The MLB offseason is nearly two months old. And despite Shohei Ohtani’s record-breaking contract with the Los Angeles Dodgers, many of the league’s top free agents still remain unsigned.
That doesn’t sit well with Chris “Mad Dog” Russo, who used Wednesday’s edition of First Take‘s “What’s are you mad about?” segment to take aim at the pattern of the MLB offseason. According to Russo, while the NBA and NFL offseasons are strategically paced, MLB’s meanders on, to the detriment of the sport.
“I have had enough with basically going all over the place waiting for a morsel of information about some big free agent pitcher who’s now going to let us know in the middle of January where he’s going to sign his $300 million contract,” Russo said. “They send everybody to Nashville, Tennessee, for the Winter Meetings and nothing got done except Ohtani and that happened four days later when he want to the Dodgers. I am so tired of the baseball free agency lasting into spring training. Let us put everything to bed and we can relax for three months and not pay attention to baseball and we can get ourselves organized in March and get ready for the season.”
“It goes on and on and on and it’s a joke!” he continued. “And it’s a major problem. You need an end game!”
Mad Dog has some issues with the MLB offseason.
"It goes on and on and on and it's a joke! And it's a major problem. You need an end game!" pic.twitter.com/CdbDj3CRFR
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) December 20, 2023
While one could debate the actual impact that an offseason has on a sport’s popularity, Russo has a point regarding the pace of baseball’s free agency. Both the NBA and NFL open their respective offseasons with a flurry of high profile signings, much to the delight of their fanbases. And while there are some football players who hold out until closer to training camp (or even later), it’s hard to imagine the NFL equivalent of Blake Snell remaining unsigned more than a month into the offseason.
Always one to embrace debate, Stephen A. Smith took the other side, arguing that MLB sprinkling free agent signings throughout the time between the World Series and free agency is actually a good strategy for the league. While it’s unclear if Smith was simply trying to agitate Russo, it did open the door for host Molly Qerim to tease some news regarding the radio legend’s future on ESPN’s top debate show.
“Do you ever go away for three months?” Qerim asked Russo.
“I think too many people are getting tired of me,” he answered. “I might go away quicker than you think.”
“That’s not what I heard is happening,” Qerim replied with a knowing smile. “The streets are talking.”
[First Take]
About Ben Axelrod
Ben Axelrod is a veteran of the sports media landscape, having most recently worked for NBC's Cleveland affiliate, WKYC. Prior to his time in Cleveland, he covered Ohio State football and the Big Ten for outlets including Cox Media Group, Bleacher Report, Scout and Rivals.