On Sunday, Major League Baseball's teams combined to tender qualifying offers to 14 players ahead of the official deadline. Those players will now have until Nov. 17 to accept the offer (a one-year deal worth $18.4 million) or reject it and head into free agency with the requirement that their next teams surrender draft-pick compensation.
Here is a complete list of the aforementioned 14 players:
1B Brandon Belt, Giants OF Nick Castellanos, Reds OF Michael Conforto, Mets SS Carlos Correa, Astros 1B Freddie Freeman, Braves RHP Raisel Iglesias, Angels LHP Robbie Ray, Blue Jays LHP Eduardo Rodríguez, Red Sox SS Corey Seager, Dodgers IF Marcus Semien, Blue Jays SS Trevor Story, RockiesRHP Noah Syndergaard, Mets UT Chris Taylor, DodgersRHP Justin Verlander, AstrosWe are nothing if not the messy, speculative kind. As such, we've decided to highlight three players who we think could accept the qualifying offer and return to their current teams for another year. (Do note that the players are listed below in order of their perceived likelihood of accepting the QO, and that this is more of an art than a science.)
1. Noah Syndergaard, Mets
Syndergaard is, by far, the most logical candidate to accept the tender. He's appeared in just two big-league games since the end of the 2019 season because of Tommy John surgery and various setbacks. In those appearances, he showed diminished fastball velocity and he did not throw a single breaking ball. Syndergaard's track record and upside would make him an appealing pillow-contract candidate for any number of teams, but it seems unlikely they would offer him more than $18.4 million. He might prefer to stay in a familiar setting anyway. (Mets outfielder Michael Conforto would've ranked on here, but reports from last month suggested he would decline the QO.)
2. Raisel Iglesias, Angels
Relievers are always at risk of taking the qualifying offer. Iglesias will probably decline and pursue a deal that matches or exceeds the three-year, $54 million contract Liam Hendriks inked with the Chicago White Sox last winter. But it has to be tempting to take the sure thing and kick the long-term deal aspirations a little further down the road. Again, we're ranking him here because you can never be certain with relief pitchers.
Former Marlins president David Samson reacted to the list of players with qualifying offers on Monday's Nothing Personal with David Samson. Listen below:
3. Brandon Belt, Giants
There's a reasonable chance we're proven to be too low on Belt and his prospects this winter. We ranked him 23rd on our top 50 free agent list because of what appeared to be decaying bat speed. As we wrote then: "On pitches that were at least 94 mph, he recorded an 82-mph exit velocity and a 36 percent whiff rate; his worst marks in the previous three seasons had been 85-mph and 26 percent." (Of course, he still had a highly productive season, so maybe none of that really matters). What might be more important is that Belt is a 33-year-old first baseman hitting the market at a time when the market does not take kindly to older, corner-only players.
