Madison Bumgarner hasn’t been a member of the Diamondbacks for two days yet, and already he has his walk-up song.
“Let me tell you how it will be. There’s one for you, 19 for me. ‘Cause I’m the taxman, yeah, I’m the taxman.”
From Ken Rosenthal, expert on all things MLB: “Two notes on Madison Bumgarner: 1) Per sources, he was the Nationals’ Plan B if they had not re-signed Stephen Strasburg. 2) A California-based team would have needed to offer him $100M to match the net after tax of $85M from the D-backs.”
Yes the Giants, A’s, Dodgers, Angels, and Padres were bargaining from a position of weakness because of California’s tax laws.