SI.com reports on the details on Miguel Cabrera's record setting contract extension with the Tigers:
Being spurned by reigning AL Cy Young winner Max Scherzer hasn’t reined in the
Tigers’ desire to spend big. On Thursday, they reached an agreement with
two-time AL MVP winner Miguel Cabrera on an eight-year extension
running through 2023, worth roughly $248 million. While there’s little doubt that the 30-year-old slugger (31 on April
18) is the best hitter in baseball right now, this record-setting
contract locks in what’s likely to be his decline phase at a fairly
steep price.
Scherzer turned down a Tiger offer of a reported $144 million. Apparently, that budget line will pay for about half of Cabrera's new deal. Cabrera was owed $44 million remaining on his current deal
(eight years, $152.3 million), so he is now guaranteed a total of
$292 million over the next 10 years, surpassing Alex Rodriguez’s
10-year, $275 million deal.
The $31 million average annual value over
the new portion of the deal eclipses the $30.7 million of pitching ace Clayton Kershaw's own contract extension. Cabrera has a pair of vested optionsvalued at $30 million apiece tacked onto the end of the deal.
During his Tigers tenure, Cabrera has won three straight batting
titles, led the league in OBP three times and in slugging percentage
twice, all while helping the Tigers to three straight AL Central flags.
He won the Triple Crown in 2012, the first player to do so since Carl
Yastrzemski in 1967.
In his tenure with Detroit, he has led the league in hitting; his .327 batting average, .588
slugging percentage, 163 OPS+, 229 doubles, 227 homers and 737 RBI are
all MLB highs, with the on-base percentages of Joey Votto (.421) and Joe
Mauer (.411) the only ones surpassing his .407. He hasn’t led
the league in Wins Above Replacement at any time since the trade thanks
to below-average defense, but his 36.4 WAR across that span is second
only to Albert Pujols’ 38.3.
But giving a 30 year old player nearly $300 million for the back end of his career in the new non-PED era really a good idea?
One can say that owners never learn their lessons about spending like drunken sailors. Very recent examples in the Angels roster, Pujols and Hamilton, have started to seriously break down after signing large megadeals. A-Rod was the poster boy for not signing expensive long term deals, that even the rolling in money Yankees could not get rid of him.
It helps that the Tigers are owned by an old pizza billionaire who wants to win at any cost a championship.
It guarantees Cabrera will be a Tiger for life. It guarantees Cabrera and his family will have generational wealth. In the short term, it may keep the Tigers on track to win another AL Central crown. But long term, the massive amount of salary invested in one player will come back to hurt the team. Even the Cubs new front office felt the yoke of the Soriano contract for many years, including this year's final dead money payment. The Cubs have used the past payroll errors to justify a total rebuild of the team with young, contract friendly players.
Showing posts with label MCabrera. Show all posts
Showing posts with label MCabrera. Show all posts
March 30, 2014
September 21, 2012
DUMB RULES DUMBER RESULTS
Baseball is all about statistics and rules. The simplest rules are based simple mathematics. Batting average equals hits divided by plate appearances. The player with the highest batting average wins the batting crown. Simple. Straight forward.
But contracts, negotiations, bonus clauses and lawyering have confused a simple rule into a major PR mess. The Associated Press quotes the rule book as stating:
Baseball rules state a player needs to average 3.1 plate appearances for each of his team's games to become a batting, slugging or on-base percentage champion. But the last sentence of 10.22(a) says: ``Notwithstanding the foregoing requirement of minimum appearances at the plate, any player with fewer than the required number of plate appearances whose average would be the highest, if he were charged with the required number of plate appearances shall be awarded the batting, slugging or on-base percentage championship, as the case may be.''
So a player may "win" the batting title even if he does not have enough "real" plate appearances to qualify for the crown? It is a stupid rule, to add phantom plate appearances so a player can "win" an award he did not actually qualify for - - - part of baseball is endurance. So if you can't get to 502 plate appearances to qualify, then you don't win the award.
Giants oufielder Melky Cabrera was suspended for 50 games for testing positive to PEDs. The 50 game suspension ended his regular season.
As AP article states, Cabrera has 501 plate appearances, one fewer than the required amount if the Giants play 162 games. Under section 10.22(a) of the Official Baseball Rules, he would win the batting title if an extra hitless at-bat is added to his average and it remained higher than that of any other qualifying player. That rule came into play for the first time in 1996, when San Diego's Tony Gwynn won his third straight NL batting title, and his seventh overall. Gwynn hit .353 in 498 plate appearances and won when four hitless at-bats were added and his average still topped that of Colorado's Ellis Burks, Gwynn's closest pursuer at .344.
Major league baseball and commissioner Bud Selig do not want a drug user to win the batting title. So the union and owners got together to re-write the batting championship rule to state that the phantom at-bats will not be counted for any player who is under a league suspension. That would mean that Cabrera at 501 at bats would not win the batting crown this season, since Cabrera is one plate appearance short. End of potential controversy, or is it.
The media reports suggest that the league and union agreement is worded in such a fashion that it is still possible that Cabrera could win the title: the only way Cabrera would qualify for the batting title is if the Giants had a rainout and played only 161 games, in which case 499 plate appearances would be sufficient.
More controversy if that happens. And none of this has to happen if the rule was simple and crystal clear: 502 plate appearances or bust. You don't have 502 plate appearances, you can't win the batting championship.
But contracts, negotiations, bonus clauses and lawyering have confused a simple rule into a major PR mess. The Associated Press quotes the rule book as stating:
Baseball rules state a player needs to average 3.1 plate appearances for each of his team's games to become a batting, slugging or on-base percentage champion. But the last sentence of 10.22(a) says: ``Notwithstanding the foregoing requirement of minimum appearances at the plate, any player with fewer than the required number of plate appearances whose average would be the highest, if he were charged with the required number of plate appearances shall be awarded the batting, slugging or on-base percentage championship, as the case may be.''
So a player may "win" the batting title even if he does not have enough "real" plate appearances to qualify for the crown? It is a stupid rule, to add phantom plate appearances so a player can "win" an award he did not actually qualify for - - - part of baseball is endurance. So if you can't get to 502 plate appearances to qualify, then you don't win the award.
Giants oufielder Melky Cabrera was suspended for 50 games for testing positive to PEDs. The 50 game suspension ended his regular season.
As AP article states, Cabrera has 501 plate appearances, one fewer than the required amount if the Giants play 162 games. Under section 10.22(a) of the Official Baseball Rules, he would win the batting title if an extra hitless at-bat is added to his average and it remained higher than that of any other qualifying player. That rule came into play for the first time in 1996, when San Diego's Tony Gwynn won his third straight NL batting title, and his seventh overall. Gwynn hit .353 in 498 plate appearances and won when four hitless at-bats were added and his average still topped that of Colorado's Ellis Burks, Gwynn's closest pursuer at .344.
Major league baseball and commissioner Bud Selig do not want a drug user to win the batting title. So the union and owners got together to re-write the batting championship rule to state that the phantom at-bats will not be counted for any player who is under a league suspension. That would mean that Cabrera at 501 at bats would not win the batting crown this season, since Cabrera is one plate appearance short. End of potential controversy, or is it.
The media reports suggest that the league and union agreement is worded in such a fashion that it is still possible that Cabrera could win the title: the only way Cabrera would qualify for the batting title is if the Giants had a rainout and played only 161 games, in which case 499 plate appearances would be sufficient.
More controversy if that happens. And none of this has to happen if the rule was simple and crystal clear: 502 plate appearances or bust. You don't have 502 plate appearances, you can't win the batting championship.
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