Why do these things always come down to the last minute? Well, part of it is, like my kids with weekend homework, is that nothing can be done until the last minute. I mean you can explain that homework can be done on the Friday and Saturday, but it won't happen until Sunday night.
The other thing that happens is that, as the arbitration hearing gets closer, the player's agent starts to worry some. In this case he has told Jose that they can get $10.5 from the arbitrator. He starts thinking 'Who is Jose going to be mad at if we lose?' Agents can be fired as quickly as managers can. Jose might start thinking 'Hey that Scott Boras gets a lot of money for his players. He wouldn't have lost the arbitration hearing, I'm sure he'd get me to best deal when I'm a free agent next year'.
So he starts telling his client 'We know you are worth the $10.5 million but those idiot arbitrators, you never know what they might do. I know I said we should wait until after this year, but we have some leverage now, let's see what we can get in a long term deal, you never know when an injury might happen'.
The team? They would rather be in control too, with an arbitrator they don't have that control. The team also knows that, if Jose has a decent season at all, he'll be in a spot to make a lot more money than he can get this year. If they can buy out a couple of free agent years at a reduced rate, life would be good.
We get down to the last moments and things suddenly happen.