Boras sent 75-page binder on Arrieta to each MLB owner

As part of his plan to secure a lucrative deal for Jake Arrieta, Scott Boras revealed he sent a 75-page binder outlining his client's numerous selling points to all 30 owners, bypassing front offices entirely to market the former Cy Young award winner directly to those authorized to hand out nine-figure contracts.

"Scott's big thing is to show these owners that it's good business to sign his players,'' one baseball insider told ESPN's Jerry Crasnick.

Boras insisted, however, that he didn't specify any contract parameters in his Arrieta packet, noting he just "give(s) them all the book, and the onion starts to peel."

"I don't put values on anything,'' Boras said from the MLB winter meetings. "I just look at performance. I look at the marketplace and say, 'How does he stack up against the top pitchers in the game, and why?' I am not the purchaser. I am not the check-writer. I am merely someone who talks about the performance value."

Despite regressing a bit in 2017, Arrieta - who rejected a qualifying offer from the Chicago Cubs earlier this offseason - won't come cheap, and one MLB executive said he's under the impression Boras is hoping to get the 31-year-old a $200-million contract. Though he wasn't as effective or durable in 2017 as he was the two seasons prior, Arrieta still crafted a 3.53 ERA (123 ERA+) and 1.22 WHIP over 30 starts while finishing 17th among qualified National League starters in WAR (2.4).

Since the start of 2014, Arrieta has been one of the game's elite starters, authoring a 2.67 ERA over 188 innings per season, on average, and managing more WAR over that span than every qualified starter except Clayton Kershaw, Corey Kluber, Chris Sale, and Max Scherzer.

Arrieta, 2014-2017