Assumptions: The owners by and large have been better than some. They haven’t taken any profit out of the team, although they have every right to. They kept baseball in Seattle and got Safeco built. If they plan to sell the team I doubt it will be soon, they would be selling low. They need a winner to sell for a bigger profit.

Lincoln and Armstrong, despite strong opinions to the contrary, are not total idiots. They
are fans just like us and want to win even more than we do; their legacy is on the line. They have made some bad hiring decisions and PR moves and probably interfered in baseball decisions more than they should. They have built a firm financial foundation for the team moving forward with the new regional TV network deal and they bought into Jack Z’s plan to build a strong farm system that will provide new potential big leaguers to the team every year. This keeps their payroll down so they can spend when and where they need to.

Basically Z’s plan has and is working, he’s brought in talent, built up the farm system so it will be producing team-controlled players for years to come. He’s made some good and bad trades and signed some good and bad free agents. On review that is typical human behavior and not a criminal offense, however he has lost a lot of goodwill and respect and most likely has got one more season to show us the wins.

According to Cot’s Baseball Contracts the team’s payroll this season was $84MM.
Obligations for 2014 are about $40MM, of which $22MM is for Felix and $6MM for Iwakuma. The rest is basically about $500,000 each for about 20-odd MLB minimum income youngsters and a first-time arbitration deal. The new MLB national media deal will pay them about $25MM more next year. The new regional TV deal is reported to be worth $117 according to Forbes magazine, when it kicks in has not been spelled out. The old contract paid them $45MM according to Wendy Thurm of FanGraphs. If it doesn’t kick in for the next season or two they can back load contracts so big money comes due when the new bucks are in the bank. So they have more than $40MM in contract space compared to last season, at least $25MM in new MLB revenue for next season plus about $70MM coming available for longer term deals. They can afford a payroll in the
$100MM (minimum) to $150MM (longer term) range.

They need at least one quality outfielder and a decent backup, one quality pitcher (they can’t bet on Walker, Paxton and Hultzen all being available or good and Maurer and Ramirez have not qualified for the rotation this season, plus you can never have enough pitching in case you weren’t taking notes this season) minimum. If Ackley is in the outfield they need a veteran 2B as Franklin failure insurance, unless they want to gamble on
Romero or another farm hand, plus a hopefully better backup catcher. They also still need one middle of the order bat in addition to Morales, who I’m going to presume they resign as they want him and they have the QO leverage.

As I’ve stated elsewhere I believe they should go after Jose Dariel Abreu the Cuban big bat defector and Masahiro Tanaka the Japanese pitcher (25-years old next season) who has won his last 23 decisions and had ERAs under 2 the past 3 seasons. They are both
elite players and the only ones available unless Stanton is raffled off. They won’t be cheap but imagine what Felix and Stanton would cost as free agents, these guys wont be that expensive. The Dodgers paid $48MM for Puig, Abreu is expected to cost north of $50MM-$60MM, The M’s should offer him 6/$80-$90MM (less if he’ll take it). Tanaka will
require a posting fee if made available, the M’s should offer $60-$70MM and expect to pay him about$60-$80MM for 6 years of salary. That adds up to $200MM to $240MM for six years, (their prime years) with a total AAV (Average Annual Value) of $33MM to
$40MM for the two of them each year. They would solidify our rotation and middle of the order power for six years for less than the Angels paid for Pujols. It would also make a huge statement to the fans and other players they want to bring to Seattle, a.k.a. Looserville. Watch the season ticket sales go up!

They should also sign Ellsbury or Choo or trade for an equivalent level outfielder; I’d prefer Ellsbury, as it is obvious that small ball is the game of the future. I would also sign Johnny Peralta, because he will be cheap coming off of his suspension and liable to take a one or two year deal. That covers us if Franklin doesn’t grow up as we hope he will and provides shortstop backup, plus allows Ackley to stay in LF. Abreu allows us to trade Smoak and whatever for a decent outfielder. Our top of the rotation 1-2-3 would equal any in the game and cut down on the bullpen workload, add in two of Walker, Hultzen, Paxton, Maurer or Ramirez and we won’t have to sign a Saunders or Harang equivalent for years to come. It would also probably allow one of them to be used as a trade chip.

I understand this is a big step and it will require guts but it is worth it in light of the positive value it would add to the club and the faith of the fans.