Fever BaseballFor collectors and stat nerdsFuture Value Radar (FVR) · On the record
BAL

Baltimore Orioles

American League · American League East · Oriole Park at Camden Yards

Umpire favor

-15.7 net runs over 133 graded gamesthe zone cost the club more than it gave, on balance.

Biggest swings: -1.5 vs CIN · -1.4 vs WSH

→ all umpire grades

The season ahead

29 games left on the schedule — what’s next, then the road to the finish. Times are in your own clock.

On deck

at St. Louis Cardinals (66–68)

Thu, Aug 27

Game 3 of 3· Busch Stadium

Probables: Trevor Rogers vs TBD

The card will be kept live — follow along →

29 games left

Aug 276:15pmat STL (66–68)
Aug 281:40amat ATH (53–81)
Aug 292:05amat ATH (53–81)
Aug 308:05pmat ATH (53–81)
Aug 3112:40amat COL (52–81)
Sep 112:40amat COL (52–81)
Sep 27:10pmat COL (52–81)
Sep 311:15pmvs BOS (73–60)FOX / FOX ONE

On the radar

What the market seesWhat the engine sees
PlayerPosAgeResultsSampleBoardSignal
Carlos NarváezC27OPS .48779 GBREAKOUTEV95 105.7
Pete Alonso1B31OPS .881133 GBREAKOUTEV95 109.4

Left of the rule is the league’s own line on the player — his results, not our numbers, and never an input to any FVR signal. Right of it is what the engine measures.

The Card Pulse

What the collector market pays for this roster — movers first. A rising price is demand, not our read on the player. The full board →

Grade F · #28 of 30Heat 5.1%Value $39.09 avg
Samuel BasalloSamuel Basallo [Red Rookie Variation] #93
8.8%$37.20Collect →
Rece HindsRece Hinds #RA-RH
5.2%$45.76Collect →
Pete AlonsoRCPete Alonso #475
3.6%$15.54Collect →
Dylan BeaversDylan Beavers [Red Rookie Variation] #69
3.2%$34.59Collect →
Pete AlonsoPete Alonso #SMLB-47
2.1%$34.61Collect →
Dylan BeaversRCDylan Beavers #SMLB-33
1.6%$36.23Collect →
Carlos NarváezCarlos Narvaez #248
1%$43.33Collect →
Samuel BasalloRCSamuel Basallo #ES-10
0.1%$35.41Collect →
Carlos NarváezRCCarlos Narvaez #RA-CAN
0%$158Collect →
Willy VasquezRCWilly Vasquez #CPA-WVZ
0%$16.30Collect →
Willy VasquezWilly Vasquez #BPA-WV
0%$1.44Collect →

What they pay

A market fact, not an engine read — and the club’s own row from the payroll board, computed once so the two pages cannot disagree.

vs the tax line
+$31.3Munder
MP/MW
$4.80M12 of 30 — 1 is cheapest

The five biggest commitments this season

  • Pete Alonso$21.0M
  • Chris Bassitt$18.5M
  • Tyler O'Neill$16.5M
  • Ryan Helsley$14.0M
  • Andrew Kittredge$9.0M

Cash is what the club pays out; the tax payroll is average annual values under the CBA’s own rulebook. Two answers to one question, never subtracted from one another. Figures from Cot’s, as of .

A second set of books

The numbers above are Cot’s. These are MLB Spreadsheets’s, and they answer two questions Cot’s cannot: what this payroll is made of, and where it has moved since Opening Day. We keep both sources rather than merging them, because the only thing that catches an error in one is the other.

Where the two sources disagree

  • On cash payroll, Cot’s reads $163.1M and MLB Spreadsheets reads $166.0M $2.9M apart, with 1 day between the two sheets.
  • On tax payroll, Cot’s reads $212.7M and MLB Spreadsheets reads $216.8M $4.1M apart, with 1 day between the two sheets.

Both are reputable and neither is wrong on its own terms. A gap on sheets a month apart is one source catching up; a gap on sheets a few days apart is a real disagreement about what a club is paying, and nobody prints those. We do not average them, and every figure on this site says which source it came from.

Since Opening Day

Cash payroll
$170.0M$166.0M −$4.0M
Tax payroll
$209.0M$216.8M +$7.8M

The two rulebooks moved opposite ways. This club’s cash payroll and its tax payroll have traveled in different directions since March — one is down and the other is up. Both are true. A trade moves the cash a club pays and the average annual value it is charged by different amounts, and this is what that looks like on a single club’s books.

A move is not a verdict. Adding payroll is not virtue and cutting it is not vice, so nothing here is colored — the sign is the whole fact. And a move in dollars is not a payroll in dollars: we never compare one to the other.

Where the money goes

Cash payroll

$166.0M

Tax payroll

$216.8M

LineCashTax
Players on the rosterSalary to the men actually playing, majors and minors.$151.0M$191.5M
Major-league salary$148.5M$189.1M
Minor-league salary$2.5M$2.5M
Players who are goneSalary buying this club no player at all.$3.4M$3.5M
Outright assignments$3.2M$3.3M
Termination pay$0.2M$0.2M
BonusesSigning bonuses charged against this season, buyouts of options declined, and bonuses already earned.$10.1M$0.1M
Signing bonuses (prorated)$9.9M
Performance and award bonuses$0.1M$0.1M
Cash in tradesMoney sent out with a player traded away, or taken in — a negative figure — to absorb someone else's contract.$1.5M$1.6M
League chargesThe same for all thirty clubs — no front office decided to spend this.$20.1M
Benefits$18.4M
Pre-arb bonus pool$1.7M
Total$166.0M$216.8M

An em dash in one column and a figure in the other is not a missing number — it is the two rulebooks sorting the same money differently. A prorated signing bonus is in the cash figure and already inside the average annual value the tax is assessed on; league charges are the reverse. That is why the two totals differ, and why they are never subtracted from one another.

Composition and Opening Day figures from Ethan Hullihen (@EthanHullihen, MLBSpreadsheets), from a workbook whose oldest relevant sheet is dated . The workbook carries a different date on every tab, so this is the oldest of the ones we read rather than the file’s own. Every line above was checked to sum to the club’s stated total before it was printed.

Down on the farm

Organization prospects on our pre-consensus boards.

What the market seesWhat the engine sees
PlayerPosAgeClubResultsSampleBoardSignal
Willy Vasquez3B24Chesapeake BaysoxOPS .67946 GPRE-CONSENSUSEV95 108.515
Anthony NunezP25Baltimore OriolesERA 4.3148.0 IP · MLBPRE-CONSENSUSStuff 0.9434
Dylan BeaversRF25Baltimore OriolesOPS .72378 G · MLBINDEXEV95 105.775
Rece HindsCF25Norfolk TidesOPS .83172 GINDEXEV95 111.73
Samuel BasalloC22Baltimore OriolesOPS .74093 G · MLBINDEXEV95 109.7

Left of the rule is the league’s own line on the player — his results, not our numbers, and never an input to any FVR signal. Right of it is what the engine measures.

On the record

  • C0016 Carlos Narváez · open

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