It is already the second week of January, spring training is a month away and yet not everyone has signed. Cody Bellinger and Jordan Montgomery are two notable names yet to be with a new team. As we reach closer to spring training it looks like a lot of these players value will inevitably drop down. In the meantime lets examine the players that have signed and the teams that have gotten better from this offseason. As well as the teams that have failed to reach exceptions with mediocre offseasons. Nonetheless the offseason isn’t over, but it looks pretty solidified already.

Teams that WON the offseason

LA Dodgers

I cannot make this article without firstly mentioning the Dodgers. Last year the Dodgers completely stunned everyone with a quiet offseason only signing the likes of RHP Noah Syndergaard to a one year deal. But after this offseason showed who’s really the boss of baseball. The Dodgers exploded this offseason with the cataclysmic record breaking signing of Shohei Ohtani to a 10 year $700 million contract. It breaks all sports contracts in all of North America. What makes this contract even more insane is that $68 million of his annual salary is deferred until the 2040’s when Ohtani calls it a career. ‘ Deferred’ is a big part of the Dodgers offseason as both of their power hitters they’ve signed are apart of a deferred system. Shohei Ohtani deferring $68m a year and Teoscar Hernandez who signed for a 1 year $23m deal with $8.5m of it being deferred over the course of a 9 year period, 2030-2039. Hernandez will be getting $800,000 a year for 9 years, instead of just giving him his expected contract the Dodgers defer it to stay under the luxury tax. Dodgers also signed Yoshinubo Yamamoto to a record breaking contract, the largest contract ever given out to a pitcher $325/12, beating out Gerrit Cole’s 2019 contract by 1 million. They also traded for star pitcher Tyler Glasnow and OF Manuel Margot from the Rays and immediately extended Glasnow to a 5 year 100m contract. They also resigned Joe Kelly to a one year deal solidifying their bullpen. The Dodgers spent over 1.2 BILLION dollars this offseason, it is the craziest and most historic offseason there is in all of baseball history.

Atlanta Braves

Alex Anthopoulos made this offseason about tweaking his already perfect Braves squad to eliminate any sort of weaknesses and ‘dirty laundry’ players the Braves have that do not provide much impact to the 2024 squad. Mike Soroka, 2019 ROY runner up (13-4 record) was never the same after his rookie season, injuries and bad luck hindered him from being the ace pitcher he was meant to be. Alex Anthopoulus traded his ‘garbage’ to the White Sox for LHP reliever Aaron Bummer for 4 players in return. None of these players looked like they would remain with the team the following year. The trade consisted of Bummer going to the Braves for Nicky Lopez, Brandon Shewmake, Jared Shuster, and Michael Soroka going back to Chi-town. The White Sox badly needed players and a revamped rotation so they took the swing and hopeful promise these players will turnout well for their 2024 squad. Braves also signed Reynoldo Lopez to a 3 year $30m contract to put him in the bullpen with newly acquired Aaron Bummer. The Braves also sent Kyle Wright to the Royals for 2018 first round draft pick Jackson Kowar. This was another dumpster trade AA pulled off, Kowar hasn’t really reached his expectations with the Royals and hopes to make it with his new team… the Mariners. Yes, the Mariners. AA traded for Kowar just to be traded to the Mariners as he reached an agreement to send Evan White (another random player AA traded for and flipped) and Kowar for Jarred Kelenic, a failed prospect hoping to turn it around with the Braves. And to top it off the Braves again made another trade this time to the Red Sox sending Vaughn Grissom to the Sox in exchange for LHP Chris Sale. To top off the hectic offseason arguably the smartest move was extending GM Alex Anthopoulus to be in Atlanta until 2031.

NY Yankees

Any team that trades for Juan Soto is a winner in my book even if it is the cross town rivals; the New York Yankees. The Yankees traded 5 players, 4 pitchers for the likes of rentals Trent Grisham and superstar talent Juan Soto. It looked to be a massive overpay the Yankees front office will regret in the coming years. However after this season where the Yankees went 82-80, the worst stretch they’ve played since 2013 it seemed important to boost up this lineup with Soto at the top. Lefty power hitter who knows how to command the strike zone and walks a ton seems like a perfect match for the Yankees. Hopefully they can bring him back long term but doesn’t seem to look that way. They also made a rare trade with the Red Sox for Alex Verdugo to provide more outfield insurance in case one of their main stars gets injured. They acknowledged their rough rotation by signing RHP Marcus Stroman to a 3 year deal bringing him back to the Big Apple. As well as this they also made a trade with the Dodgers after Ohtani signed and Joe Kelly signed as a means to clear roster space. They acquired lefty specialist Victor Gonzalez for the bullpen. As well as more outfield depth/trade candidates in Oscar Gonzalez and Bubba Thompson.

St. Louis Cardinals

In 2023 the Cardinals faced their first loosing season since 2007 the year after they won the World Series. After Goldschmidt and Arenado both collected over 7 WAR in 2022 it looked like the Cardinals will ride into 2023 with a strong powered offense that will hopefully guide them into the playoffs. Wrong to be as the Cardinals dropped down to 5th place in the NL Central and were not helped by their abysmal weak pitching staff. John Mozeliak took to this offseason to find capable pitching. He signed Kyle Gibson and Lance Lynn to one year deals to bulk up the back of the rotation. They aren’t the best pitchers to add but they were top 10 in innings pitched last year so that was the deciding factor in bringing these two win St. Louis for 2024. After this they signed Sonny Gray to a 3 year deal that provides an ace level pitcher to lead their staff. They traded Tyler O’Neil to the Red Sox to help ease up their crowded outfield for more pitching help. And they traded Richie Palacios to the Rays for all star closer Andrew Kittridge. Hopefully these moves will bring the fighting reds back into contention.

Chicago Cubs

The most underrated offseason of any team that will probably get stronger if they sign Cody Bellinger. The most notable part of the Cubs offseason was snatching their division rival Brewers managers; Craig Counsell to a 5 year $40m dollar contracts making him the richest manager in all of baseball. People thought for certain Counsell was to be headed to the Mets after they parted ways with Showalter, but it was apart of his scheme to use the Mets and the Guardians to raise his contract value. Until now the Cubbies hadn’t made any noise until just recently they inked Shoto Imanga, Japanese LHP to a 4 year $51m deal. To make things better they spiffed up their lineup by trading for Dodgers #1 prospect; Michael Busch to be their everyday first baseman. Also in the trade was Yency Almonte going to Chicago for two unranked prospects back to LA. Besides this not much going on in Chi-Town as reported now.

Teams that LOST the offseason

San Diego Padres

The biggest loss of any team this offseason has to be the San Diego Padres. The Padres unfortunately were left with a devastating lost to their head owner of the club; Peter Seigler. They were left with extreme financial burdens and had to make serious payroll cuts. They couldn’t even afford their players last year as they had to take out a massive loan in order to pay their players. To make matters worse they cut payroll by trading star OF Juan Soto in a deal to the Yankees. Soto is a player unlike anyone else, he has already been in two historic trades the past two years, the first from the Nationals to the Padres and recently to the Yankees. Even though he will most likely just be a rental for NY he still commanded a large return for San Diego. They received Yankees #1 star pitching prospect LHP Drew Thorpe, RHP Randy Vasquez, RHP Johnny Brito, LHP Michael King and catcher Kyle Higashiokia for Juan Soto and Trent Grisham. The Padres also made moves, signing Japanese relief pitchers Woo Suk Go to a 3 year deal and Yuki Matsui to a 5 year deal to become their closer. They also traded RHP Scott Barlow to Cleveland Guardians for RHP Enyel De Los Santos. Regardless of these moves the Padres are the biggest loser of the offseason, and to make matters worse their manager Bob Melvin went to their division rivals SF Giants to be their new manager.

Toronto Blue Jays

The Blue Jays are on this list because of their failure to grab one of the superstars on the market in Shohei Ohtani and Juan Soto. They didn’t provide a good return to the Padres to make a trade and Ohtani was never interested in signing up North. There was massive speculation during the long awaited time for Ohtani to pick his next team that it would be between the Blue Jays and Dodgers. Well a false flight log from Los Angeles to Toronto spoofed the world that Ohtani was flying to Toronto to agree on a deal with the Jays and completely set people off. Everyone and celebrities started posting Ohtani-Blue Jays related content as they believed they reached an agreement with the Japanese superstar. They were wrong and since missing out on both guys they haven’t done much to build their team. They signed Kevin Kiermaier to be back in CF and signed Isaiah Kiner Falefa to be utility/3B but besides that its been pretty quiet up North.

Overall, the offseason isn’t over and one move can completely change the dynamic and powerhouse of any team. There is still time left and players to sign. With the Market being so expensive and lucrative for pitchers, teams will wait till the end until players are desperate to sign and their value will inevitably drop. Players like Josh Hader, JD Martinez, Blake Snell are some of the top players still up for grabs. As we come closer to Spring Training, the clock moves faster and the deadline to sign will approach sooner. There is still time to shock the league, but for now these are the teams that have taken advantage of the slow offseason while the other two teams have lucked out.