Angels narrowly avoided the luxury tax

The Angels final 2023 payroll came in within $30,000 of the luxury tax threshold, according to a source, demonstrating that their final month push to trim payroll worked as intended… barely.

When the Angels made a series of trades in late July to try to contend, they pushed their projected payroll above the $233 million threshold for the luxury tax. However, they fell out of the race weeks later, and general manager Perry Minasian placed six players on waivers and then moved catcher Max Stassi to the restricted list, all of which reduced their payroll incrementally.

During the final weeks of the season, and as recently as the GM Meetings last month, Minasian said the Angels were too close for him to know officially if they had gotten under the threshold. Some of the numbers for the calculation come from Major League Baseball, and aren’t finalized until early December.

The significance for the Angels of being below the luxury tax threshold is that their compensation draft pick for losing Shohei Ohtani — if they lose him — would be after the second round instead of after the fourth round.

Also, the penalties for going over the threshold increase in consecutive years, so the Angels would pay a 30% tax if they exceeded the threshold in 2024 as a second-time offender, compared with 20% if they were first-time offenders.