After the World Series ended with the Texas Rangers winning their first championship, Major League Baseball is now in free agency. Free agents became eligible on the third day after the World Series. The original clubs have five days of priority negotiations until the 8th. On the ninth, the free agency market opens in earnest.
Ryu Hyun-jin, who signed a four-year, $80 million free agent contract with the Toronto Blue Jays, will be the center of attention. Ryu sees staying in the big leagues as a priority, and is looking for $10 million per year. He believes that $10 million is enough to make him valuable as a starter and guarantee his job security.
Based on this standard, it seems that ‘big leaguer Ryu Hyun-jin’ will remain the same next year, regardless of which uniform he wears. On March 3, John Heyman, a prominent reporter for the New York Post, predicted the signing of 16 players, saying, “Despite the departures of Shohei Ohtani (elbow injury) and Julio Urias (domestic violence allegations), the market for free agent starting pitchers in Major League Baseball this winter is solid.” He and two unnamed experts predicted the signings of 16 players. In addition to himself and two anonymous experts, three others predicted the size of the contracts for the free agents.
Ryu was the 15th of 16 major free agents to make the list. Heyman described Ryu as “a solid finisher who will earn a major league contract” and projected $12 million for one year. Expert 1 predicted $13 million, and Expert 2 predicted $10 million with incentives.
The consensus among the experts was that he could get a $10 million contract. Tim Britton of The Athletic, another outlet, predicted free agent pitcher contracts based on fWAR and inflation-adjusted contracts of similarly performing free agents over the past decade, and found Ryu to be worth $11 million per year.
10 million dollars is about 13.1 billion won at the current exchange rate. That’s a whopping 5 billion more than Kim Kwang-hyun (SSG Landers), who earned 8.1 billion won last year, the highest salary in KBO history. Ryu’s current value is not something the KBO can afford.토토사이트
The salary cap (11.426 billion won), which was introduced in the KBO this year, doesn’t allow the Hanwha Eagles to offer Ryu an unlimited amount of money. Hanwha has about 5 to 6 billion won to spare, and even after counting the penalty for exceeding the cap once, Ryu would need a significant home discount to return.
Ryu has promised to return to Hanwha when he has the strength to do so, leaving the door open for a return to Korea. He’s been in the U.S. for more than a decade, and he wants to play with his former teammates while they’re still strong. However, he is still in demand in the major leagues, and given the realistic price difference, he would have to be very determined to return to Hanwha.
Hanwha has also been in contact with Ryu and is keeping a close eye on the situation. If Ryu returns, it will be like adding another foreign player to the roster. Along with the huge boost in power, Hanwha is also looking forward to the impact Ryu will have on the team as a pitching staff leader. With a roster full of young pitchers, the return of a top pitcher like Ryu is a huge tangible and intangible boost. However, it’s not easy to beat a $10 million-plus major league pitcher.