Dodgers: Will Tony Gonsolin and LA Reach a Salary Arbitration Hearing?
On Friday, the Dodgers agreed to one-year deals with nine of their ten arbitration-eligible players. The only player they didn't reach an agreement with was Tony Gonsolin, who is in his first year of arbitration eligibility. Instead, Gonsolin and the team exchanged arbitration numbers.
Gonsolin asked for $3.4 million in arbitration, while Los Angeles offered $3 million. While $400,000 doesn't seem like much for a team with a payroll over $200 million, it does represent a difference of 13.3% between LA's number and Gonsolin's.
Interestingly, even Gonsolin's request is lower than he was projected to make in arbitration. MLB Trade Rumors projected Gonsolin at $3.5 million, and Spotrac had him at $3.86 million.
During Andrew Friedman's time heading up the Dodgers front office, 70 players (including the 10 this year) have been eligible for arbitration. Of those 70, 63 have reached agreements on or before the exchange deadline, including those nine this year.
LA isn't really a "file-and-trial" team — "file-and-trial" means a team that take a hard line, "If we don't reach an agreement before we officially exchange numbers, we're going to the arbitration hearing." File-and-trial teams use the exchange deadline as a hard deadline for reaching an agreement.
Los Angeles clearly has file-and-trial leanings, though, which is why 63 of the 70 players have agreed by the exchange deadline. But of the six who didn't agree (not counting Gonsolin), only two have actually gone to arbitration. In 2020, both Joc Pederson and Pedro Baez went to a hearing, with Joc losing and Baez winning.
The other four players who didn't agree by the deadline but also didn't go to a hearing all signed multi-year deals: Austin Barnes, Walker Buehler, Max Muncy, and Chris Taylor.
You might be inclined to think maybe the Dodgers and Gonsolin are working on a multi-year deal, and they certainly could be. But any multi-year deal would definitely have a higher average annual value than $3.4 million, and since the luxury tax is based on AAV, even a deal that saves the team money in the long run would be counterproductive to getting below the luxury tax.
So the most likely outcome is that Gonsolin and the Dodgers will head to an arbitration hearing. LA's argument would likely be based around the fact that Gonsolin has thrown just 272.2 innings in his four years in the big leagues; Gonsolin's team would argue, "Yeah, but when he's been on the mound, he's been crazy good," with a 2.51 career ERA and 0.987 career WHIP to back them up.
If the two sides go to a hearing, it would take place between January 30 and February 17.
