ESPN insider Jeff Passan is facing backlash from baseball fans this week due to old remarks he made about the Los Angeles Dodgers.
When the Dodgers signed Kyle Tucker last offseason, MLB fans accused the reigning World Series champions of breaking baseball. Passan, however, argued that other teams could also spend as much money as Los Angeles.
“The Dodgers are an easy scapegoat for any owner who cares to argue in favor of a salary cap. Cap enthusiasts cite a laundry list of facts pertaining to payroll and success, and they’re persuasive,” Passan wrote. “How more than half of playoff teams since the turn of the century carried top-10 payrolls. Twelve of the past 15 World Series winners, too. Leaguewide winning percentages correlate more strongly with payroll than the NFL, NBA or NHL. Nobody can deny that in MLB, an owner’s spending matters.”
Part of the reason why the Dodgers have been so aggressive is because they have a TV deal worth $8.35 billion. Now that owner Mark Walter is under federal investigation, fans are questioning the integrity of that deal.
Well, Passan announced this week that Los Angeles monetized its TV deal through debt deals with Mark Walter-owned insurers.
“The Dodgers’ local-TV deal is a profound competitive advantage,” Passan wrote. “Because of a bankruptcy-court ruling, the team will shield more than $1.3 billion from rev sharing over 25 years. What you might not know: They further monetized it through debt deals with Mark Walter-owned insurers.”
Naturally, that has MLB fanatics revisiting Passan’s comments about the Dodgers “cracking the code” in free agency.
The outrage is getting out of hand.
Unsurprisingly, Passan is receiving a ton of backlash from fans who dislike the Dodgers.
“It’s amazing Jeff Passan is now trying to backtrack like he never got on air and scolded every other team in MLB saying they could all do what the Dodgers were doing,” SportsTalkATL said. “It was always [expletive], but you’re just going to have to take this one on the chin.”
“To argue that Jeff Passan is anything less than a mouthpiece for the Dodgers organization at this point would be laughable. Wow,” one person wrote on X.
“Passan had the nerve to repeatedly tell fans ‘all teams can do what the Dodgers do, they just choose not to.’ Then said he never said that,” one fan commented. “Then got community noted, Then deleted the post. Instantly the most hated man in baseball media if he hadn’t been already.”
At the end of the day, Passan can only report what he knows. If he doesn’t have findings about the Dodgers violating the CBA, he’ll stick by his initial reporting. And if new information comes to light, he’ll disclose that too.
Make no mistake though, MLB fans aren’t thrilled with Passan.
