Marlins could offer Giancarlo Stanton $250M, but is that reason to stay?
PHOENIX – The Miami Marlins could commit $250 million or more to Giancarlo Stanton, the 25-year-old outfielder with the size, strength, tools and conscience to steer an organization for at least a decade.
They could make Stanton rich, and they could ride his talents through his prime, and they could have a good, authentic, loyal face for a franchise that hasn't always deserved it. This is the cost of privilege, of running an honest business, and this is why the Marlins are obliged to make it happen.
But, what of the risk … for Stanton?
Yeah, this is one of those rare negotiations in which the player is being asked to take all the money and assume most of the risk. Were it me, I'd want the money and a no-trade clause and an opt-out after every season, which is totally excessive yet wholly warranted given the franchise's recent history.
This isn't Mike Hill's fault. It isn't Dan Jennings' fault. It wasn't Larry Beinfest's fault before that. They run – or, in Beinfest's case, used to run – the baseball end of the Marlins, and they're the reason there's a player such as Stanton even worth having this conversation about, and they're the reason there's hope for Marlins fans again after the most recent organizational surrender. They make it work in spite of ownership (see fire sale of 2012), and they keep their heads up and keep grinding, and they have the Marlins trending in a reasonable direction again.
That said, you're Giancarlo Stanton. Someway, somehow, you're going to make your money. Maybe that's today. Maybe that's another day. In the meantime, arbitration is doing a pretty reasonable job of making you your money – $6.5 million in 2014 and perhaps double that in 2015. By the end of 2016, where there could be another $20 million or so, you're a free agent, at 27.
And then you could sign with a franchise with a history of chasing championships and acting predictably.
It's a lot to decide. The Marlins say they will make an honest effort to sign Stanton to the contract he deserves. Stanton appears to be, at the very least, listening. His relationship with the baseball folks – Jennings, in particular – seems strong. But, will owner Jeffrey Loria allow a reasonable ballclub to be built around a contract of this size? Will he commit to a decade of the same? Is there pitching coming?
"Everything has been positive," Hill, the club's president of baseball operations, said Tuesday. "We're just keeping an open dialogue and letting them know what we want to do. … Giancarlo Stanton is a Marlin and we're going to do everything in our power to keep him as long as we can."
They are asking Stanton, Hill said, "to trust in the job Dan and I do."
"I think his overriding desire is to win," he added. "He knows that's our goal. We want to win as badly as he does."
To that end, Hill did not dismiss the possibility of no-trade protection in a new contract with Stanton. The club has a long-standing philosophy against such clauses. Also, Hill and Jennings have been so adamant about working toward that new contract, and have for so long stiff-armed teams inquiring about Stanton's availability, that teams no longer, according to Hill, even ask about Stanton.
That would change – or revert to previous form – presumably, if another winter passes without a contract extension.
But, for now, Hill appeared reasonably optimistic. Asked what he would tell Stanton about tomorrow and next year and five years from now, you know, should Stanton ask about the franchise's long-term commitment to winning, Hill said those answers could be found in one of the better young outfields in baseball, and in a slick young shortstop, and in a promising young rotation (Jose Fernandez is progressing well, he said, from Tommy John surgery) and an improved bullpen, with more on the way. The club would like to add veteran starting pitching, as well, but between "would like to" and 200 or 400 innings of reliability is a good-sized gap.
See, there is promise here. There's progress. It's a credit to Hill and Jennings that there is, and so quickly. But can Loria be trusted to stick with the program when it comes time to bring in vital parts, and to pay all these young men when their arbitration and free-agent seasons arrive, and to make the Marlins anything more than the Giancarlo Stanton show?
That, for the moment, is for Stanton to decide. The money will be there. Will the job satisfaction be there too? Will the wins be there? Who's taking on all this risk anyway?
"He's our guy," Hill said.
And they're his team.
"Hopefully," Hill said, "that partnership can keep going."
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