I'm not against the idea of maximum length on deals. I think if anything that's one of the compromises we'll have to see in order to get baseball back. But it's complicated because without a cap on what AAV you can offer it is unclear what impact it would have on free agent behavior. For max effect you'd maybe need to set an AAV limit. Would the players go for that? No salary cap but a "cap" of no more than 40 million AAV? That impacts like 5 guys total that make that kind of money per year.
I think you need a bigger delta though, maybe if they make it 4 years max for a free agent switching teams and 8 years max for a guy staying on his own team. That would hypothetically address the looming "Skenes" problem because the Pirates should be able to offer something like 8 years 260 million (33 million AAV) that at least makes Skenes consider it. He could get 4 years 160 million on the free market (40 million hypothetical max AAV) but now he's gambling that he's still healthy and effective in 4 years to make another 100 million to match the total value of the Pirates deal.
Realistically it only affects a few guys who sign deals that long and for that kind of AAV, but if it helps the Pirates, Rays, Reds and other smallish markets hold on to their top tier stars it's probably a good thing to try. The real test will be when we find out if teams like the Pirates will even try to hang on to a guy like Skenes even with an advantage like this. In the past, they haven't even tried.
I think you need a bigger delta though, maybe if they make it 4 years max for a free agent switching teams and 8 years max for a guy staying on his own team. That would hypothetically address the looming "Skenes" problem because the Pirates should be able to offer something like 8 years 260 million (33 million AAV) that at least makes Skenes consider it. He could get 4 years 160 million on the free market (40 million hypothetical max AAV) but now he's gambling that he's still healthy and effective in 4 years to make another 100 million to match the total value of the Pirates deal.
Realistically it only affects a few guys who sign deals that long and for that kind of AAV, but if it helps the Pirates, Rays, Reds and other smallish markets hold on to their top tier stars it's probably a good thing to try. The real test will be when we find out if teams like the Pirates will even try to hang on to a guy like Skenes even with an advantage like this. In the past, they haven't even tried.