The off-season in MLB could look drastically different in the coming years.
MLB proposed changes to the off-season calendar on Thursday, which could speed up free agency and trade negotiations through the winter months, ESPN’s Jeff Passan reported.
According to Passan, free agency could be shortened to a two- to three-week period. A dead period would follow the end of the World Series and would last until the Winter Meetings in early December — players and teams would be allowed to negotiate, but no deals could be signed.
The league is proposing the change in order to avoid a slow-moving free agency, with signings and trades coming in over the course of the four-month off-season.
Free agency would then open up at the start of the Winter Meetings and would last until Dec. 21.
Following that window, the league would enter another dead period lasting until the first Monday in February, during which no signings or trades would be allowed.
Signings and trades would then resume following that day in February.
The plan offered to the players’ association Thursday is contingent on the adoption of the salary cap system MLB proposed in May, which the union has vowed never to accept.
Additionally, MLB proposed lowering the maximum in-season options to the minor leagues from five to four and adopting a system of weekly rosters.
Teams would be allowed 14 pitchers, up from 13, when the 26-man roster limit is in effect from the season’s start through Aug. 31.
— With files from The Associated Press