Manny Machado Signs Huge Deal With Padres
Photo: Stephen Brashear/Getty Images
It has finally happened. After keeping an eye on the two biggest free agents all offseason (Manny Machado and Bryce Harper), one of them is finally off the board. We heard talks between Harper and the Phillies were really heating up, but it was Manny Machado who agreed to a deal first. The San Diego Padres and Manny Machado have agreed to a 10-year, $300 million deal, which is the largest contract in the history of American sports. The infamous Alex Rodriguez deal with the Yankees in 2007 was for ten years at $275 million. The Machado deal includes an opt-out after the fifth year.
Photo: The Chicago Tribune
It was no secret the San Diego Padres were pursuing both Manny Machado and Bryce Harper, but most wouldn’t have considered them the favorites for either superstar. There are several interesting facets to this deal, starting with the enormity of it. While I’m a huge MLB fan, deals this large are ridiculous. No player is worth that much money, even Mike Trout. While Manny Machado is a very good player, he is not worth the largest contract in baseball (much less the history of American sports). The next interesting aspect to this deal is the longevity of it. One of the reasons it took so long for Machado and Harper to sign is because of teams’ hesitancy to offer long-term deals. Deals of 7+ years don’t have a good history of working out in the teams’ favor. The aforementioned A-Rod deal didn’t bode very well for the Yankees those last several years. The 10-year deal that Albert Pujols signed with the Angels in 2011 isn’t so delightful to the franchise while Pujols plays out his last several years. It doesn’t matter how good you are, age will catch up to you, causing the downhill side of long-term deals not to be team-friendly. You cannot blame the players though, because it’s the perfect situation for them. No matter how much Machado’s production may fall off, he has millions of dollars guaranteed to him for the next ten years.
You also have to wonder how this will impact the Padres going forward. Of course it makes them a much better team with his bat in the middle of the order, but does it make them a contender? If not, when will it contribute to them becoming a contender? The Padres have the top farm system in baseball with ten of the MLB-top 100 prospects entering the 2019 season, so if several of their prospects prove they are the real deal in the coming years, there’s a good chance we’ll see them contend for their first ever World Series. I don’t see them contending for the division this season, or even next season, but beyond that they could be a dangerous team for years to come.
If their prospects don’t pan out, however, then this deal will be a very bad one. The Padres still won’t compete and they will be stuck in a bad deal they can’t get out of, unless Machado were to opt out. The Padres are notifying the baseball world that they are going “all in” with this deal, gambling their prospects live up to their potential. For a team that has struggled for a long time, and hasn’t had a superstar since Tony Gwynn, it is pretty cool to see them make a move of this magnitude. It’s nice seeing a different team sign a top free agent rather than the big-market teams. If the Padres start competing within their division, it will make the NL West a very fun division to watch, with so much talent already out there. So while it’s a nice change of pace to see the Padres making moves, I just don’t think it’s a very wise one to offer that much, for that long. But, and this is the counterargument question, if this brings them one World Series over the next ten years, does that make it worth it? I must admit it would be very hard to answer that with a “no.”
Garett