Which teams have spent the most money in the post-COVID era?

During the four seasons since the pandemic-shortened season, a small group of teams has dominated spending on free-agent players.

When the low season arrives Major Leaguesthe topic that dominates the conversation regarding professional baseball in the United States is the start of free agency. Where the main free agents will play always attracts fans, thinking about who could reinforce their squads for the following year, as well as journalists, media, connoisseurs and people related to MLBbecause of the way the business is restructured every year.

The teams are the main interested parties in monitoring the movements of free agency, taking into account their planning, the needs they have and their budgets. However, investing more or less money can be the difference between landing the best free agent in a given year or losing him and having to resort to a plan B. Since the season shortened by the COVID-19 pandemic, we have seen certain Teams become much more aggressive in free agency in order to amass the greatest talent available, leaving aside, at times, caution when it comes to spending money.

Three teams have surpassed the barrier of one billion dollars invested in free agency talent in the last four years, topping the list of organizations that have spent the most capital in this scenario, while there are three others that have not even reached 100 million in the same period of time.

The obligatory question is which teams have spent the most money in free agency from 2020 onwards and how that has influenced their production. Using the information provided by the Spotrac portal, specialized in contracts of professional athletes, regarding the total money contracted with players, AM850 Digital compiled the Top 5 of the groups that have spent the most money in the post-pandemic era.

LOS ANGELES DODGERS – 1.77 BILLION

The Dodgers They have been, by far, the team that has spent the most money in free agency over the last 4 years, although it is important to note that a significant portion of that money came from the $700 million contract they offered to Shohei Ohtani, his main signature in the section.

Other names such as Freddie Freeman, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and most recently, Blake Snell, join the body of stars who have decided to take their talents to the city of Los Angeles.

His investments became a ring of World Series in the 2024 season.

NEW YORK YANKEES – 1.11 BILLION

The “Bronx Bombers“are ranked as the second team that has spent the most money in the post-COVID era of the MLBmainly after having offered two contracts of more than 300 million dollars to Aaron Judge and Gerrit Cole.

Other names like Carlos Rodon and Marcus Stroman arrived with substantial contracts obtained in free agency.

The additions the team made during this stretch allowed them to break a 15-year drought without reaching the World Series.

PHILADELPHIA PHILLIES – 1.09 BILLION

The current philosophy of Phillies is to amass the greatest amount of talent possible to compete, without taking into account its cost, which tends to be the trend of groups that are run by Dave Dombrowski.

Trea Turner is probably the most important name acquired in free agency, but other players such as Nick Castellanos, Kyle Schwarber and Zack Wheeler (who arrived exactly in 2020), are also part of the great investment made by the Phillies in the last years.

NEW YORK METS – 993.8 MILLION

Since the arrival of the new owner of the team, Steven Cohenthe Mets They have shown that they are not afraid to spend money and although a couple of high-value signings did not go as the team expected, in the cases of Justin Verlander and Max Scherzer, that has not stopped the team in terms of investments in free agency.

Kodai Senga, as well as the Dominicans Starling Marte and Frankie Montas are some of the names that stand out among the signings in free agency in recent years.

TEXAS RANGERS – 966.7 MILLION

The Rangers They were an extremely aggressive team in recent years, seeking to secure talents of the caliber of Jacob deGrom, Marcus Semien and Corey Seager, which places them in fifth place among the teams that have spent the most money in free agency after the season cut due to the pandemic.

The result of his investments was the ring of World Series of 2023 against the Arizona Diamondbacks.

THE TEAMS THAT HAVE SPENT THE LESS MONEY

It would not be fair to finish without first indicating which have been the three teams that have spent the least money in free agency since 2020.

The first place is that of the Baltimore Orioles, who have only offered 57.9 million in free agency, followed by the Cleveland Guardians with 77.7 million and the Tampa Bay Rays with 89.1 million in free agency players.