Jack Flaherty's simple take on Dodgers' spending should shut haters up (but won't)

Jack Flaherty's been spending a lot of time on Twitter while he lingers in free agency this offseason. It's unclear why exactly Flaherty has lasted this long on the market, especially after he readjusted his contract expectations to reflect fewer years and the fact that he's now the best starter still available, but he's occupied his time by posting context-less GIFs on Twitter, which immediately had fans speculating whether he had big news coming soon.

If the Dodgers hadn't signed Roki Sasaki, then Flaherty made some sense as a consolation re-addition, if they really wanted to pack the rotation that much and potentially sacrifice a bullpen arm to make roster space. Flaherty's GIFs did coincide with the day of Sasaki's announcement, but it's pure speculation to read into them having anything to do with Sasaki or the Dodgers.

Still, Flaherty's also made it clear on Twitter that his loyalties still lie with LA. When the Sasaki signing on top of Tanner Scott and Kirby Yates' reported deals stirred up a new firestorm about deferrals, Flaherty wrote, "A certain team is not ruining baseball. A lot of other teams are just doing very little."

Dodgers fans will love Jack Flaherty's take on Dodgers deferrals, LA dominance

And, well, the guy's not wrong.

Deferrals aren't a new hot-button issue, but complaints about them have certainly become louder since Scott's deal (still pending a physical) was announced. Although Anthony Santander's new contract with the Blue Jays also includes deferred money, no one's doing it like the Dodgers, who are taking every step to heed Shohei Ohtani's directive to build a superteam around him.

Flaherty's take might've upset some people, but he was kind of preaching to the choir with Dodgers fans. The fact is that deferrals don't break any rules and any team that wants to use them will be able to keep using them as a negotiating tactic, if Rob Manfred's wet blanket take on them and the players' desire to keep signing those kinds of contracts are any indication (and Tony Clark, the director of the MLBPA, has said the union will defend players' rights to do so). A salary cap will likely never exist in baseball, so other teams really just need to figure out how to keep up.

Flaherty was quickly clowned and accused of sucking up to a team that won't be re-signing him. That's not a totally unfair assessment, but he's also just...correct.