Cincinnati, OH- The Reds and Dodgers just pulled off one of the biggest trades at the winter meetings in all of baseball. Star OF’s Matt Kemp and Yasiel Puig, along with LHP Alex Wood and backup catcher Kyle Farmer for Starting Pitcher Homer Bailey. The Dodgers also sent a buttload of cash in the sum of 7 Million dollars. The Reds are definitely buyers this offseason and they said they aren’t done yet but the Dodgers may have been the real winners in this trade.
By dumping the massive salaries of Kemp, Puig, and Wood, the Dodger’s open up their pocketbooks to go out and pursue the biggest prize in baseball, Bryce Harper. Bryce Harper is probably going to receive a long-term contract of 10-years worth around 400 million dollars. Holy Sh*t right? That’s a wild amount of money and will break records for sure. Harper isn’t alone though. All-Star shortstop Manny Machado will probably join Harper in breaking records, he’s poised himself to get over 350 million for signing this year as well.
Remember this, Manny Machado was most recently a Dodger and went to the World Series with them, could the Dodgers be making a play for both? I wouldn’t be surprised to see Manny re-sign if they are able to sign Harper and work out maybe taking a little less to get a Championship. They would be like baseball’s Golden State Warriors if they did though. I also want to be abundantly clear that I write this as a die-hard Mets fan and it pains me greatly to see that this may be a real scenario.
I expect both signings to happen shortly after the new year and we’ll know from there where the new home for baseball’s two biggest young stars will be. For now, the race for Bryce and Manny continue but the direction of the run seems like it’s going west, even though Bryce Harper recently purchased an apartment in Long Island City, NY. We’ll just have to wait and see.
Bryce Harper pictured with Manny Machado
