worst contract out of these $100 million contracts

Posnanski put Pujols at #23 on his Top 100 list yesterday. (The rankings not meant to be taken particularly seriously, as he has pointed out many times.)

i might buy his book when it comes out (i'm assuming this will be a book). i really liked the top 100 countdown back when it was on his website

trout was in the mid-20s, right? surprised to see him not in the top 10

Trout's at #27. I don't know how much rewriting there's been on the current countdown--can't remember how far he got last time, either (not to #1, I know that).

For reference that is 14,286 Chris Davis contracts https://t.co/FamuS5Xbcb

— Bmore Train-liking Fellow (@FreeMassTransit) August 25, 2021

This is floating around today, with Bobby Bonilla mentioned every time--as in, leave him alone, there's a new gold-standard for deferred insanity.

https://thespun.com/more/top-stories/sports-world-shocked-by-chris-davis-payment-details

the thing is that deferred money is far more favorable to the franchise than the player. if i owe chris davis $42 million i’d rather spread it out over 15 years too

True...It's more of a symbolic effect. If you pay the guy up front, he's out of sight and out of mind when he retires; this way, it's a never-ending reminder of how bad that contract is.

if i owe chris davis $42 million

that tweet cited in the article was incorrect (they replied with a correction shortly thereafter), it's $59M. but yeah, if you assume a 2.5% inflation rate for the next 15 years, deferring the money saves the team about $7M 2022 dollars -- moreso if you think inflation will be higher than 2.5%. also, the orioles don't have much money, right? if you offered an orioles fan the choice between using the money saved by deferring to compete in 2023, or instead paying off the chris davis contract in a lump sum, i'm guessing they'd choose to have more money to spend on active players, now. it opens up payroll space in the current time period while reducing the real money value of the future payments.

the only party that is actually damaged by these deferments is the player themselves, because they're getting paid less. the fans will complain during each deferment period where an old bust gets another couple million dollars, but they're complaining about an action that made a very bad Chris Davis contract slightly less bad (imo)

ALL THAT SAID - in a situation like Chris Davis, i agree with clemenza that there is a very strong symbolic effect, and this whole conversation is going to take place every single year until 2037 among orioles fans, at the least, reminding everyone of how terrible the contract was and that they're still paying for it. all the deferment stuff makes financial sense, but baseball and fandom in general is full of intangible things that should also be considered

Wonder which of the recent massive deals will wind up the worst…my money’s on bogaerts.

it's an older, smaller bad contract, but Bumgarner's deal with the diamondbacks (5 years, $85M) has been pretty bad. this line from the ZiPS preview for the 2023 dbacks jumped out: "ZiPS actually thinks Bumgarner has more value as a pitcher hitting in a non-DH league than as, well, a pitcher."

Wonder which of the recent massive deals will wind up the worst

i'd love to see them all get a chance to stay healthy and see what they can do. unfortunately i think when it comes to a 12+ year contract it starts to become more likely that injuries or PED revelations will derail a career. imagine if a 25-year-old grady sizemore was playing these days, and just got a 13-year mega extension. based on his first handful of years, you'd think there was no way it could go wrong

Wonder which of the recent massive deals will wind up the worst…my money’s on bogaerts.

― omar little, Thursday, December 15, 2022 5:30 PM (forty-five minutes ago)

de grom. bogaerts will at least be on the field

Oof yeah you’re right forgot about him

miguel cabrera, 2016-2023, $248M ($31M AAV)

so far, he has 3 WAR over the course of the first 6 years of the 7 year contract

in the first year of the contract, he had a 5.1 bWAR, followed by: -0.9, 0.2, 0.0, 0.1, -0.5, -1.0

but hey, that first year -- great!

buyer bWAR

I'm posting the exact opposite here--or maybe this is the worst contract post free-agency from a player's standpoint. Ozzie Albies, of course. For seven million this year, the Braves have a 4.0-5.0 WAR second baseman with 30 HR, 100 RBI, and a .500+ slugging percentage, just heading into what should be the prime of his career. They also have him for the same seven million in 2024 and 2025.

Stephen Strasburg has retired. He signed a $245,000,000 contract in 2019 but threw only 530 pitches in the big leagues after that. pic.twitter.com/rrPKMmChwS

— Codify (@CodifyBaseball) April 7, 2024

Actually unbelievable. They got their ring though 🤷‍♂️

I think Strasburg would have been good for a few more years if he had stayed healthy, unlike most of the players discussed on this thread.

this was a trickier situation than usual due to the size of the money owed to Strasburg and the Nationals' lack of insurance for his contract, which usually mitigates long-term injury risk.

i have no idea what it would have cost to insure a contract like that, but wow was forgoing it a terrible decision

It might not have been insurable if he had a history of injury

i hate to say it since i will love him forever, but that contract the Rockies gave Kris Bryant is looking pretty bad.

patrick corbin's first season in washington (2019):
14-7, 3.25 ERA, 138 ERA+, 5.0 bWAR (regular season)
2-3, 5.79 ERA in the playoffs but hey flags fly forever

patrick corbin's next 4+ seasons in washington:
28-61, 5.62 ERA, 73 ERA+, -1.9 bWAR

patrick corbin's earnings with washington: $140m

anthony rendon is having a rough one too

Padres shortstop second baseman Xander Bogaerts has nine seasons left on his deal, not including this season (he's on the IL and may not play again this year...)

(while terrible this season, he had time to get it together and he was good in 2023, so this is a speculative pick)

I think this has been raised in this thread before: I always differentiate between deals that go unexpectedly wrong, and ones you know are bad from the outset (Hampton and Zito are the two that come to mind). Bogaerts was so durable and so consistently good before this season (the term was maybe a bit much, but not unheard of).

The Zito contract meant he could pitch the two games of his life in the 2012 postseason so I don’t think anyone regrets that now

I looked at the two games, and at his start in the divisional series before that, and we disagree there.

the term was maybe a bit much, but not unheard of

you can make an argument for giving pujols or harper or trout or mookie or shohei decade-long deals as they head into their 30s -- those guys are all-timers and multiple mvp-winners. obviously the pujols deal was a disaster, and trout's is headed that way*. the others will need to win some titles.

*(tbf, people want to come to the park simply to see the latter four play, which is awesome and worthwhile. i'm not sure pujols was ever that kind of draw for the angels, but my god he was *so* good in st. louis)

anyway X is a really good player but he's not their calibre, and having to move him to 2B in the second year of an 11-year contract is alarming. but he's definitely a better bet than eric hosmer

Since we're on the subject, just came across this right now on my FB wall--weird!

https://i.postimg.cc/8kmy2PJK/lyman.jpg

This is amazing:

After the 1977 season ended, Bostock became one of baseball's earliest big-money free agents, and signed with the California Angels, owned by Gene Autry. Bostock had made $20,000 with the Twins in 1977 and signed a $2.3 million, six-year contract with the Angels. The Twins, Padres and Yankees had all tried to sign Bostock. Almost immediately, Bostock donated $10,000 to a church in his native Birmingham, Alabama to rebuild its Sunday school.

The 1978 season started off poorly for Bostock; he batted .150 for the month of April. Bostock met with the team's management and attempted to return his April salary, saying he had not earned it. The team refused, so Bostock announced he would donate his April salary to charity.

"He came into my office and told me he was reluctant to take his salary," Angels' general manager Buzzy Bavasi recalled. "He said, 'I'm not doing my job.' But I told him, 'I won't let you do that.' And he says, 'Why not?' So I told him, 'What if you hit .600 next month? You're sure as hell not getting any more money out of me.'"

Thousands of requests came in for the money, and Bostock reviewed each one of them, trying to determine who needed it the most. After his poor April, Bostock hit .404 in June and was hitting .296 when he was killed in September.

I looked at the two games, and at his start in the divisional series before that, and we disagree there.

We just disagree gyac. It's a game from 12 years ago...

Forget it, clemenza, it’s China Basin…

also lyman bostock is a fantastic Baseball Name

(rip)

It was a sad story already, and after reading all that, doubly so. (Agree about him name: euphonious.)

"him" = "his"

I disagree about Zito's contract. It was completely defensible at the time he signed it. He'd been healthy and durable his entire career and had never had a bad season. If he'd been a free agent this past off-season, alongside inconsistent and fragile question marks like Snell and Montgomery, he'd have been the number one FA pitcher on the market, easily.

Early on in this thread you said you had a soft spot for Zito, but later on:

Bonus points go to contracts that were indefensible at the time. Wells' was at least somewhat defensible -- he'd been a 4-5 win player on average up until then, still a good defender, and was entering his age-27 season. The market for outfielders was thin, and he was a popular homegrown player. I don't think the disaster signs were obvious compared to the Zito and Hampton signings (or A-Rod's 2007 re-up).

NoTimeBeforeTime, Wednesday, February 13, 2013

When I wrote "I think this has been raised in this thread before" yesterday, I might actually have had you in the back of my mind.

Haha, someone did their research!

At the time, I think Zito's contract was the largest ever for a pitcher? Clearly Zito wasn't the most valuable FA pitcher ever, so the consensus was that the Giants vastly overpaid, and the consensus was right. Even if you were optimistic about Zito, you had to admit that his contract was ridiculous. You can compare it, say, to deGrom's contract with the Rangers.

That said, looking at it eleven years later, I stand by my post from earlier today. In a market where Strasburg earned 250M for throwing about 500 pitches, and where Blake Snell can't string together two good seasons in a row? And along comes a FA pitcher with a CY under his belt and with no history of injury? That guy is making serious bank.

Wonder which of the recent massive deals will wind up the worst…my money’s on bogaerts.

― omar little, Thursday, December 15, 2022 5:30 PM (forty-five minutes ago)

de grom. bogaerts will at least be on the field

― J0rdan S., Thursday, December 15, 2022 6:16 PM (one year ago)bookmarkflaglink

Oof yeah you’re right forgot about him

― omar little, Thursday, December 15, 2022 6:26 PM (one year ago)

we both might be right

xp and who, crucially, can win you an elimination game in the playoffs. 😎

Zito quoted Sabean in his autobiography* saying he had zero regrets over the deal. I guess I understand their intention was for Zito to mentor the young pitchers/be the leader of the staff and he was more a terrible influence iirc. But he delivered when it really mattered!

* I reviewed it on here and it’s well worth a read solely for how casually he mentions doing meth in his misspent youth

We’ve all been there.

Wonder which of the recent massive deals will wind up the worst…my money’s on bogaerts.

― omar little, Thursday, December 15, 2022 5:30 PM (forty-five minutes ago)

de grom. bogaerts will at least be on the field

― J0rdan S., Thursday, December 15, 2022 6:16 PM (one year ago)bookmarkflaglink

Oof yeah you’re right forgot about him

― omar little, Thursday, December 15, 2022 6:26 PM (one year ago)

we both might be right

― slob wizard (J0rdan S.)

i think you were righter at the time and might be in the long run, my Bogaerts pick was more a vibes thing, plus my suspicion he was somewhat boosted by Fenway.

Stipulating that arguing over something that happened over a decade ago is pointless, my thinking (the same as then, when I said how terrible it was):

You can't really compare that deal then to what pitchers get now. Yes, the 2006 Zito would be a solid investment today: a guy who can give you 180 IP like he gave the Giants those first four seasons is highly coveted, almost regardless of how he pitches. But I assume the Giants were expecting a lot more than what they actually got those first four seasons (4.45 ERA, below league average, 5.5 WAR total), never mind after that.

The two post-season starts were very good, but to my mind, not anything extraordinary (Bumgarner was extraordinary). He pitched 12 innings between the two games, left each one with a comfortable lead. Somebody would have pitched those games--I don’t see that he did anything unique. Even going on to win, that’s just not worth $126M to me. And I do include his first start that postseason, where he pitched poorly in the divisional series in a game that might have eliminated his team.

I think you were right the first time, NoTime (and a lot closer then to the actual event).

Started looking around, and it still seems to be considered a historically poor use of $126 million:

Guy who sort of defends it (“Was it a terribly misguided contract? Yeah, it was. In the wake of two World's Championships, if you're a Giants fan would you like a do-over on that terrible contract? I think maybe you wouldn't.”):

https://www.sbnation.com/2013/9/3/4691644/barry-zito-free-agent-contract-evaluating-san-francisco-giants

Judged terrible before the 2012 World Series:

https://bleacherreport.com/articles/698108-mlb-power-rankings-barry-zito-and-the-50-worst-contracts-in-baseball

https://www.complex.com/sports/a/ralph-warner/the-25-worst-contracts-in-sports-history

https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/heres-the-answer-to-whether-zitos-is-the-worst-free-agent-contract-ever/

Judged terrible after the 2012 World Series:

https://www.sportingnews.com/us/mlb/list/worst-mlb-free-agents-signings-josh-hamilton-carl-pavano-jason-bay-carl-crawford-albert-belle/zaaj9h66jdc41an4uaou11u0n

https://www.thescore.com/mlb/news/427337

https://www.yardbarker.com/mlb/articles/the_worst_contracts_in_mlb_history/s1__28002203#slide_28

https://www.sportingnews.com/us/mlb/list/worst-mlb-free-agents-signings-josh-hamilton-carl-pavano-jason-bay-carl-crawford-albert-belle/zaaj9h66jdc41an4uaou11u0n

I have some thoughts on this and not trying to argue really (I wasn’t there nor am I inclined to really want to change your very legitimate perspective on this), but I want to make some points. I’ll hang up and listen.

The two post-season starts were very good, but to my mind, not anything extraordinary (Bumgarner was extraordinary). He pitched 12 innings between the two games, left each one with a comfortable lead. Somebody would have pitched those games--I don’t see that he did anything unique. Even going on to win, that’s just not worth $126M to me. And I do include his first start that postseason, where he pitched poorly in the divisional series in a game that might have eliminated his team.

The Aaron Rowand signing was way more annoying than Zito