Written by Greg Fertel
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18 April 2008
In what I think was really a stunning move today, the
Rays locked Evan Longoria up for 6 years, 17 million dollars, plus two currently unknown club options to buy out his first two years of free agency.
This is a very important signing that will cause an effect throughout baseball over the next couple of years. The Rays gave a long term, guaranteed, major league deal to a player who is for all intents and purposes still a prospect. Before Longoria, the key deals for young players to look at were those of Troy Tulowitzki and Chris Young. Young signed for 5 years (plus 1 or 2 options) and 28 million dollars while Tulowitzki signed for 6 years, 31 million. The key difference is that both did so after successful rookie seasons. Longoria is very much still an unknown entity.
Basically, both the Rays and Longoria hedged their bets. Longoria decided that financial security was more important than the chance of exceeding the total sum of this deal in a single year of free agency. The Rays decided that the risk of Longoria not developing into a major league player was worth it because they could avoid his 10 million dollar arbitration hearings.
Teams follow set trends. Agents ask for comparative deals. The Longoria deal is going to come up in many conversations between agents and teams for top prospects - maybe even including our own, I'm think of Montero - once they enter the major leagues. We're seeing very few young players opt to test free agency while they are still young players.
This means a few big things. First off, there will be even fewer in-their-prime free, Grade A free agents for the Yankees to snipe. Looking at a 25 year old Justin Upton on the Yankees? He'd have to be pretty confident in his abilities to sacrifice financial security for a chance at the big contract. And since the Yankees are competing against a lot more teams with plenty of money to spend these days, demand will almost certainly exceed supply. Big, big contracts could be in store.
This makes the information that observe and analyze from the minor leagues so much more important. I'd wager that five years from now, the financial advantage of the Yankees is not framed in a free agent context, but in a minor league signing one. Once Dustin Rose, class of 2014 at Nebraska and golden spikes candidate, realizes that the Yankees are willing to break the bank on draft day, he can comfortably tell teams that he's only signing for 15 million dollars.
