The Mariners acquiesced to Robinson Cano‘s request for a 10-year deal:
Robinson Cano is headed to the Seattle Mariners, agreeing to terms on a 10-year, $240 million contract, according to a person with direct knowledge of the negotiations.
The person spoke to USA TODAY Sports on condition of anonymity because the deal has not been announced.
The agreement comes just hours after talks between Cano, his representative Jay-Z, and the Mariners broke down when the hip-hop mogul asked for a 10th year from the Mariners.
I don’t quite understand walking out on the deal, then agreeing right away. Did they really think that Cano would take a lot less money from the Yankees?
Good for Robinson, one of the fine hitters in the game. I don’t believe there is any way he lives up to the contract, but Seattle needs to bring some offense to their game, and Robinson will give that that at least for a few years. Seattle second basemen were terrible offensively in 2013, so Cano should provide a huge boost where the Mariners can use one.
Of course, catcher, shortstop, and centerfield were also weak offensively, so the team is a long way from being strong up the middle. Seattle has a star, but now they need the complementary players to support him.
It does seem like serious overpayage.
But, hmmmm. He needs to post 40 WAR over ten years, right? Maybe less, since the price of a WAR might be quite a bit higher in 2020. So, is that really so unlikely?
In the short term where else are you going to get 6 WAR for 24 million (4 million per WAR).
Yeah, the last 3 years won’t be productive, but when you can pay the Mike Trouts of the world 10 WAR for 400K you can subsidize it, and 5% salary inflation probably makes 24 million then about 16-18 million in 2014 dollars, and the LT threshold may be up to 220 million then.
That’s what people don’t get. Arods contract itself was not a problem by itself, it was a problem when the Yankees farm system stopped producing young talent to subsidize it. You can’t have too many of these deals on the book that are unproductive at the same time, but 1-2 should not kill you.
I’ve never seen a guaranteed ten year contract that struck me as a good idea, and IIRC the track record for the teams that signed MLB players to ten year, $200M+ contracts currently stands at a “perfect” 0 for 3 for ones with completed seasons*, and with both ones starting next year featuring players who will be at least 40 in the last year of the deal, I don’t expect that to change. As a Dodger fan, I fear that management will cave and give Kershaw ten years guaranteed, and that’s just *begging* to have him blow out his arm early because he’ll think he has something to prove and will overstress that golden left elbow the first time he has a real tough patch, knowing that his financial security is not at risk for a decade. Better to give him five years at substantially more a year with vesting options based on reasonable innings targets.
*–Prince Fielder’s 9 year, $214 million deal can safely be said to be taking on water as well, considering the Tigers couldn’t wait to dump it and him only two years in.