The Giants have made it known that their goal is to retain ace Madison Bumgarner for the long haul, but a contract extension might not come until next offseason at the earliest because of the luxury-tax threshold, per John Shea of the San Francisco Chronicle. The Giants will outspend the mark for third straight year in 2017, writes Shea, meaning they’ll have to pay a 50 percent tax on every dollar they exceed next season’s $195MM limit. By extending Bumgarner, the Giants would put themselves in position to incur more taxes. Fortunately for San Francisco, a new deal for Bumgarner isn’t necessarily urgent. The 27-year-old is under control at a palatable $35MM for three more years, including $12MM team options for 2018 and ’19.
More from the NL:
- The Cardinals entered free agency intent on signing center fielder Dexter Fowler, general manager John Mozeliak revealed after the team inked him to a five-year, $82.5MM deal Friday. “From day one, this was always someone we were hoping to sign,” Mozeliak said (via Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch). “We wanted to address athleticism. We wanted to address someone who could hit at the top of the order if possible to allow us flexibility with (Matt) Carpenter. And we were also looking to find someone extremely competent on the basepaths. But Mr. Fowler is more than that.” Mozeliak, who just met Fowler face to face for the first time Thursday, also lauded his “infectious” personality and leadership abilities. “I don’t want to overplay this but when you think about his personality and the energy he brings, it was very evident at dinner,” added Mozeliak. “It really just reinforced what we were trying to do, that this was the right person for us.”
- Mets manager Terry Collins wanted Michael Conforto to play winter ball this offseason, but the outfielder’s representatives “weren’t enthused,” tweets Adam Rubin of ESPN.com. Conforto’s camp balked at the idea because of the significant financial ramifications that would have come had he suffered a major injury. The 23-year-old isn’t under contract for the long haul (or even next season), so he doesn’t have future guaranteed money due from the Mets. That isn’t the case for teammate and fellow outfielder Juan Lagares, who’s playing winter ball two seasons into a five-year extension. Lagares, who suffered a minor injury to his throwing shoulder Saturday, has at least $20.5MM coming his way over the rest of his contract.
The Giants are very good at locking their home grown talent up, I can’t see MadBum playing anywhere else, but I do agree with the sentiment that it’s not exactly a pressing issue right now…
You gotta respect an organization that looks after their guys like SF. Really they could just wait until he has one year left and look to extend him but they are doing the righty if they extend him and up his AAV. One of the best things about SF is that they also do reward contracts which is painful at times (e.g. lincecum)
I wouldn’t say, they’re looking after mad bum, it’s good business to lock him up before he has another 2 good seasons and his price tag on an extension goes way up. It’s still just a business at the end of he day and they’re doing what is best for the giants. If they were doing what’s best for Madison then they would renegotiate his current contract. But I agree that they give contracts to guys that have played in San Fran a long time even if they shouldn’t.
We don’t know what the deal is until they do a deal, so I can’t comment on whether it’s good business or not. BUT, SF have shown over the years that they will do look after players with reward contracts and Sabean has gone on record saying that they feel like it’s the right thing to do (Huff and Lincecum are examples).
To be fair, no contract extension with Bumgarner would be a pure reward contract but it would be a combination of good business as well as doing the right thing. One could argue that if you were looking at it purely from a business perspective and the less risky move would be to look at an extension closer to the end of his current deal. Mad Bum seems practical and wouldn’t seem to hold anything against SF for waiting.
Pablo Sandoval. Granted, they dodged a bullet on it, but how can one say they are good at locking up homegrown talent?
Posey, belt, Crawford, Mad Bum, Cain don’t count?
They also offered Timmy 5/100 but he turned it down
They offered Pablo more than Boston did but their offer contained weight stipulations so he chose to go get fat in Boston.
I still maintain that Sabean intentionally acted like a knob during that Sandoval negotiation because he didn’t want him back but had to make it look to the fans that he was trying. I’m expecting this to be in Sabean’s memoirs titled “How to Win a WS and Cut MLB Food Budgets”
Giants top pitchers have not been durable, they lost Lincecum after 2 Cy Youngs, and Cain really fell off. I wouldn’t sign Bum just yet!
Lincecum is one thing, but Cain’s problems weren’t about durability. He caught a bad break and had a freak injury during his prime. No way to foresee that.
It wasn’t a freak injury. Cain was pitching through bone spurs in his elbow for years.
For a guy who isn’t seeing consistent playing time, wouldn’t it make sense to do winter ball and try to get a full time job to help bump up his coming arb salaries?
Sure they overpaid to get him, but Dex solves some of their issues they’ve needed to address
He’s a great sign. Twice as good as Heyward and twice as cheap.
But heywards ceiling is much higher. I hardly doubt he’s declining already, last year was probably just an adjustment year
Actually as someone who has followed JHey since he was with the Braves, this year was not as adjustment. He has NEVER been what people hype him to be on offense. Great glove in the outfield but horrible overhyped with a bat. I said from the beginning that the Cubs would eventually regret signing him. They may not regret it right now but they will.
They severely overpaid for Fowler and they know it. Mo mentions speed and athleticism? Haha, that’s a massive contract for those attributes for a guy that’s already on the wrong side of 30. I’m glad Dex got paid and took advantage of the Card’s desperation. Theo got the most out of him but was not interested in paying for PAST performance. A desperate move by the Cards in an otherwise quiet offseason for them. With the Dodgers/Giants/Nats/Mets all clearly better, it will be another year with no Wild Card, thus no playoffs for the dead birds.
Well you don’t seem biased at all.
Haha, I love Dex, love what he did for the Cubs the last couple of years, but that contract is ridiculous. TOR really wanted him and didn’t come close to that offer. It’s almost as if Mo thought he was stealing him from the Cubs when, in fact, he was not even offered a contract by Theo. The Cubs already decided to give the keys to Almora in CF with Jay as insurance. Again, I’m glad Dex got paid and it will be nice to still see him 18-19 games a year.
The Cardinals signed Holliday on “The Wrong Side of 30” to 7 years and more money and I think that turned out pretty good. And when the Cubs will be paying Heyward 24.5 Million at the age of 34 the Cardinals will have only paid Fowler 16.5 million at the age of 35
this was the market for Fowler and frankly, I think the Redbirds will be better off with Fowler at this price than with Heyward. Fowler checks off most of the boxes for STL when it comes to lineup and defense.
That absolutely was NOT the market for Dex, Toronto was the only other serious bidder and the Cards outbid them by over 20 mil. That info is everywhere and not hard to find. Mo did exactly what desperate GMs do, overpay for PAST performance. He’s already on the wrong side of 30 and plays marginal CF defense. Do you really think that “speed and athleticism” that Mo was excited about will get better w/age? Haha, no. Desperate move by the Cards that will not be enough to catch the Giants or Mets for a wild card spot.
Bryzzo2016 – I’m neither Cards nor Cubs fan, but have tremendous respect for the Cardinals as storied franchise with long history of winning and knowing how to do so even present day.
Cards signed the player they wanted both on the field and in the clubhouse – a consummate professional, leader, high OBP, energetic leadoff hitter still only 30 with a lean athletic body that should age well.
Seems to me there’s a part of you trying too hard to diminish both the Cards decision-making and a now former Cubs who will now play for the opposition against your team. The nature of your efforts says to me the defection bothers you.
Make no mistake, Dexter Fowler was very important to the 2016 Cubs who went into .500 ball mode when he went down to injury. And overall, the Cubs were 85-40 when he played, and 18-18 when he didn’t.
This is a move to make the everyday fan happy. It is a “steal” from the Cubs and for some reason they were willing to overpay massively to do it. To me though it doesn’t make sense. Okay so you aren’t convinced that Tommy Pham can play everyday CF and give you quality ABs. I’ll give you that but you are neglecting Harrison Bader who is knocking on the door ready to taste the majors. Yes he struggled making the jump from AA to AAA last year but he has absolutely KILLED every place he has been. Signing Fowler to 5 years makes no sense. If it was a 2 year deal with an option for 3 then I’m okay with it but not 5 years. They will regret it.
Please change your handle.
Aloha cardfan2011: Here is something I will say that would be “controversial” on Cubs blogs: if the Cubs FO had not gone after Heyward at the end of last season, then they could have resigned Fowler and had a Melancon/Jansen/Chapman. I only say this because I see it with fans of any team but many times there are those who think their “FO’s (front office)” can do no wrong. Sure Heyward came at a discount for last year compared to what the Cardinals and some other teams offered him. I love the Cubs but felt that Heyward thrived in St. Louis, especially after Matheny dropped him down in the lineup early in the season to take pressure off of him in 2015; then worked him back up towards the later part as he did well. I was reporting this on the Cubs blogs all the time and could not believe Maddon (for as good as he is) did not follow Matheny’s example when it came to Jason. I will take this an extra step, I currently am in the SF Bay Area, I was in ball through college, have many colleagues who were blessed to go to the “show” and also work for various organizations including the Giants & A’s. You remember a pitcher name Barry Zito (I know Cardinal fans probably do not like him). Well, the market was soft/weak for left handed pitchers after the 2006 season. Many of my colleagues and my father a head collegiate coach himself were saying that Zito should accept the offer from the A’s to stay in the organization that had worked with him, to which he responded well. Instead, the Giants made a crazy offer at the time and Zito’s agents said to go for it, which he did and you know the rest, he was never the same. We saw a glimpse of Zito’s past during the 2012 season but that was it. So, I think Jason may have done better staying with the Cardinals, though it would have cost the organization a lot, one could say it was worth it. Now, we will never know. Maybe the Cardinals overpaid for Fowler, the same could be said for Heyward. I do hope the best for both of these players as I respect them very much. I know they are both competitors; I hope Jason is comeback player of the year in 2017, more for him than for fans. I hope Fowler can build off of this past year and that the Cubs-Cardinals tradition continues with fierce but civil competition like how it was with Banks & Musial. You take care now. Mahalo!
Please. Hit the return button. Occasionally. Nobody can read this massive wall of text
Aloha david- I am sorry, I will learn to break things up better and try to keep it short. My main points were that Heyward did well in his season with the Cardinals and that when he had issues at the plate, Matheny moved him down in the order and brought him back up as he adjusted. I felt as a Cubs fan I was one of the few that would “critique/question” the move to get him and when he had difficulties, why not do what Matheny did when he was in St. Louis?
The other thing that I brought up that might have been controversial was that Heyward may had done better to have stayed in St. Louis, even if it cost the organization a bit because not only do they have one of the best defenders in all of baseball but he was hitting there too. Having said that, if the Cubs did not sign Jason, they could have re-signed Fowler and possibly made a run at a Meloncan/Kenley/Chapman. I think Fowler would have given the Cubs a bit of a discount on the yearly price if the FO would have given him a 4yr contract. I used the example of how Barry Zito never got back to where he was with the A’s when he signed his big contract to come over to the Giants.
Going back to cardfan2011, yes maybe the Cards overpaid for Fowler same for the Cubs with Heyward. I do hope that both succeed as I respect them very much as people not just for their play. And as I have expressed to cardsfan2011 and others here, I want the Central Division to be the best in all of baseball. I also hope it can be fierce play on the field but civil like past players Banks and Musial. You take care now. Mahalo!
/book
Conforto is smart. If he gets injured playing winter ball, where’s his next check coming from?
And if he doesn’t improve, where does his next check come from and how little will it be? It’s sad that we’re defending players that are more concerned with their pay than their play.
If Comforto were smart he would have figured out a way (insurance?) to play winter ball. He’s coming off a year of struggling and inconsistent at bats, plus he could have gotten some innings at 1B.
I would imagine if the Mets have a roster issue at the end of spring training and the choice is between Conforto and another player, guess who might get sent down? If the manager and coaches see a flaw in your game that could be eliminated with more quality AB’s, then go to the Dominican Republic and get the AB’s.
“The 27-year-old is under control at a palatable $35MM for thee more years, including $12MM team options for 2018 and ’19.”
***three
Check & double check your editorial content before it’s strike three.
Don’t you mean strike thee?
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GM speak for knowing you overpaid for a guy, “infectious personality”, “great clubhouse guy”
Long story short… St. Louis replaced an aging Matt Holliday with a young(er) Dexter Fowler. If he performs anywhere near he has, then I believe this was a good move!
Bumgarner really has nothing left to prove – he’s one of the best in the game. Does he regret signing the extension? Who knows. Giants made out like bandits on that deal.