The hot stove isn’t providing much heat during these cold days of record-breaking temperatures in Baltimore. All across baseball, free-agent signing announcements are rare. ESPN’s David Schoenfield recently wrote a piece outlining possible reasons why so many 2018 free agents remain unsigned with just a month to go before pitchers and catchers report to spring training.
Schoenfield lists ten reasons, but the most compelling argument he makes is that the quality of this free-agent class is, in his words, bad. He tallied the WAR totals among the top 15 free agents this off-season compared to the last two, and the results show a strong drop – 67.