Building an all free-agent dream team on a budget

Free agency has been open for nearly two weeks, but things won't really get started until Monday in Orlando, Fla. It's here at the GM meetings, where executives who represent the 30 teams get together, talk specifics and put the pieces in place to potentially make deals with the free agents available on the open market.

All of these executives will be looking to improve their ball clubs, but will also presumably try to keep the price tag of those they acquire as low as humanly possible due to budgetary restrictions.

But, just because a team has a budget, doesn't mean it can't find value.

Knowing that value does exist on the open market - even in one as thin as this year's crop - would it hypothetically be possible for a front office to build a dream team solely consisting of free agents? Let's take a look and see.

So, before diving into the creation of this team, there were some parameters and restrictions laid out:

• The team had to be a full 25-man roster with no DH.
• The budget for the team was the average Opening Day payroll in 2017, which was $137,746,636.
• Salaries were based on MLB Trade Rumors projections for the top-50 free agents. If a player was not among MLBTR's top-50 free agents, their 2017 salary was used.
• Projected arbitration salaries for 2018 were not used in these calculations.

Using these guidelines, the following team was created, and let me tell you something; this was not an easy exercise to complete.

Starting Lineup

The starting lineup has pop, speed, and defense. Bruce and Santana combined for 180 RBIs last season. Dyson and Nunez stole 28 and 24 bases, respectively, and Cozart finished top-10 in the majors in defense at shortstop as ranked by FanGraphs' defense metric. The team is on the old side however (32.25 years averaged), but we are talking about free agents here, and typically - thanks to arbitration - players don't hit free agency when they're young.

Bench

Thanks to solid campaigns and low price tags on Reynolds, Lind, and Jackson, the bench turned out pretty well. The aforementioned threesome combined to hit 61 home runs and drive in 199 runs last season. Thanks to Reynolds' ability to also play third base, and with starting third baseman Nunez potentially filling in at second and short when Utley and/or Cozart need rest, the bench can carry two outfielders in Jackson and Young Jr., adding additional speed.

Starting rotation

Building a starting rotation on a budget was tough, but all things considered, the rotation isn't an abomination. Having an established ace in Darvish leading the way helps, and Cobb is a solid No. 2. Things aren't as picturesque afterwards though, with Chatwood, Fister, and Feldman combining to record a 4.78 ERA last season in 349 1/3 innings.

Bullpen

While the rotation may not be stellar after Darvish and Cobb, an effective bullpen would be there to back them up if things got messy. This bullpen was constructed with a low budget in mind and considering only $13.75 million was spent, it turned out marvelous. The seven-man 'pen listed above combined to post a 2.68 ERA in 2017, which would have been good for the best in baseball last season.

End result

Building a team consisting solely of free agents is hardly a dream team, but the club could do some damage.

The squad built above was acquired for $137,140,000 and is worth a combined 43.8 WAR.

Understanding there are other factors that are not being weighed here (Reynolds for instance, likely wouldn't play 148 games on this team unless there was an injury) only the Houston Astros (50.3), Los Angeles Dodgers (48.0), Chicago Cubs (46.0), Cleveland Indians (45.7), and Washington Nationals (44.4) posted a higher combined team WAR last season.

Not too shabby.

(Photos courtesy: Getty Images)