Cup of Joe: Starkey on sports in 400 words or less
The Pirates on Wednesday made the Konnor Griffin signing official — nine years, $140 million with escalators that could take it to $150 million.
It’s great news, but it’s certainly no reason to be heaping praise upon team owner Bob Nutting.
The Pirates did what the Pirates had to do, and what so many teams around baseball are doing: They locked up a prized prospect at a fixed cost. The player got security. The team got a bargain if the player pans out.
The Pirates paid more for their prospect because that is what the market demanded. He’s higher-rated than the others. This is merely the cost of doing business, kind of like Nutting finally cracking the $100 million barrier on payroll this season.
I don’t laud the baseball player who runs out a ground ball, the worker who shows up for the job, the apartment dweller who pays the rent on time — or the baseball owner who finally spends a semi-respectable amount of money on baseball players in an effort to win.
That is the basic job requirement. It’s not worthy of laudation.
In fact, if we’re talking about a previously derelict apartment dweller, it might even merit suspicion. Certainly, it should elicit no more than a comment like, “Good job, but you better keep it up — and I don’t trust that you will.”
The Boston Red Sox last year gave prospect Roman Anthony an eight-year, $130 million contract (worth more in annual money than the Griffin deal) soon after he arrived in the majors. The Seattle Mariners recently signed shortstop prospect Colt Emerson to an eight-year, $95 million deal. The Milwaukee Brewers have handed a few such deals, the latest to minor-league shortstop Cooper Pratt, who got an eight-year, $51 million contract with two option years.
Griffin is a spectacular talent. There is perhaps a three-year window with him and Paul Skenes, and we got a taste of what that could be like in Tuesday’s victory over the San Diego Padres.
The deal will buy out three years of unrestricted free agency, which means the trade talk likely won’t start until after Griffin’s seventh year, when he is 26.
It’s also the biggest contract in franchise history, but that’s kind of like being the fastest runner at a tortoise convention. There isn’t much to compare it to.
Good for Nutting for doing his job.
Now keep it up.