The Pittsburgh Pirates just signed Gregory Polanco to a five-year deal worth $35 million with an additional two club options that could eventually buy out a total of three free agent years for Polanco. Craig Edwards of FanGraphs, however, points out that Polanco is not the most obvious of extension candidates.
About a month ago, I discussed potential contract-extension candidates this year, and I mentioned both Polanco and [Kolten Wong]. In terms of quality and career production, Wong was near the middle of players who’d recorded at least two years of service time. Polanco, on the other hand, sat near the bottom of the list of players who’d recorded between one and two years of service time. Players like Mookie Betts and George Springer headlined that list, but Polanco was also behindKevin Pillar, Matt Duffy, David Peralta and Rougned Odor in terms of production. It’s possible we are seeing a bit of a trend in players and teams failing to agree to extensions that buy out free-agent years, but there could be a trend in terms of the declining quality of players who have been locked up.
The premise here is that the very best players are betting more on themselves than ever before, and that contract extensions are either getting more expensive or occurring at a younger period of time. The Marlins themselves saw that they needed to sign players at a younger age and with less service time in order to get them to agree to these relatively team-friendly contract extensions; Christian Yelich signed with only about a year of service time on his clock and after about one and a half seasons of good play. The team's other recent extensions have come during arbitration seasons. One was rightfully massively expensive (Giancarlo Stanton) and the other represents what contract extensions used to look like (Dee Gordon).
But if the trend is indeed that lesser players or players who have yet to prove themselves in the bigs are getting these extensions, then which players may fit the mold for the Miami Marlins? The team is in a particular situation with regards to young talent; the club has some young talent still under cost control, but those players are closer to arbitration and some of them are represented by Scott Boras. The team has already seen this problem recently in the case of Adeiny Hechavarria. In his first two seasons, he was not likely good enough to be worth an extension. His 2015 season was a success defensively, earning him some mention for extension talks. However, Hechavarria was close enough to arbitration that he decided to decline Miami's interest and bet on himself eventually testing out the free agent market.
So which Marlins fit this mold of either (or both) less proven players or guys with less service time who might warrant an extension look? Among position players (because the Marlins would be highly unlikely to consider a contract for a starting pitcher), the only player who fits this profile is J.T. Realmuto. The former catcher prospect turned Marlins starter did a decent job last year but definitely had his fair share of concerns heading into this season. There are still unknowns in his performance in terms of how well he will hit or whether he is capable of improving his pitch framing.
However, the point of these early extensions is that they do hold some small amount of risk, especially in buying out free agent years. For the team, it also poses a potential benefit, especially in the case of small market clubs. The Marlins would otherwise have a difficult time finding a league average catcher on the kinds of budgets with which they often work. It is perhaps easier to snag a cost-controlled player, keep him around for a reasonable sum, and take the consequences if that player turns more into Rocco Baldelli or Jedd Gyorko rather than Andrew McCutchen or even Jason Kipnis.
As Edwards points out, the player has more incentive to sign this deal when offered early like in the case of Polanco.
There are two "worst" case scenarios for Polanco, depending on how you look at it. Both scenarios are pretty appealing. Either (a) Polanco gets hurt or gets bad (the worst) and he gets $35 million despite failing to deliver on his promise or (b) Polanco plays very well, Pittsburgh exercises his options and his free agency is delayed three years (the "worst") and Polanco heads to free agency with $60 million having just finished his age-31 season.
So would Realmuto be worth a look like Yelich? Not as of yet, and of course, everything is dependent on price. Realmuto needs to show he can at least frame pitches more effectively than last season, and he probably does need to flash some of that strong swing he showed off in Double-A a few years ago. In particular, Marlins fans and front office should be watching how Realmuto develops in terms of plate discipline, because part of what made his 2014 Double-A year impressive was his nice strikeout and walk numbers. His 9.7 percent walk rate was good given his 13 percent strikeout, and he consistently posted average walk numbers in those years. How his patience or hitting ability develops to improve his on-base rate will be telling.
However, Realmuto is the only candidate for such an extension, and that in and of itself is a problem for the Marlins. The team has control over several of its position talents, but perhaps only for a few more seasons at that. The farm has been whittled down recently, so less talent is coming up the pipelines. The near future may be a tough road to handle for the Fish.