Friday, February 05, 2010

The Uncensored Truth About The Justin Verlander Signing

The Tigers played it smart with Justin Verlander. As soon as Felix Hernandez signed his contract for $78 million and five years with Seattle, which is a reasonable cost for a premier starting pitcher, the Tigers immediately threw out a five-year, $75 million offer to Verlander. Just enough wiggle room to top King Felix (they eventually upped offer to $80 million). Just enough guaranteed money that Verlander would likely sign. If he had played out his contracts to free agency, Verlander would have gotten much more - assuming he'd maintained health. And probably would have ended up in the Yankees' price range rather than the Tigers' price range.
Will Verlander be a Tiger for the length of the contract? Don't count on it. General manager Dave Dombrowski said the exact same type of things two years ago when the Tigers locked up Curtis Granderson to a five-year deal even before he was eligible for arbitration. But at least this gives the Tigers the option of getting players or prospects in return when it comes to trading Verlander.

Random Thoughts

- Saw where Michigan State athletic director Mark Hollis didn't stick with his new logo. Honestly, I didn't see anything wrong with the change and am curious why MSU's faithful seems to consider it more important than the off-the-field issues facing the Spartans' football program. Hollis' feet should be held to the fire for that, not the logo change.

- The more we know about Demar Dorsey, the more lame Michigan football coach Rich Rodriguez sounds explaining his recruitment.

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3 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Tigers won't trade Verlander

4:09 PM 
Blogger Barry said...

Pat, this is a good signing especially the contract is back loaded. I agree that there is a 50/50 chance that Verlander will still be a Tiger after 5 years. Tigers need to keep drafting starting pitchers and power bats in the first two rounds because they are so expensive to buy in free agency. Tigers can always buy above average players in free agency for less than $7 million/year. A Kennedy sign for just over $1 million.

5:46 PM 
Blogger Fred Brill said...

It seems like it was only a little while ago the debate was looking over who was the Tiger's Ace - Bonderman or Verlander.
Hey Pat,

Verlander should be enough proof to all that the Tigers can pick good young talent and procure them to high levels.

Gives me a glimmer of hope that this year will be another season where the Tiger's are picked to finish in the middle and put up a good fight for the ALCS.

I'm more worried about second base right now than centerfield.

My own random thought - it would be great if you came over to Windsor and did a peice about our Spitfires - possibly in a position to be a back-to-back Memorial Cup winning team - I'd go to the game with ya! We're pretty close to being local.

10:10 AM 

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