Yankee fans are likely excited that Jorge Posada is staying in the Bronx for the foreseeable future. He reportedly agreed to a 4-year, $52.4 million dollar deal with the club. I know he's coming off of arguably his best season in pinstripes (.338, 20, 90) but will the Yankees (and their fans) be as excited about this deal in 4 years when JP is 40 and making $13.1 million? To me, it seems like a high risk offering a catcher on the wrong side of 35 a contract that long and that lucrative. Since turning 36, Mike Piazza hasn't had 400 at-bats in a season, hasn't hit over .285 and hasn't topped 70 RBI. Ivan Rodriguez turns 36 next month and is coming off a season where he posted some of the worst offensive numbers of his career (11 HR, 9 BB, .294 OBP, .420 SLG). Johnny Bench retired after the 1983 season, most of which he spent as a 35-year-old hitting .255 with 12 HR and 54 RBI. Carlton Fisk is really the only catcher in this class to post moderately good numbers after turning 35. In 1985 as a 37-year-old with the White Sox, he hit won the Silver Slugger after going 37/107 with 17 steals. But he only hit .238 and wouldn't top 500 AB's again in his career.
My guess is, this deal won't look so hot a year or two from now.
1 comment:
Here's why the deal is good and I disagree with you. Say you're right and Posada's skills fade, say the last two years of his contract he hits .250 with 15 hrs and 70 rbis, then you have two years of a top 3 or 5 offensive catcher (the first two years of his contract) and 2 years of an average to below average catcher (the last two years). Posada was not signing without that 4th year, so if you don't offer it to him he walks and you have to try and sign the next best thing, someone like Micheal Barrett or Paul Lo Duca for two years. So instead of a top flight catcher for two years possibly longer, you just have a flat out crappy catcher for 4 years. It's not like money is an issue so I'm pretty happy with this signing.
Also, all those players you mentioned who broke down around age 36 all caught 500-700 more games than Posada at that point in their career. Carlton Fisk on the other hand had caught a similar amount of games as Posada at age 36. That may be a factor, it may be that the Yankees just signed the equivalent of a 32 to 33 year old catcher. Or I just may be trying to justify it, we shall see.
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