When I was 10, Barry Bonds left the Pirates and signed a contract with the Giants. In the first week of December that year, he sent a bit of a shockwave through the baseball world.
That particular ripple of news didn’t reach me until sometime late the following spring. It was warm enough to be sitting on my bike, a few houses down the street from mine, talking baseball with a friend. Bonds was at least several weeks into his season with his new team before I had any idea.
I followed baseball pretty closely back then, as much as a kid my age could, and months had gone by without the news of his departure from Pittsburgh reaching me. Now, in 2023, it would be near impossible to accomplish being so uninformed, even for a 10 or 11-year-old.
This week, the MLB winter meetings are in Nashville, and it’s traditionally the time when fans and baseball pundits expect that trades and free agent signings will really get going. Unofficially, the winter meetings are when we imagine that the offseason heats up. There is no rule that says this; trades and signings have already happened this offseason, and they will continue well into February.
The first winter meeting for Major League Baseball was as far back as at least 1876 (back then they kicked two teams out of the league for not playing their full schedule), and it became an annual event in 1901. People at all levels of the baseball world are there, so it does create an environment where deals can be negotiated. There have been times when the biggest moves and/or the highest level of activity of the offseason happened during the winter meetings. Here’s a sampling, courtesy of Wikipedia:
At the 1975 Winter Meetings in Fort Lauderdale, new Chicago White Sox owner Bill Veeck sat at a table in the lobby behind a sign that said "Open for Business". During the course of the meetings, Veeck negotiated six trades involving 22 players.
At the 1988 Winter Meetings in Atlanta, the Texas Rangers closed three trades involving 15 players and signed free agent pitcher Nolan Ryan.
At the 1992 Winter Meetings in Louisville, first-time free agent Barry Bonds was signed by the San Francisco Giants for six years and $43 million. Bonds personally negotiated to have a hotel suite at his disposal during road games.
On the last day of the 2011 Winter Meetings in Dallas, Albert Pujols, who had won a World Series ring with the St. Louis Cardinals that fall, inked a 10-year, $250 million deal with the Los Angeles Angels.
In the space of 24 hours at the 2014 Winter Meetings in San Diego, the Los Angeles Dodgers concluded six transactions with four teams, involving 19 players and a free agent.
On consecutive days during the 2019 Winter Meetings in San Diego, Gerrit Cole signed a nine-year, $324 million deal with the New York Yankees, followed by Anthony Rendon agreeing to a seven-year, $245 million contract with the Los Angeles Angels the following evening.
This December, nearly all eyes are on Shohei Ohtani.
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