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Freddie Freeman Newsbeat
Friday, July 01, 2022
Then, after the lockout ended, Excel called the Braves on March 12 to give them a couple counteroffers, and let them know they needed an immediate response and needed to present their max offer, with the implication being that they were ready to move. That night, sources say Excel presented two options as “Braves prices,” which presumably meant a discounted deal for his favored team: $165 million for five years or $175 million for six. They also upped the urgency by telling the Braves they had exactly an hour to respond.
The Braves got back and said no thank you to Excel’s figures, but since they had to try something for an iconic Brave following the World Series win and end of the lockout, sources say they verbally upped their offer to $140 million for five. It wasn’t a huge increase for an iconic player, but Freeman’s reps could have countered at that point, and it’s hard to imagine the Braves wouldn’t have gone to at least $145 million considering his value to the franchise. Instead, sources say the talks appeared to end amicably, with the sides starting to talk about other Excel free agents, and the Braves believing the Freeman camp had something for $175 million-plus and were about to take it.
Tuesday, June 28, 2022
Los Angeles Dodgers first baseman Freddie Freeman will no longer be represented by Excel Sports Management, according to ESPN’s Buster Olney. Freeman, now listed internally as his own agent, has reportedly told friends that he’s angry with how his free agency played out last winter, when he left Atlanta for the West Coast after the Braves acquired Matt Olson in a trade with the Oakland Athletics.
He had previously spent his entire career with the Braves, with whom he won a World Series last fall.
Freeman’s annoyance with his now-former agency may stem from the seeming ultimatum that Excel presented to the Braves days before the Olson trade was completed. Here’s the backstory on that, courtesy of MLB.com’s Mark Bowman:
As the days, weeks and months of the offseason passed, Freeman just assumed he’d eventually end up with the Braves. He maintained this thought until the evening of March 12. This is the night when Close contacted Braves president of baseball operations Alex Anthopoulos, gave him two requests that far exceeded Freeman’s expectations and said the Braves had an hour to respond.
Freeman’s agents contend this wasn’t an ultimatum. But Freeman certainly felt like it was. When he received an update that evening, he walked back into his son’s birthday party and felt like he was in shock as he told his dad and wife that he didn’t think he was a Brave anymore.
Tuesday, April 12, 2022
In doing so, the Yankees passed on one of the best free-agent classes in recent memory. They were connected to Carlos Correa and Freddie Freeman throughout the winter, though GM Brian Cashman confirmed Monday that the Yankees never did make either player an official offer.
Many times statements like this come down to semantics. “We didn’t put a piece of paper in front of them to sign, though we talked terms and knew what it would take.” That kind of thing. Still, Yankees fans don’t want to hear their team didn’t bother to make an offer to two of the game’s best players. They just want the best players.
Rizzo has played well in the early going (he is the first Yankee to drive in multiple runs in each of the team’s first three games since Hall of Famer Joe DiMaggio in 1949), but Kiner-Falefa is 1 for 11 with several defensive misplays. He hasn’t exactly made Yankees fans forget about Correa (or fellow free agents Javier Báez, Corey Seager, Marcus Semien, and Trevor Story).”
Thursday, April 07, 2022
Braves star outfielder Ronald Acuña Jr. did an Instagram live interview on Wednesday night with Dominican journalist Yancen Pujols in which he addressed Freeman’s departure. According to Pujols, Acuña said that he won’t miss Freeman and that he didn’t speak with him often. He also claimed Freeman had been unkind during his rookie season.
Here’s a snippet of the video, during which Acuña can be heard saying “nada” in response to a question about if they spoke frequently.
Acuña, for his part, has since tweeted a denial in response to a tweet outlining some of his comments.
Thursday, March 17, 2022
Freddie Freeman has agreed to terms with the Los Angeles Dodgers on a six-year, $162 million deal, sources told ESPN’s Jeff Passan and Kiley McDaniel.
Freeman, 32, reached free agency for the first time in his career after helping the Atlanta Braves win their first World Series since 1995 with a six-game triumph over the Houston Astros. During his 12th big league season, the first baseman hit .300 (eighth in the National League), with 31 homers, 83 RBIs and an NL-leading 120 runs scored.
That Freeman reached free agency was a bit of a surprise for a player long lauded as the face of the Atlanta franchise. The Braves anointed him as such, inking him to an eight-year, $135 million extension in 2014 to serve as the franchise’s cornerstone player through a rebuild.
Tuesday, February 22, 2022
That point of view may be changing. ESPN’s Buster Olney reports that the view on Freeman from within the industry has shifted and many now think that he will leave the Braves and sign somewhere else in free agency.
So the industry view has shifted; there is a growing belief that Freeman will land somewhere outside of Atlanta because of the standoff in his negotiations. The Braves offered $135 million over five years, sources say, and Freeman is looking for a six-year deal.
“I think [the Braves] will move quickly to settle on an alternative and move on to get past the conversation,” one official said.
Freeman is expected to be one of the first dominoes to fall once the lockout is over. The Braves are expected to act quickly as well. Per the report, one agent said that Freeman’s negotiations became a competition between he and Atlanta’s front office. The Dodgers, Yankees and Blue Jays are teams that have had reported interest in Freeman.
Saturday, February 05, 2022
The New York Yankees are expected to “take a run” at free-agent first baseman Freddie Freeman when Major League Baseball’s owner-imposed lockout is lifted, according to MLB Network’s Jon Heyman. (Teams are not allowed to contact players or agents during the lockout, according to the league’s rules.)
The Yankees’ rumored interest in Freeman is nothing new. Back in November, CBS Sports even mentioned New York as one of five potential landing spots for Freeman if he did the unthinkable and left the Atlanta Braves after winning the World Series last fall. (We should note that we were dismissive of the idea, thinking that the Yankees would instead pursue shortstop Carlos Correa as their big offseason addition.)
While most of the industry has expected Freeman and the Braves to work out their differences and agree to a new contract, it’s notable that the first half of MLB’s offseason came and went without the two sides agreeing to a pact.
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