Honestly, I am not a huge fan of Curt Schilling’s blog. In fact, I am not a big fan of Schilling at all (must have something to do with rooting for the Yankees). But today’s post may be the first one in a long line of thoughts that I actually enjoyed reading. The subject: Free Agency.
Schilling discusses what it is like to be a free agent at the age of forty, and for the first time in twenty one years of playing professional baseball. I really do not sympathize with him or send him congrats that he will now make even more money. However, I think that his post is a good read because it explains a bit about how free agency works in baseball. Schilling gets to experience it up close, as he will represent himself in any negotiation.
From Schilling’s site:
For the next 15 days I can speak with other teams, and they can contact me, but no details can be discussed. They can only express interest. For the next 15 days the team that remains my first choice, the Sox, have exclusive rights.
So this huge thing, free agency, was accomplished by doing the following. Place a phone call to the MLBPA, tell them you want to become a free agent, hang up. Weird. Something that can be so life altering was pretty much a 48 second phone call. They file a letter with the commissioners office “A letter of intent” that lists all the players filing that day, and it’s official.
This shows the relative ease of filing for free agency. Most interesting about the entire post is that Schilling listed the teams he is considering if the Red Sox do not submit a generous offer that he is willing to accept. The list is not in alphabetical order, so may we assume that after the Red Sox, his first choice would be Cleveland followed by Detroit?
-Darren Heitner
