Three teams that know how to play the winter waiting game

The Tampa Bay Rays don't know where they will play in a decade. The Milwaukee Brewers spent about $150 million less in payroll than the champion Red Sox. The Minnesota Twins just announced they will retire the number of their most prominent 2018 star, Joe Mauer, who is headed into retirement.

These three franchises face perpetual challenges in payroll and resource management, working with the knowledge that one big personnel mistake -- paying too much money to the wrong guy -- could devastate their franchise, a concern the Red Sox, Yankees, Dodgers and other superpowers don't bear. For the Rays, Brewers and Twins, two significant mistakes could require a recovery period of five to eight years, and (probably) front office turnover.

Last spring, the Rays surprised the baseball world by moving Corey Dickerson to the Pirates, just 41 days after they had agreed to an arbitration settlement of $5.95 million with the outfielder. Initially, there was some question about whether this was part of a Rays effort to tank, but really, it was about the Rays trying to spend their money as wisely as possible. At that time, the prices in the market for free-agent outfielders had plummeted, with many accomplished players unsigned, and about a week after the Dickerson trade, the Rays pivoted and signed Carlos Gomez to a one-year, $4 million deal.

During the season, Tampa Bay would also pioneer the opener strategy -- beginning games with a reliever in front of a parade of relievers, to exploit specific matchup advantages. But it was also about payroll and risk management: Because the Rays will never win a bidding war for a star starter like Yu Darvish or Patrick Corbin, they had to find a way to piece together pitching production inexpensively. By using relievers to cover the nine innings on a given day, the Rays didn't have to pay exorbitantly, and, at the same time, they weren't relying heavily on the success or failure of any particular pitcher.

Even after their surprising agreement with Charlie Morton -- the biggest free-agent contract doled out in franchise history -- the Rays' financial obligations for 2019 are about $50 million; beyond 2019, they are on the hook for about $50 million, in deals with Kevin Kiermaier and Morton. And they will probably contend in 2019, after winning 90 games last season.

With Mauer's contract expired, the Twins now owe just $47 million in guaranteed contracts as they move forward -- and after 2019, not a nickel. After Minnesota surprised everyone, including its own front office, by making the playoffs in 2017, the Twins tried to augment their roster last spring with a bunch of late-winter, one-year deals, with Lance Lynn, Logan Morrison and others. Those signings didn't pay off as the Twins had hoped, but for Minnesota, risk was properly managed; the big mistake was avoided. And now Minnesota has close to a clean slate financially as it picks and chooses deals this winter, and some agents say the Twins are poised to be sneaky aggressive -- such as when they quickly grabbed Jonathan Schoop with a one-year, $7.5 million deal after the second baseman was non-tendered by the Brewers in November.

As the Brewers shaped their roster last winter, with the trade for Christian Yelich and the signing of Lorenzo Cain, folks in the media (like me) anticipated they would make a big move for a starting pitcher, like Darvish or Jake Arrieta. But with a core of starting pitcher prospects and minimal payroll flexibility, the Brewers waited ... and waited ... and waited. They added Jhoulys Chacin on a two-year, $15.5 million deal, and rode him through 35 starts and a rock-solid 3.50 ERA. In February, they signed Wade Miley to a minor league contract, and got 80? good innings out of him. They grabbed Gio Gonzalez off the late-season bargain-basement bin for five starts. And they led the NL with 96 wins, through the excellence of Yelich and Cain, and the tremendous work of their bullpen.

This winter, the Brewers are waiting again, probably confident they'll be able to find solutions among the 200 or so unsigned free agents.

Some agents report this winter only a small handful of teams seem willing to spend aggressively early in this market, and most teams seem to be waiting, to manage payroll and manage risk, as the Rays, Twins and Brewers have done so effectively the past couple of seasons.