Indians may need to up offer to keep Sabathia
UPDATE (2-5-08; 10:17 AM): Indians General Manager Mark Shapiro has stated that he won’t trade Sabathia before or during the 2008 season, unless the team suffers an early season collapse. If the two teams are unable to reach a deal, the Indians seem to be prepared to take the draft picks as compensation of Sabathia’s departure.
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The Cleveland Plain Dealer reports that the Indians offered C.C. Sabathia a four-year contract extension that was worth between $68 and $72 million in December. The extension would have been added on to his current contract that has one year remaining at $11.25 million, taking the contracts total value to $79.25 to $83.25 million over five seasons.
With recent events, it appears that if the Indians want to keep Sabathia, they’ll have to up that offer as Sabathia is now the premier pitcher on the free agent market in lieu of the Santana trade and extension. Santana is set to make a little over $21.5 million over the next seven seasons, setting the bar for Sabathia and the other starting pitchers next winter. The Indians offer would come in between $15.85 and $16.65 million per year, well under Sabathia’s current market value.
I would suspect that the Indians will have to go over $20 million annually to get Sabathia. He may take less money to stay in Cleveland, but it won’t be something that will cost him somewhere in the neighborhood of $20 to $25 million over the life of his contract.
Filed under: C.C. Sabathia, Cleveland Indians