.

03:32There's two areas of criticism for Jim Crane, not having a GM in an off-season where they

03:36made massive decisions that were bad, and number two, people have criticized him like,

03:40you offer Carlos Correa five years 160 when you knew the market was more than that for

03:45him out there.

03:46It was eventually going to be Springer, same thing, probably Garrett Cole, they made an

03:49offer too that wasn't anywhere near the Yankees offer.

03:53So there's been that criticism out there that they make offers that make it look like they're

03:58in the game, and I think this offer to Bregman early on got some of that criticism before

04:03we saw how tepid and lukewarm at best his market is.

04:07They up the offer when nobody else is upping their offers right now.

04:10So if you're going to, when this whole saga eventually plays out, I would tell people

04:14to, I mean, you can do whatever you want.

04:17I will not have criticized, the only criticism I would have would be why are you upping your

04:24offer to this guy?

04:25Well, the other part of it too is when you look at those other teams and the cities in

04:31which they play, the states in which they play, and then not to mention Canada and what

04:35the tax situation is up there, you factor the income tax into it and it's a very, very

04:40fair off.

04:41If these deals are close, then financially it's close enough that I don't try too much

04:47to say that a player should be loyal to his previous team and free agency, but man, we're

04:51splitting hairs at this point.

04:54I'm just, I'm tired of it.

04:55And he's 31 years old.

04:57It's yeah.

04:59I wonder, my contention all along, at least part of it was, I wonder how much he believes

05:05in the direction of the franchise right now, Bregman, like he wants to win and you look

05:09at those other teams that are in on him right now, none of them are the Dodgers or the Yankees

05:13or a team that's a perennial contender, a team that you know is going to be in the postseason.

05:17It's the Red Sox who've been very up and down the last few years.

05:20It's the Blue Jays who have not been able to get over the hump.

05:22They spent a lot of money.

05:24It's the Cubs who really haven't been a factor since they won the World Series 10 years ago

05:28or eight years ago, whatever it was.

05:30And what was the, oh, the Tigers who granted they beat the Astros in the postseason last

05:34year, but they're a long way from being a team that you feel like is going to be in

05:37contention to win the American league year in and year out.

05:40So I, like, I wonder Bregman sitting around waiting for like to see if the Yankees eventually

05:44get into this thing.

05:45You know what I mean?

05:46What do you think?

05:47What do you think the Astros did in terms of upping the offer?

05:49I haven't seen any reports about any specific, I would say probably sprinkle, you know, maybe

05:53get him back.

05:54He reportedly, one of the issues he had with this offer, the Astros had is less than been

06:00making at the end of his last deal.

06:02He'd been making 27, 28 million.

06:04So the optics of that would have been that he was taking a pay cut, at least on the AAV

06:09average annual value part of it.

06:10So maybe they said we'll split the difference or we'll come up to it.

06:14I mean, they weren't far off.

06:15They were a couple million off on a $156 million deal.

06:19If I had to guess, that's what it would be.

06:20I don't think it's, we're going to give you opt-outs each year because I just don't think

06:23the Astros want to play that game.

06:25What's your prediction emotionally in terms of, okay, we're getting to the point now where

06:31we're sick of it.

06:32We did a poll the other day where about 70% of people that respond and said, all right,

06:36that's enough.

06:37Let's just, let's just move on.

06:38Yeah.

06:39Take it or leave it.

06:40Let's go.

06:41This is, it's getting ridiculous.

06:42I feel like I know myself and I know how I feel in the middle of a long negotiation like

06:46this or a long process like this, a lot of the, a lot of the tension gets wiped away

06:51pretty quickly.

06:52Do you, do you feel like there'll be residual tension or acrimony from us or the fan base

06:58towards Alex Bregman two or three weeks into the season?

07:01Let's say he signs the first day of spring training.

07:03So you're saying if he comes back here, how will people feel about it?

07:06No, I think people, people have short memories.

07:08Yeah.

07:09I think it'll, he'll get a chance to step in front of a mic.

07:12He'll say the right things.

07:13He's not a dummy.

07:15So I don't think I don't now, now if this is a team that cause they're going to be well

07:20above the competitive balance tax, whether he's making 26 or 28 million, like at least

07:25for a year while they've got all this dead money sitting there with a Braves contract

07:29and Montero's contract.

07:31No fans are fans.

07:32And I think they'll be happy to, I'll be happy to have Bregman, but he makes him a better

07:35baseball team in the short term.

07:36You know?

07:37Yeah.

07:38That's what I got.

07:39I keep reminding him.

07:40I just, I let the pettiest version of myself take over and at the end of the day, I like

07:44Alex Bregman.

07:45Yeah.

07:46It's just that it's just like when you're in an argument with anybody you love, sometimes

07:50you don't feel, you don't feel the, the, all, all of those emotions, the loving emotions

07:55during the acrimony.

07:56Yeah.

07:57I think people come around.

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