The Rangers and left-handed starter Derek Holland have stopped discussing a possible contract extension for the time being, Richard Durrett of ESPNDallas.com reports. The Rangers and Holland’s representatives at Martini Sports Management started discussing a long-term deal in December, but aren’t likely to resume negotiations this offseason.
Holland, who missed this year's super two cutoff and is not yet arbitration eligible, will remain under team control through 2015. A five-year deal would buy out one pre-arbitration season, his three years of arbitration eligibility and his first season of free agency.
The 25-year-old posted a 3.95 ERA with 7.4 K/9, 3.0 BB/9 and a 46.4% ground ball rate in 198 innings this past season. He set career highs in everything from ERA to innings to strikeouts (162) to wins above replacement (3.6).
Yovani Gallardo, Ricky Romero, Jon Lester, Clay Buchholz and Trevor Cahill are unavoidable points of reference for the Rangers and Holland’s representatives. All five starters signed five-year deals in the $30MM range at similar stages in their respective careers. Holland has more career innings than any of those pitchers did at the time of their extensions, but none of them had a career ERA above 3.94 at the time of their deals, while Holland has a career mark of 4.73. Options are often a point of contention in extension talks, so it's worth noting that the deals for Cahill and Buchholz include two club options, while the other deals include just one.
They put it on hold with Napoli the other day also. This is telling me that Darvish is about to be signed OR they wont be able to get him but decided to give Fielder whatever it will take to sign him.
That seems likely. 9 days and counting…
My guess is they have three options out there two of which are contracts. Option 1 is the contract to Yu. If he accepts options 2&3 go bye bye. Option 2 if darvish does not sign that money goes to fielder and option 3 happens which is trading
Moreland for pitching.
Any contract should have incentive clauses as to how long the mustache gets.
I hate when teams make you shave but I would offer Holland more to not grow that thing at all until he can fully grow one. The HS “look i can grow hair! mustache” was not a great look.
Knowing of course that he won’t be able to meet those incentives–peach fuzz is as far as he can get.
I don’t think it would be a good idea for the Rangers to extend him right now. He is under control through 2015. Wait until about 2013 and evaluate him.
It’s cheaper to extend players as early as possible, if money is a cause of concern for the franchise. But I guess you could say its usually done with players that show greater potential than Holland does, so eh.
It would actually be a great idea to extend him early. However, I think they should wait till next year to make sure he continues improving in the bigs. But Texas has a star being born here. It’s about time we have a successful home grown starter.
You extend guys you project as top of the rotation starters to obtain value in their arbitration years. Holland doesn’t do it for me, but I guess we’ll see.
Double post
Holland grew up a huge Yankees fan. I’m sure if the Rangers don’t offer up what he deems to be a favorable deal, he’ll wait it out til he’s a FA and see if the Yankees come knocking.
Holland has shown improvement every year so far. He’s only 25 and many aces didn’t earn the moniker of “true ace” until close to 30. James Shields led the majors this past season in complete games but Holland led the AL with four complete game shutouts. I think in two years that Holland will be spoken of like a true ace with other elite pitchers in the game. Keep improving Dutch! Go Rangers.
I’m pretty sure if Holland grew out that terrible mustache he had he would be a Cy Young candidate. St. Louis was so distracted by its ugliness that they couldn’t even hit the ball in Game 4 of the World Series.
I’m pretty sure if Holland grew out that terrible mustache he had he would be a Cy Young candidate. St. Louis was so distracted by its ugliness that they couldn’t even hit the ball in Game 4 of the World Series.
Texas let Wilson walk because he wanted too much money and too many years. Napoli’s negotiations stopped because he was asking for much more than Texas felt was fair…and the best I know…the club is right about Napoli. Now negotiations have stopped on Holland. Soon, we will find out that negotiations have been suspended for Hamilton until next winter. Negotiations with Darvish aren’t going well as we move toward the Jan. 18 deadline.
Tough business for JD this winter, huh? So much for resigning the “core” of the team.
I still think Kinsler will re-sign. He wants to be a Ranger so much I think he will stay.
I’m willing to bet extension talks are being put on hold for the Darvish talks. It’s obvious that Darvish probably wants more than was originally thought, so I think JD is just seeing what happens with Darvish before going ahead with Napoli and Hamilton.
Shave the ‘stache
Wow Texas, lock some of your stars up.
He isn’t a star. He has had one above average year in his major league career.