Verlander to Mets - 2 years, $86 million

[tmwiese55]

On 12/5/2022 at 8:20 PM, umphrey said:

Burnes and Woodruff will get paid, no question about that, but the Scherzer and Verlander deals have nothing to do with them. Those are first ballet HOF pitchers coming off career years. Oh and they didn’t even have to commit long term. 

I guess.  But Burnes/Woodruff are basically as good as they are right now but are 10-12 years younger.   If guys similar to them at 40 are still getting 40mil per year, then they don't have to worry about getting a big FA deal when they hit the market in their low 30s.   There could've been a logic to "hey  i'm not gonna be a FA until low 30s so will I get the big 7 year deal for 200+ at that age, might as well just lock in now to not risk injury before then".   But after seeing this any wavering on whether to take the injury risk is outweighed by the big upside.  I think these deals makes it clear, if it wasn't already, that the risk is worth the reward in riding out to get to FA.