The structure of these deals are interesting in themselves. Popo will be able to opt out after his fourth season, at which time he would be 31. Tobias can opt out after his first season, but in doing so would leave $27M of the $35M on the table. Both are player friendly in their way, with Tobias’s being the bigger risk merely due to the fact that he’s 31.[Ed Note: I admit to being a little bit personally afraid of both of these, but I can see them working out, too…and the chances are, they will.]
Jacksonville’s deal is interesting in that it’s player friendly in salary, but team friendly in control. Past history suggests that $7M is probably the top end of the starter’s value (whatever the hell that is), but given his injury history, Suzuki is likely reliable. Paying him at the top end, but putting team option gates at every level gives the Hurricane’s great financial flexibility, which given the state of their non-dynasty is probably worth the cash.
VESTING DEALS POPULAR?
Other smaller ticket items of note were two season deals let by Las Vegas and Louisville for catcher (naturally!) Marcus Forryan and reliever Andy Cantrell. Both took vesting options that give the team injury flexibility as well as financial flexibility to get out of the deals if they aren’t working out. Forryan’s deal vests on 500 plate appearances (he got 541 with Brooklyn last year, but most outsiders consider that eventuality will not be repeated in 2039), Cantrell’s vests on 100 IP. One would also expect Cantrell’s deal not to vest, but the 35 year-old lefty could also find time in the rotation, which could change the calculus. At 35, though, one can guess Cantrell is willing to give the club whatever flexibility they want merely to avoid the prospect of selling insurance as a follow-on career.
Also of interest in these signings is that they represent some of the earliest work of new management teams in Huntsville and Louisville, and while you can learn a lot from hearing them flap their gums, the proof is always in the rum itself.
COOLING MARKET HAS PEOPLE TALKING
“They can get away with it because they’re signing the Suzukis and the Tobias’s to those kinds of deals, which they can then point to when fans start to ask questions. But the real money hasn’t gone anywhere yet,” said a union insider. “When you’ve got star players like Jared Gillstrom, Egbert Behner, and Reece Wareham floating in the open market without a touch of current going on around them, you know something’s wrong.”
Team GMs argue that the players are pricing them out of the market, however, and note that several teams have been tied to guys like Behner over the course of the last two months. “The guy says he wants LaLoosh money,” said one assistant GM off the record. “And we see what giving LaLoosh that kind of money did to Phoenix. We might be dense, but we’re not stupid.” All three of these players are asking over $100M for long term deals, and they aren’t the only ones.
“It’s human nature, though,” said BBA Today analyst Gail Combes. “The players are going to start at position Z and the teams at position A. The goal is to find another place in the alphabet where they can both live, and sometimes that takes a little time.”
