Adrian Beltre likes the direction the Rangers franchise is taking:
Agent Scott Boras said he fielded calls about Beltre from several teams, including two of the Rangers’ AL West rivals. The Los Angeles Angels were considered the front-runner and seemed a good fit for Beltre, who lives in LA.
But the Rangers trumped the Angels financially and with their potential for long-term success.
“He was very clear with us about he was not going anywhere where he would not have the opportunity to win,” Boras said. “Everything that we looked at as to what would give him the best opportunity to win was here.”
What happened to the Angels? They were the team to beat in the AL West for most of the prior decade, with an owner willing to spend the money to keep it that way. What happened? Might it be that the club got burned by the Torii Hunter contract? They are paying him $90 million over five seasons, and so far he’s returned $42 million, well short of his salary. Early in the decade, they were able to buy Vlad Guerrero in a poor market for free agents. Maybe they’re just not willing to over spend again.
Interesting that Hunter has provided so much less value than his contract is paying him.
His OPS during his 3 seasons with the Angels have been excellent, relative to his career figure. The most curious part of it all is that Hunter has posted the 3 best OBP’s of his career in his first 3 seasons with the Angels. The Abreu factor… ?
And finally.. using B-ref WAR figures, he’s averaged 3.67 WAR per year with the Angels, a number he eclipsed only once in his career (when he was 25 he posted a 4 WAR).
Just what were the Angels hoping for? He’s done everything they could have possibly hoped for and more!
@zeppelinkm: Perhaps a little more playing time.
I hear ya. Although it was really only 2009 that Hunter missed significant time (about 25% of the season).
Further irony is that his best WAR season with the Angels and best of his career – 5.2, was during that 2009 season.
Pretty sure we can chalk that up to a defensive WAR anomaly though, as B-Ref is giving him 1.1 dWAR, which is the first positive dWAR Hunter has achieved since 2003.