Qualifying Offers Could Be Scrapped for Good as MLB and Union Agree the System Must Go

This winter's qualifying offers could be the last ones baseball ever hands out. Eight free agents received the one-year, $23.15 million offer on Monday, a record figure set at the average salary of the game's 125 highest-paid players, but both Major League Baseball and the players' union have now proposed scrapping the system entirely in the next collective bargaining agreement. The union first proposed eliminating qualifying offers on May 27, and the league agreed on June 25. MLB repeated that offer again on Tuesday in a proposal that also pushed its salary-cap plan back to 2028. The eight players who received offers this year, including Brewers slugger Jake Bauers, Yankees closer David Bednar, Cubs outfielder Seiya Suzuki and Marlins outfielder Randy Arozarena, have until 4 p.m. ET on November 17 to accept the one-year deal or turn it down and test free agency. Eight offers is the fewest since 2023, and teams handed out 14 before the last lockout. The current labour deal expires on December 1, with a lockout expected to follow, and the qualifying-offer system has long been criticised for depressing the market for mid-tier free agents. If both sides hold to their proposals, the mechanism that has shaped offseasons for more than a decade will disappear when the next agreement is signed.