PHOENIX — There he was, sitting alone in front of his locker Tuesday morning, without a single reporter around him.
He’s pitcher Elvin Rodriguez, the Milwaukee Brewers’ most exciting free-agent signing of the winter.
The same day that 23-year-old Japanese pitching sensation Rōki Sasaki announced he was signing with the Los Angeles Dodgers, Rodriguez, 26, who pitched last season for the Tokyo Yakult Swallows, signed with the Brewers.
While there has been $3.2 billion spent in free agency this winter, the Brewers’ big move was spending $900,000 on Rodriguez with a $1.35 million club option.
That's small market life in Milwaukee, which has dominated the National League Central Division since 2017, winning four division titles and has reaching the playoffs in six of the past seven season, despite having a paltry payroll.
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Now, after winning the NL Central in back-to-back years, instead of going for jugular like the Los Angeles Dodgers and New York Mets, the Brewers are standing pat.
It’s enough to drown yourself in beer and stuff your face with cheese curds.
“We really don’t have a choice, right?" Brewers outfielder Christian Yelich, their highest-paid player at $22 million, tells USA TODAY Sports. “It’s not up to us to decide who’s on the roster or who’s not, or if we’re going to acquire anybody in the offseason. It’s out of our control here.
“It’s a challenge we seem to have to face every year. We lose pieces. Some years, we lose more than others.
“You’d like to have every chance and opportunity to compete. I think we still do. We just have to go out there and see how it plays out."
The Brewers lost All-Star shortstop Willy Adames to the San Francisco Giants and traded All-Star closer Devin Williams to the New York Yankees, and are staying within the organization to replace them, using reliever Trevor Megill and youngsters Joey Ortiz and Brice Turang at shortstop
“We’ve got some good young players," Yelich said. “We’re always relying on young players, trying to find a way. So, we’ll see. That’s kind of how it always is. We’ll see how it plays out."
Brewers owner Mark Attanasio isn’t about to apologize. Sure, they would have loved to keep Adames. They wish they had the resources to sign a marquee free-agent starter instead of relying on Yankees castoff Nestor Cortes or perhaps wait to see if veteran free agent Jose Quintana’s price-tag drops.
Attanasio hears the complaints. He isn’t whining about the Dodgers and Mets. He isn’t moaning about the payroll disparity throughout the game more than any other small-market owner.
But he’s also not spending.
Attanasio insists they are struggling to break even, just like the Cubs claim they lost $20 million last year, and Angels owner Arte Moreno projects they’ll lose $50 million this year. The Mets and Padres lost in excess of $100 million last year. Their only bump in revenue, Attanasio says, was the $2.5 million cash influx from their wild-card playoff round against the New York Mets.
“My goal, from an ownership standpoint," Attanasio said, “is to always compete. … I don’t like to talk about us as a small market. We’ve certainly not played like a small market. Since 2005, we have the fourth-most most wins in the National League."
The Brewers, Dodgers and Astros are the only teams in the major leagues to win at least 86 games in a full season for the past seven seasons.
The difference, of course, is that the Dodgers have won two World Series championships and four pennants in that stretch.
The Brewers haven’t been to the World Series since 1982, let alone win one.
“Is my job to win a World Series," Attanasio said, “or is my job to provide a summer of entertainment and passion and a way for families to come together?"
It would just be a whole lot easier to compete for the World Series, Attanasio says, if the revenue streams were a bit closer to the big boys. While the Brewers have drawn 2.5 million fans the past two years, ranking 9th in the National League, and drew 3 million fans three times since 2008, their TV revenue is about $35 million. The Dodgers, in comparison, are in the middle of a 25-year, $8.35 billion TV contract, averaging $330 million annually.
“I don't want to think small, but we've never been able to do what the big markets do in terms of free agency and payroll ... ,’’ Attanasio says. “We don't have the financial ability to bring in superstars. We try to hold on to whatever we can.’’
Now, if the local TV revenue was ever equally shared, like the NFL, it may be a completely different story. The Kansas City Chiefs have been in the Super Bowl three consecutive years and have had epic matchups with the Buffalo Bills. The last small-market World Series matchup was in 1997 with Cleveland and the Florida Marlins.
“If there's a playoff game between the cities of Buffalo and Kansas City in the NFL, and it's hugely followed, isn't that good for the sport?" Attanasio asks. “And why can't we figure out how to get closer to that?. …
“You see what the NFL has done with their media contract. You see what the NBA has done. It's all sitting right there. If we can do something like that, the pie is bigger for everybody, for owners, for players, for everybody.
“We just have to figure out how to do it, whatever the labor system is."
Is it actually possible that one other teams would agree to share their local TV revenue?
“Sure, of course, anything’s possible," Attanasio said. “Probably better to ask those teams than me. But look, we’re going to do whatever the system is, we’re going to compete. For 20 years, we had the lowest media contract in baseball, and that didn’t stop us.
“And you had continuing gaps in baseball symmetry, and that didn’t stop us."
They’ll still find ways to lock up players, just as they did with Christian Yelich on his nine-year, $215 million contract in 2020, or rookie Jackson Chourio with his eight-year, $82 million deal last spring.
“I think one of the reasons for our success is that we set out on a way of operating that we have stuck to for 20 years," Attanasio said. “And we have not wavered. We have executed and executed and executed. We’ve always tried to keep our players to the end. Sometimes we couldn't."
And yet, the Brewers keep chugging along.
“We recognize the challenges in the industry around the economics of the sport," Brewers GM Matt Arnold said, “but we're not going to make excuses about any of that. We have to do things a little bit differently here, and we embrace that."
Really, they have no choice.
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