Bob Nightengale of USA Today is reporting that the Giants and reliever Jeremy Affeldt have agreed to a two-year contract extension worth $9.5MM. Nightengale tweets that the deal should be announced tomorrow.
Affeldt was due to earn $4MM from San Francisco this season, which would have been the final year of the two-year, $8MM pact he signed after the 2008 season. Under the new contract, Affeldt will make a guaranteed $4.5MM in both 2010 and 2011. For the 2011 season, the Giants can either pick up an option on Affeldt that would pay the left-hander $5MM for the year, or the club can buy him out for $500K.
The 30-year-old enjoyed the best season of his eight-year career in 2009. He posted a career-low 1.73 ERA in 74 appearances with San Francisco, and tied Minnesota's Matt Guerrier for the major league lead in holds with 33.
this is great news! this guy was awesome last year.
This is awesome!!!!!!!
Pointless move by Sabean, but I guess we shouldn’t be surprised. Affeldt’s 1.73 ERA was a fluke. K/9 down from 9.2 to 7.9, BB/9 up from 2.9 to 4.5. BABIP .244, 63 pts lower than career mark. Not a move that’s going to kill the team by any means, but Wilson is going to be due a huge raise (again) next year and the Giants DO have a budget.
Appearing in almost half your teams games will do that. He is still one of the best lefty bullpen arms in baseball
I’m leery of this extension. The season hasn’t even started yet, and while I love love love Affeldt, I don’t think there was any need to rush an extension when you can sit on it for most of this season and see how he does, given that last year was so much better than any year in the rest of his career. It also makes Affeldt more or less impossible to trade, which while I wouldn’t necessarily want to happen, you never know what’s going to happen in the middle of the season.
Affeldt is great, but I don’t see an upside here.
I like this extension, it will look pretty good if he can come close to his 09 numbers, but that being said you raise a great point. It would be a lot better to see what he can do since relievers can be brilliant one year and then fall apart the next. Hopefully all works out well with this move.
90 million payroll isn’t exactly a “budget”
90-ZITO-ROWAND=59.5
That’s incredibly sad to type.
Hot damn, gotta love Sabean.
As a Giants fan, here’s hoping he doesn’t regress to the mean.
As already noted on the board, this move is definition of unnecessary. There’s little he could do to significantly increase his value over the course of the season. I don’t understand why this move couldn’t wait until later in the season, or (preferably) the off season.
Obviously, we’re not privy to the inner workings of the organization, but once again I am left no choice but to question Sabes.
This is actually a misleading report by Nightingale … Baggs reports on his blog that it is only a one-year $4.5M 2011 extension with a club option for 2012 (and an extra $.5M for this year and a $.5M buyout for the option). So the additional guaranteed money is $5.5M. I think the 2012 option is the key value for the Giants – when you take a look at Tim’s 2012 free agent list, there will only be 5 fairly unexciting LH relievers available.
Baggs also reported that Affeldt “celebrated today by fielding a bunt and throwing it into the stands.”