Justin Turner is staying with the Dodgers

Justin Turner alerted the baseball universe that he is staying with Los Angeles. Pending a  physical, the Vayner Sports client will re-sign with the Dodgers for two  years, $34 million with a $14 million team option for a third year. The deal  includes an $8 million signing bonus and built-in escalators that could raise  the overall value of the deal to $52 million over three years, conditional to MVP voting.

Turner staying with the Dodgers hardly counts as a surprise, although the scuttlebutt of late had pushed the narrative of a possible departure. Whether he actually came close to signing with the Brewers or another club is unclear. What we know is that Turner will return to the franchise with whom he made his name, became a superstar, fan favorite and world champion. The 36-year-old third baseman was an All-Star in 2017 and earned down-ballot MVP votes in 2016, 2017, and 2018. For his career, he owns a .292/.369/.469 line with 124 home runs and 29.5  bWAR thus far.

His career famously started slowly, however, as he languished through most of his 20s as a contact-first reserve infielder for the Orioles and Mets. As he arrived in Chavez Ravine, he brought with him just a .260/.323/.361 slash line over 926 career plate appearances. Perhaps most notably, he had shown almost no signs of power through his  age-28 season with a meager .101 ISO.

The tale turned rapidly in LA as Turner hit a revelatory .340/.404/.493 line, 158 wRC+ in 2014, his first season with the Dodgers. The change was prompted by a swing change that he’d begun work on during this final season with the Mets, the results followed only followed when he headed west. Turner has to this point produced  98.0 percent of his career bWAR since donning Dodger blue as a 29-year-old.

The relationship has benefited both sides, of course, as Turner has grown into a centerpiece of a dominant era of Dodger baseball. They have won the National League West every season that Turner has been stationed at the hot corner and finally broke through to win the World Series last year – their third season as pennant winners together.

By staying, Turner is able not only to help the Dodgers defend their title, but to move together beyond an uncomfortable moment on the national stage that took place, unfortunately for him, at the crowning moment of the Turner-Dodgers partnership. Turner was pulled late in the clinching game of their World-Series-clinching win because of a positive coronavirus  test. Turner nonetheless returned mask-less to take part in the  postgame celebration.

The dilemma put upon Turner, the Dodgers, and MLB was no doubt trying considering the amount of work Turner had put into his career up to that point. He is, after all, not only a gregarious and popular player on one of the league’s preeminent franchises, but he is a symbol of perseverance for the game, its young players and its fans. Nevertheless, it was an unfortunate disregard of protocols on a national stage.

Turner will add another chapter to his Dodgers’ career. By staying to help the Dodgers defend their title, Turner joins an arguably even more star-studded team that the one that defeated the Rays in six games last fall. With the addition of NL Cy Young winner Trevor Bauer to the rotation, as well as former AL Cy Young winner David Price, who opted out of 2020, the Dodgers boast one of the more decorated rotations in recent memory. All-time great Clayton Kershaw remains at the top with young phenom Walker Buehler. Julio Urias, who closed out the World Series, rounds out their likely starting five.

According to Cot’s Baseball Contracts, the Dodgers’ CBT payroll now stands around $254.7 million. That means they’ve passed the base-tax threshold ($210 million), the first surcharge threshold ($230 million) and the second surcharge threshold ($250 million). MLBTR’s Tim Dierkes calculates the Dodgers' projected tax amount at about $13.8 million, but that’s only if their payroll holds at this level. The second surcharge threshold is especially steep, as any dollar spent beyond $250 million is taxed at 62.5%.  t’s plausible the Dodgers will attempt to get back under that line, perhaps by trading Joe Kelly and his $8.33MM CBT hit.