Whenever Major League Baseball gets a new record-sized contract, it's tempting to get into hand-wringing and bellyaching about the league's eternally reckless spending.
But that's not what we're here to do with Giancarlo Stanton and the Miami Marlins. Rather, we're here to issue a well-deserved toast to both parties.
In case you just crawled out from under a rock, the Marlins have agreed to make Stanton a rich man. Andy Martino of the New York Daily News was first to report that the Marlins will announce a new contract extension for the 25-year-old slugging right fielder at a press conference at 11 a.m. ET on Wednesday, and he and Jon Heyman of CBSSports.com have the details:
- 13 years.
- $325 million.
- A full no-trade clause.
- An opt-out after the sixth season.
Stanton has yet to be heard from. Marlins owner Jeffrey Loria, however, had this to say to Heyman:
If you want to be straightforward, Stanton's new deal has topped Miguel Cabrera's $292 million contract with the Detroit Tigers from 2014 as the largest in baseball history (a $248 million extension was added to his existing pact). If you want to get technical, it's topping Alex Rodriguez's $275 million contract from 2007.
Either way, you might be thinking this is absolutely, positively crazy. Sure, Stanton is good. But 13 years and $325 million for a guy who's only been in the league since 2010?
In reality, though, Stanton's contract isn't that nuts. In fact, it's arguably the least crazy megacontract baseball has ever handed out.
Let's narrow things down to pacts that have been worth over $200 million, with an emphasis on the age range each was set to cover. With an assist from MLB Trade Rumors, we find:
The bulk of baseball's $200 million contracts have begun either in the recipient's late 20s or early 30s. That's smart in light of the size and quality of the track records they've rewarded but stupid in light of what we know about how players age.
There's been a lot of work done to uncover when players hit their peaks, including one study by J.C. Bradbury for Baseball Prospectus in 2010. He found that players tend to peak around 29, or "possibly 30 for hitters in modern times." After that, it's all downhill.
As such, most of the $200 million contracts that have been handed out have been invested mainly in decline years. That's not the case with Stanton's.
There's a period of six years from now until Stanton's age-30 season, so roughly half of his new contract is invested in what should be prime years. And in the end, he could be a huge enough value in those years alone to make the entire deal worthwhile.
When word came out that the Marlins were pushing a 12-year deal worth $325 million that would cover Stanton's two remaining arbitration years and 10 free-agent years, FanGraphs' Dave Cameron looked at Stanton's future from a Wins Above Replacement perspective and concluded:
That projection values his 10 free agent years at a total of $390 million…Toss in another $35 million for the two seasons before the 10 year extension kicks in, and this would suggest a value of $425 million, $100 million more than the Marlins are reportedly offering.
This conclusion isn't a consensus, but even more conservative projections have Stanton's contract being a reasonable payout. ESPN's Dan Szymborski, for example, used his ZiPS system to project the rest of Stanton's career and found he should be worth over $300 million in the end:
If you're not one to trust WAR, that's OK. There are other ways we can get a glimpse of how bright Stanton's future should be.
One thing to consider is how Stanton possesses a career .903 OPS and 154 home runs through only his age-24 season. For an idea of what that means, check out who else has done that:
It's Stanton and then a collection of guys with Hall of Fame-level talent. That's high praise for what he's accomplished in his first five years and a good omen for what's to come.
And this is without even considering that Stanton's true offensive ceiling extends beyond a mere .900 OPS. In two of the last three seasons, he's done better than a .950 OPS with over 35 homers.
The only other player to do so is Cabrera. With Cabrera's best days behind him, Stanton is essentially the best bet to carve out a place as the elite power hitter in baseball in the years to come. For the Marlins to lock up a player like that at a rate of $25 million per year is more than fair.
If there's a big concern, it's that the injury bug will ruin everything. This is, after all, a guy who suffered serious leg injuries in 2012 and 2013 and is coming off a brutal hit-by-pitch. Even if Stanton puts that behind him, you wonder if he'll be able to keep his legs healthy as long as his 6'6", 240-pound frame has to keep patrolling Marlins Park's big right field.
But there is a potential solution to this dilemma. If it becomes clear that Stanton's legs need to be preserved, the Marlins could always move him to first base. With only Garrett Jones there now and no young studs waiting to break through, there's nothing solid standing in the way.
There's the answer to the question of whether Stanton can actually be worth $325 million. Largely through his being a gigantic value in his remaining prime years, that could indeed be money well spent.
Of course, the other question is whether this will actually end up being a $325 million investment in the long run.
In all likelihood, no, Stanton's contract probably won't cost the Marlins $325 million.
His opt-out clause will see to that. Stanton will have the option to exercise it after his age-30 season in 2020. If his prime goes as well as it should, his opt-out will therefore be an escape hatch to go score big on the open market.
And if Robinson Cano could get $240 million fresh off his age-30 season last winter, you can only imagine what Stanton could get six winters from now. Even knowing that he'd be sharing the market with Mike Trout, it's possible Stanton could find something as large as a second $300 million deal.
As for the Marlins, they probably wouldn't mind that too much.
They'd know they got their money's worth in the first six years of Stanton's contract before he did them the favor of backing out of the last seven years. The Marlins could take the money they would have owed him and invest it elsewhere.
Granted, it is possible that Stanton could choose to stick with the Marlins when his opt-out comes. Maybe his career will go off the rails between now and 2020, in which case he'd be a fool not to take the rest of the $325 million he's owed.
If that happens, the Marlins will have a heck of an albatross on their hands. It should, however, at least become easier for them to live with it.
According to Craig Davis of the Sun-Sentinel, the Marlins' TV contract with Fox Sports Florida expires in 2020. Even if the downfall of Stanton's career were to make it difficult for them at the negotiating table, they could probably still upgrade over their current $16-18 million-per-year deal to help them pay Stanton.
The other possibility is that Stanton decides to stick with the Marlins beyond 2020 because he simply doesn't want to leave. This is probably only happening if the Marlins develop into a powerhouse.
And that's not as unlikely as you might think.
It's easy to look at how the Marlins have only had Opening Day payrolls in the $50 million range in the last two years and conclude that there's just no way they can afford to build winning teams around Stanton going forward. But they just might be able to, as they have the benefit of having a whole lot of future payroll space and a whole lot of cheap talent around Stanton.
Per MLB Trade Rumors, the Marlins currently have $8 million on the books for 2016 and nothing else that year or beyond. There's plenty of room for Stanton's deal, and arbitration will help suppress the salaries of players like Jose Fernandez, Henderson Alvarez, Nate Eovaldi, Marcell Ozuna and Christian Yelich.
Sure, things will get to a point where the Marlins' homegrown players will start becoming really expensive. But if the club's 77-85 record in 2014 proves to be the first step toward years of contention, the Marlins should become a hot ticket in Miami. They'll reap the benefits not only at the gate, but in negotiations for a new TV deal.
That Stanton's $325 million contract is a good deal for him goes without saying. Between the money, the no-trade protection and the opt-out, it has everything he could possibly ask for.
But it's really not such a bad deal for the Marlins, either. They're likely going to get a steal for six years before Stanton opts out of the last seven. If he doesn't, it's not a given that the deal will become an unbearable burden in the long run.
So grab the nearest glass and raise it high. Here's to a deal well struck.
Note: Stats courtesy of Baseball-Reference.com unless otherwise noted/linked.
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