the benefits of being a "legacy"
its the onset of Free Agency season in baseball, and with it comes the possible advent of the $30 million/year contract. the other day i saw that Gary Matthews, Jr. underwent surgery on his knee and will likely miss 4-6 months, and it brought me back to the heady days of 2006. join me in the Only-Sorta-Wayback Machine.
the year is 2006. the stock market is riding high. the Democrats have just secured a majority in Congress (which they will do absolutely zilch with). the war in Iraq is still mostly an unmitigated debacle. the iPhone is still merely a techno-geek wet dream. and the 83-win Cardinals have just become possibly the worst team to ever win a World Series.
Gary Matthews, Jr. is a 32-year old journeyman who has already played for 6 different teams and been released by at least 1 other without playing a game for them. he just finished his first ever season with a batting average over .300, or with more than 500 at bats, or with more than 15 HRs, or with more than 55 RBI. it's pretty much the definition of a fluke season. but Arte Moreno had $50 million sitting around that he didn't particularly need, and he and Bill Stoneman ended up throwing it at Matthews in the form of a 5-year contract. they even threw in 3 years of No-Trade Clause.
that same offseason, Frank Catalanotto (career .297 BA) signed for $13M over 3 years. Moises Alou (319 career HRs) signed for $7.5M. Jose Guillen, coming off a down year after 3 very solid seasons, signed a 1-year deal for $5M. most sources questioned the intelligence of the deal, but the Angels weren't having it.
"He's a guy we're really happy to have," Angels general manager Bill Stoneman said during a conference call. "One of our objectives during this offseason was to improve ourselves in center field."
"Guys learn at different times in their careers," Stoneman said. "Gary's coming into his own."
so how has it worked out so far?
Career Batting Average, pre-2006: .249
2006 Batting Average: .313
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2007 Batting Average: .252
2008 Batting Average: .242
2007: 135 games in CF
2008: 31 games in CF
Matthews immediately got caught up in allegations of HGH use, then lost 61 points off his batting average and 124 points off his OPS. he was injured and missed the Angels postseason series against the Red Sox in which they were swept. then the Angels went and signed Torii Hunter to play CF in 2008 (thus the drop-off in games noted above), and Matthews went on to lose another 66 points of OPS. he played in the 2008 ALDS against the Red Sox and went 0-for-5 as the Angels lost in 4 games. now he's unlikely to be ready for 2009 Opening Day, leaving him in danger of passing Juan Pierre (5 years, $44M) as the worst free agent signing of the 2006/7 offseason. Stoneman has since stepped aside as Angels GM, though he remains in a consultant capacity.
the big winners in all of this (besides Matthews and his agent)? the San Francisco Giants, who offered the same contract but lost out to the Angels. of course, had they landed Matthews, it might have prevented them from the atrocities of the Barry Zito era in Giantland.
meanwhile the rest of us get to sit back and marvel that many people who get paid to make baseball decisions consistently make very poor decisions. and yet, they get to keep on making those decisions, or they end up getting paid to talk about baseball, further enraging anyone with half a brain who would love it if the so-called experts actually seemed like they had a clue and weren't just saying things to be heard over the other blathering idiots or to stir up pointless controversy.