With Shohei Ohtani Now officially a member of the Dodgers and in possession of a record-breaking 10-year, $700 million contract, agent Nez Balelo pulled back a bit of the curtain on Ohtani's very secretive free agent explorations in an interview with USA Today's Bob Nightengale.
The deliberate lack of direct information about the Ohtani sweepstakes only added to the firestorm of media speculation about where the two-way superstar might end up, and the strict hand with which Balelo reportedly pursued the proceedings sparked some criticism because of it Nature was perceived as exaggerated. However, not surprisingly, the CAA agent did not regret the tactic.
“I'm so glad we did it that way and I would do the same thing over and over again. “I don’t even have a question in my head,” Balelo said. “The clubs appreciated and respected it. There wasn't a team that said, 'You know what, let's just put this out there.' Shohei and I wanted to be able to control the narrative, and the teams were okay with that. I've heard some members of the media feel like I need to share information because this is a historic moment, but I 100% disagree. I can't even imagine how that makes sense. There has to be a certain level of confidentiality… This was probably the most exposed free agent ever on the market and I ended up getting the best result. So how can you judge and criticize the way I approached this?”
However, Balelo also appeared to push back against reports suggesting that publicly acknowledging a team's interest in Ohtani could or would hurt the team's chances. “That was ridiculous. “Those words never came out of my mouth,” Balelo said, referring to the Dodgers manager Dave RobertsThe admission at the Winter Meetings that LA was involved with Ohtani “certainly had no impact, right?”
Ohtani said during spring training that he wanted to test free agency and not discuss an extension with the Angels during the season so that Balelo and the CAA team could develop “a well-thought-out approach” months before Ohtani officially hit the market. Balelo met with executives from multiple teams during GM meetings, which the agent considered “a good indicator of interest” to understand who was serious and who was really just kicking tires. There were many teams that were unable to take part in the game due to their level [money] where they all felt like this was going to happen. So that pretty much eliminated half the field.”
As more teams dropped out of the race, the five finalists were the Dodgers, Angels, Giants, Cubs and Blue Jays. “The Dodgers were always at the forefront of discussions,” Nightengale writes, and Balelo wasn’t surprised when Ohtani told his agent late in the afternoon of Dec. 8 that he had decided to sign with Los Angeles.
This came on the same day that multiple reports suggested Ohtani had agreed to a deal with the Jays and was en route to Toronto on a private jet. Balelo described the situation as “the most reckless coverage I have ever seen in this game” and “I felt really, really sorry for the country of Canada.” And I felt really, really sorry for the Toronto Blue Jays organization. They are really good people. What they had to endure and the pain was not right. I felt so sorry for everyone that they had to go through that because it was an extreme emotional roller coaster of thinking they had him and then finding out they didn't.”
The Dodgers weren't officially told Ohtani's decision until the next day, and Balelo then successively called the Jays, Giants, Cubs and Angels to break the news as well before Ohtani officially announced his choice via Instagram. Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman had some inkling of Ohtani's selection as early as Dec. 8, when Balelo inquired about whether the Dodgers would agree to Ohtani's request to keep most of his $700 million deal through 2034 and beyond to postpone beyond. That offer was already on the table, so the Dodgers didn't make a late raise to convince Ohtani to sign him.
Although deferrals have been a common feature of baseball contracts for years, Ohtani's decision to defer $680 million of his salary generated almost as many headlines as his decision itself. When discussing the deferred money, Balelo noted that Ohtani “is in such a unique position , because he's going to make so much money off the field…Basically, he's in the most unique position of any player in the history of the game to do this. It’s not like we’re setting a precedent for every player to now defer their entire contract.”
Since Ohtani's deferrals reduce his luxury tax bill to $46 million (instead of $70 million) per season, the Dodgers will benefit quite significantly from a competitive balance tax perspective, and Ohtani will cost himself some money overall due to inflation and the value of money today the money made in a decade. Balelo described Ohtani's decision as “the most incredible act of selflessness and willingness to win that I have ever experienced in my life and will ever experience.” He didn't care at all about present value inflation. And you know what, me neither. He should be praised for that. He didn't want to tie down a team with his salary. He said, ‘How can I contribute to a team and enable them to be competitive?’ So he went about it as selflessly as possible and postponed everything.”