How will the Albert Pujols situation play out?

#2 or 4

#2

#5 seems impossible.

i'd give 0% chance to #3 and 10% chance to #5 at this point

I don't know how, but I say he ends up staying. I see Pujols as a Ripken/Jeter type, playing out his career in St. Louis.

I want to see Albert stay with StL but I cant see them paying him 30 million a year for his age 41 season.

My gut says #4.

He'll end up on any of the NY/LA/CHI teams (maybe DET?). St. Louis won't pay up.

Could totally see him staying in the midwest.

i don't think any team with a good 1B under contract already will be offering him more than STL can

I'm kinda envious of the naivety of you guys that think teams will be loyal to their avg/deece/mediocre 1Bs once Pooholes goes on the market...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWlMhiEL9Mc

It's not about loyalty, it's about money.

gotta figure the cards are gonna go as far as they can w/pujols, wasn't reassuring pujols that the cards were serious about building around him for the long term part of the motive behind signing holliday? but anything can happen, even though pujols is from the area. lebron james bailed on his hometown team and maybe pujols will take his talents to motor city or the windy city or brew city?

I voted "He'll enter free agency and re-sign with the Cards"

Yeah I don't see the Yankees eating a large portion of the cost of Teixeira for the next six years just to get a relatively small upgrade w/ Pujols plus four add'l years. Same if Boston signs Gonzalez.

i don't see anyone coughing up a 10 year contract.

i'm not talking about avg/deece/mediocre 1Bs, i'm talking about good ones. i think BOS/NYY/DET/PHI are out of this except for posturing.

they should create an NBA franchise in St Louis and give it to Pujols as payment.

i hope the nats give him 350 over 10

It's not about loyalty, it's about money.

Not gonna lie, I used to think that way (and post tirelessly about it), but last year's profit leaks and then analyses like these made me a non-believer:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703743504575493942146685242.html

this line made me snort:

The No. 5 New York Mets seem to have cornered the market on unthinkable catastrophes.

that is, for East Coasters unaware of the Kansas City Royals

i would say the Mariners are a close 2nd.

(to the Mets)

If the dodgers magically get a new owner within the year I can see the new group wanting to make a splash of an FA signing, but Im not lucky enough to have McCourt removed within the next 10 months.

pujols is gonna be a redskin

I'm kind of rooting for #4 or #5 just for the gossip/high drama possibilities.

i think he'll re-sign w/ the cards in free agency

if he went to the cubs it would be a sports betrayal on the level of lebron ditching cleveland

i bet he ends up taking $25m a year or something ilke that which honestly is reasonable for him

i do believe that you have to overpay your own guys sometimes & really w/ pujols it's about justified, even if you'd be paying him obscene dollars when he's 41

give dirty his money he broke the mcdonalds sign ffs

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3554/3554666126_10a74d67db.jpg

xpost OTM, but this is also where Pujols is making a mistake if he sticks to his deadline, because he could get hurt or have an off year and lose almost all of his leverage. I know he's big on being an honest guy and being serious about this deadline, but if he signs in two weeks time then as soon as the ink is dry then nobody's going to care if he "went back on his word". He's got to know this too -- there's just way too much money at stake.

i don't think him or his agent are that stupid

anyway, could you make the argument that severely overpaying pujols at the end of his career would be, if not justified, then at least acceptable because of how severely underpaid he was at the beginning of his career?

according to fangraphs (via joe po) pujols has been underpaid by about $200m throughout the course of his career, so say they overpay him by $75m... is it considered 'even' value over the long term?

from a moral perspective i guess, but i still wouldnt want to be the team paying out the ass for his declining years

i don't mean morally, i mean economically over the span of his career

no that doesnt make sense then

okay

i do believe that you have to overpay your own guys sometimes & really w/ pujols it's about justified, even if you'd be paying him obscene dollars when he's 41

I made this same point on a thread a few months ago--that with a few select players, you should be prepared to overpay. I don't mean a Vernon Wells situation, where the Jays got way ahead of themselves on a guy who'd had one great year. (I'm second-guessing there, which is always easy, and I understand the Jays were under a certain amount of pressure too at the time.) But you can't overvalue Albert Pujols. Three or four more years of regular Pujols-type performance would, to me, justify the fact that you'll undoubtedly be overpaying him at the back end of the contract.

according to fangraphs (via joe po) pujols has been underpaid by about $200m throughout the course of his career, so say they overpay him by $75m... is it considered 'even' value over the long term?

― J0rdan S., Tuesday, February 15, 2011 1:03 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

that's a bad way to look at it when it's 2 separate contracts. teams aren't looking for 'even value' since you need a yankees-esque payroll to win 95 games if everyone on your roster is being paid even value.

having said that, pujols's current level of performance is worth probably 40mil/year so he could be underpaid for the first few years of the new contract too. in which case yes those savings can be looked at as balancing out some of the overpay on the decline years.

I'm sorry but I don't think the Rays are kept up late at night wondering how they'll make it up to Longoria on his next contract and even everything out.

Fan attrition and long-term viability is weighing on St L management's mind more than foggy notions of even value.

and it just shows how incredible Pujols is that he could generate surplus value in the first few years of an albatross contract

this seems like a reasonably appropriate thread in which to point out that i think the $5mil per win of WAR model that sites like fangraphs like to use to calculate value is incorrect. it shouldn't be linear at all, since there is additional value above the player's value itself of having that much value concentrated into a single roster spot. in fact i'd be willing to believe that pujols and other top players could be fairly valued at close to 50mil for an mvp-level year.

http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lgn5owFnom1qbrp7ao1_500.jpg

Pujols is so going to go to fat the moment he retires.

There`s also the value of `marginal wins added`, where an eight win player on a 90 win team that barely makes the playoffs is more valuable than the same player on a 70 win team or even a 100 win team that easily makes the playoffs. Since there doesn`t appear to a dominant team emerging in the NL Central in the next few years, then the Cards have to believe they can be in the pennant race almost every year, and Pujols can mean the difference between making and missing the playoffs in each of those years.

Rosenthal writes the single dumbest thing Ive read all day:

http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/Albert-Pujols-St-Louis-Cardinals-Mark-Teixeira-Ryan-Howard-speculation-021511

How can we get Pujols on the east coast? Clearly it is his destiny.

I don't think that's that dumb! I can see something like that happen very easily...

that is really stupid

tex would never consent to that trade & i hope to lord that the cardinals would not be stupid enough to acquire ryan howard for any reason

i would love to throw san fran's name in there as a potential trade partner tho i guess brandon belt is sorta cockblocking that for the moment

belt's not blocking anything since he'd be in the trade package

but the chance of pujols being traded is less than the chance of him signing with the royals next offseason, get real

Pujols is great and will probably continue to be really good, but ten years at 300 million dollars for a player that is 31 is freaking insane and I just don't see any club that will pony that out. Yanks and Red Sox are bought in on big dollar first basemen. Angels could probably afford it, but that owner seems to go cheap on the good player and then overspends on the middling ones. Mets and Dodgers finances are a wreck. Astros are kind of out of the big money game with the ownership turn over. Texas has shot their wad. It's too big for the White Sox. Cubs can afford it, but I just can't see Albert Pujols going to a club that had people selling t-shirts out front of their stadium that said "Pujols is the name of the guy that mows my lawn."

are there any examples of two elite players at the same position being swapped?

rosenthal's huffing gas.

How much money would another WS be worth to St. Louis?

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

I think for most clubs outside the Yanks, putting that much cash in one guy could end up like the Rangers budget problems with A-rod. You have no room to bring anyone else into add to the club. I think the Cards kind of stretched it bringing in Holiday. I think Cris Carpenter's contract is also up, right? It is either that or he has 1 more year.

St. Louis problem is that they are not seemingly able to re-load at other positions from the minors like they did earlier on in LaRussa's run. LaRussa also seems to be alot more cranky in the media than he used to be. I'm sure making accusations towards the players union is something that will endure him to his club.

St. Louis problem is that they are not seemingly able to re-load at other positions from the minors like they did earlier on in LaRussa's run.

Neyer wrote about the Rangers w/ A-Rod - his contract wasn't the problem with bringing in more talent, it was the other $80mn they were paying to Chan Ho Park, Rusty Greer, etc. and they had no pitching. In 2002, $80mn could buy a pretty good team, given good management, with A-Rod already as your centerpiece.

At least the Cards' big contracts are somewhat productive (or really good, depending).

How can we get Pujols on the east coast? Clearly it is his destiny.

It is his Aura and Destynné

are there any examples of two elite players at the same position being swapped?

It's not quite what you mean, but in '71 the Indians and Giants swapped Sam McDowell for Gaylord Perry. (I thought it was straight-up, but after checking, the Indians also got Frank Duffy.) And there was also the Williams/DiMaggio trade sometime in the '40s that was supposedly completed, then rescinded.

welp

yeah wasnt the williams/dimaggio swap a result of the owners hanging out and getting liquored up? need to get hank steimbrenner and nolan ryan in a room with a bottle of scotch or something.

I think he'll end up going on the free agent market and then resigning with the cards for more than he could get right now, which is probably why he's not signing right now.

The fangraphs post j0rdan linked to upthread made a good point about the value that pujols could add outside ofte field, whether that's a run at the HR record, merchandise, whatever.

but the FO's wasted a lot of time and energy chasing Pedro Felizes and Julio Lugos and Ryan Theriots and Nick Puntos and those acquisitions and TLR's tendency to play them over prospects are what's sinking the team, not the guys from their farm system.

This is so OTM it hurts.

yeah it's sad because the cards' front office is supposedly a stats-friendly one and yet they're probably second behind the royals in acquiring sabermetric-punching-bag players

He'll end up on any of the NY/LA/CHI teams (maybe DET?). St. Louis won't pay up.

― i love you but i have chosen snarkness (Steve Shasta), Monday, February 14, 2011 10:48 AM (2 days ago)

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

wee ken rosenthal is reporting that the cards offered him 'only' $19m - $21m per, which would have made him the ~10th-highest-paid player.

that doesn't seem to be a good opening move if they want to keep him

I imagine a lot of teams are playing wait-and-see with Pujols, secure in the knowledge that Lyle Overbay will again be on the market next year.

He's been the best player in the game for much of his career, how can you even make an offer that isn't the most $/year of any position player? Or even the highest $/year of this offseason?

Cards brass: "We'll offer him Zito money. He can take it or leave it."

wee ken rosenthal is reporting that the cards offered him 'only' $19m - $21m per, which would have made him the ~10th-highest-paid player.

fuuuuuuuck

*1986 action movie voice* "I gotta bad feeling about this.."

honestly, that doesn't seem right to me

that was unsourced right? there's seriously no way that's what they offered him

that's not even mark texeira money!

you have to at least take into consideration that albert's people floated that number to protect him

wait a second, didn't ken fucking rosenthal say something about trading pujols for teixeira or ryan howard?

credibility ruined

kenny r. was a reporting beast a few years back but he may have gone soft

wait a second, didn't ken fucking rosenthal say something about trading pujols for teixeira or ryan howard?

credibility ruined

― you are taking me apart, Lisa! (Z S), Wednesday, February 16, 2011 8:16 PM (1 hour ago)

Wellsies, teh Cards have one year to deal him if he don't wanna stay for Zito money. Imagination abounds at who would rent him for a playoff push...

shasta, when was the last time you weren't wrong about something

cuz you should be warned about how dumb your posts are gonna look like 9 months from now

Ok.

**prepares for wrongness**

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5178/5454295753_843fe547e2.jpg

guy is kind of a tool

kind of?

when i saw that on sportscenter i knew someone on ilx would have something snarky to say about it

this guy... ahaha,,, get this... hes wearing a freaking t-shrit!!!! what a TOOL SHED.

Hey tool, watch this (~4:15): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVDytNil9ww

Restore ~this~.

i blame larussa and his sick influence for that - what a horrible person

from now on i will imagine u with a bic'd head, a chain, and an armani exchange tshirt

Ade don't see nothin wrong...
with a lil GTL

lol dont get it twisted i was chuckling as soon as i saw the AX shirt, but at the same time its just like, whatever

most of ilx is just like whatever!

to be fair i think 1/3 the mlb wears ed hardy shirts and is mulling over a bicep snakepenis tat.

and they're all tools!

wearing an ugly shirt doesnt make u a tool, its whats in ur heart that matters...

Shasta has this weird fixation on Pujols, it goes back to him being the anti Barry Bonds.

"Every summer, Pujols along with his family, teams of doctors, dentists, and physicians visit numerous slums in the Dominican Republic. In the summer of 2009, Pujols and his crew brought hundreds of free, new mattresses to the people that live in some of the poorest places in South America. “Today many of our children have eyeglasses and healthy teeth, thanks to the Pujols. Most of the mothers in their sponsored project not only can show off their beds, but their self esteem is way up high." WHAT A TOOL LOL

Hey, Pujols is older than he sez! TOOL!

damn u guys

100s of mattresses versus shilling for Glenn Beck...

it's kinda a wash.

JKJKJK I'm glad he's doing some good with that <Zito money.

Most of the mothers in their sponsored project not only can show off their beds

filthy prostitutes, have you no shame?

all beds are weaved from glen beck's back hair.

I really don't care what ballplayers are like personally, unless they are willing to sleep with me.

^^^ new board description

When was the last time a franchise lost a player of Pujols caliber to free agency? Bonds going to the Giants?

for something this big you gotta go back to 2000 when the Phils traded Mickey Morandini to Toronto

I had to go back and check, but Maddux signed with the Braves exactly one day after Bonds signed with the Giants. Can you imagine those two guys signing within 24 hours of each other?

"When was the last time a franchise lost a player of Pujols caliber to free agency?"

A-Rod to the Rangers.

I was going to make a thread about Pujols and Fielders free agency, but this one will do. Does anyone think Fielder could get a better deal than Pujols?

Pujols is 31, but there is some doubt about his "real" age, plus he's having a "down" year (WAR shows him worth about as much as Cano), while Fielder is a definite MVP candidate and four years younger. How many teams want to be paying Pujols $25 million a year when he's 40? Only teams like the Yankees/Sox/Cubs could reasonably do that but neither the Yanks nor the Sox really have the need for him right now.

i think the market will be much larger for prince for various reasons

- his age
- he's having a better season
- he's not a great defender so you could make the argument that he should be DHing, thus potentially opening up bidding from the red sox & yankees, who theoretically have roadblocks at first
- this will be first huge contract, so there's a chance that he'd be willing to go to an establishing team like seattle, washington or toronto. i don't think that's true for pujols.

If we throw out the 2011 season, look at this slash line: .312/.394/.561 with 32 HRs. Each one of those numbers are Pujols' WORST BA/OBP/SLG/HR from 2001-2010. He's also a much better 1B. Whereas Fielder has only 3 real elite years (2007, 2009, and this one). Pujols has ALREADY had a Hall of Fame worthy career. So I can see teams going absolutely nuts for him. The Cards especially would love to have another guy to match Stan Musial in their history books. I can definitely see them scrounging up the money to overpay him.

he's not a great defender so you could make the argument that he should be DHing, thus potentially opening up bidding from the red sox & yankees, who theoretically have roadblocks at first

I highly doubt the Yankees or Sox are going to say Fielder a ton of money to DH, you can get good-but-not-great DHs for so much cheaper.

"who gets the bigger contract" would be a very interesting poll imo

also, i wouldn't put anything past the yankees & red sox. w/ the red sox it's obv extremely unlikely seeing as they've given out some massive contracts recently and are saying they're tapped out & on top of it will have to pay ellsbury big money soon. if the yankees go out before the WS this year they could go nuts. you never know, it's the yankees.

and anyway my point is less that the yankees would give prince a $200m deal, but just being in any sort of negotiation w/ him would drive his price up potentially more than it would be w/o them

I can see that but I'm not really sure if that's how the FA market works for huge contracts? I mean Beltran was linked to a dozen teams during the trade deadline but I don't think that really drove up his value. Nothing wrong with the Yankees lineup, they're stacked as it is, no way will they be able to get Fielder for anything close to what he'd actually be worth to them.

For the record, my predictions are Pujols goes to the Cubs if St. Louis doesn't overpay him, and Fielder goes to Toronto.

Fangraphs, Prince vs Pujols, 2007 through 2011:

Prince: .284/.398/.552, WAR: 20.8
Pujols: .322/.423/.605, WAR: 37.2

and that's cherrypicking it to start the range at Prince's huge 2007 season, and including Pujol's relatively poor season this year (and even then, he's among the NL leaders in HR, RBI, runs, slg, obp, etc etc).

I understand the age issue, giving money to a player at his prime vs. nearing the end of it, and so on, but I don't see how their negotiated salaries should even be close.

there's basically no comparing the careers of prince and albert, obviously. albert is one of the greatest hitters ever, bar none. but teams aren't paying for the last 5 years.

Unless you have like a $150m+ payroll. Teams like the Yankees can afford those ridiculous contracts because they can swallow a big loss if a player turns out ineffective later on. Most teams can't. If St. Louis gives him the 10/$300m deal he wants, that could potentially destroy the franchise for 5 years or more. Yes, Pujols has better career numbers and plays good defense - but those extra 4 years (or more) is a HUGE deal.

i don't think he'll get that deal

i think he'll become the highest paid player in the game (which is what i think he wants), but i don't think he'll hit $300, and i don't think he'll get 10 years

I doubt he'll get more than Tex got.

that's what he was aiming for before this season though, wasn't it?

i think his justification was that the Cards kind of "owed" him more for putting up so much WAR, so they should "do the right thing" and pay him extra for his past service or something really stupid like that.

maybe... 8/230? idk, come to think of it he might not be able to beat a rod

there's no way he sees under $200 unless he decides to give STL a huge discount

2 years, 200 million dollars

I doubt he'll do that. He may work something out with STL w/r/t deferred payments or whatever because I feel like he *wants* to stay. Cubs are also prime candidates for massive overpayment.

i think i said this upthread, but pujols to the cubs would be worse than lebron to heat

I can't even imagine a universe where that could happen. Lebron to the Cubs and Albert to the Heat seems more plausible.

me either

can anyone even put together a definitive list of the players for albert?

cardinals, cubs...? the only other few i can think of are the rangers & the angels

the interesting little sub plot to me is if it becomes clear that the cardinals are price out of the pujols race & instead turn their attentions to prince

The Dodgers *could* get Pujols/Fielder if they could get the team sold. Definitely a match in terms of needing a bat and not having anyone at first worth anything.

true, but that seems so far-fetched at the moment

As for the Rangers, I like Mitch Moreland.

The Angels have a lot of bad contracts on the books but at least they can buy out Kazmir.

Fielder to the Cubs seems really bad

Maybe the Nats? They seem like they could spend a bunch of money and definitely feel like they could be contenders in 2-3 years.

well there are tons of teams in contention for prince -- i think that albert will prob take the best balance of cash & chance to win. i don't see him pulling an a-rod to the rangers -- prince is a different story

mitch moreland is pretty good but he's no albert pujols

dodgers with a new owner IS a perfect fit, but will never happen. =(

the frank mccourt litigation deathmarch will only be halfway done by next december.

mitch moreland is pretty good but he's no albert pujols

Of course not, but he is young, good, and costs basically nothing. And it's not like they are dying for more offense.

Fielder or Albert to the NL East would make me sad.

The Yankees and Red Sox are paying about $300M combined for their first basemen, there's no way they sign either of these guys.

What about: the Baltimore Orioles.

well Prince would be re-united with his old buddy JJ Hardy

prince signing w/ the blue jays is incredibly tantalizing. for one that team would be fucking amazing, secondly bcuz it sets him up easily to have a papi-like transition into DH

Also, I do think there's a non-zero chance that he re-signs with the Brewers, considering that he really, genuinely seems to love playing there, his family likes it there, and if they win the WS they could scrounge up the money to pay him. I don't know if Fielders going to necessarily want the most money possible and I'd think playing with Braun and Weeks (who was his friend since he was a kid!) is worth something to the man.

prince signing w/ the blue jays is incredibly tantalizing. for one that team would be fucking amazing, secondly bcuz it sets him up easily to have a papi-like transition into DH

That's why I'm thinking it could happen. AA is an amazing GM and could probably broker a good deal for both sides. I think Fielder would enjoy playing in Canada for a team that would likely be huge contenders with him, especially if they add the second wild card. I can only imagine how many walks Bautista and Fielder would amass if they played together.

Also, I do think there's a non-zero chance that he re-signs with the Brewers, considering that he really, genuinely seems to love playing there, his family likes it there, and if they win the WS they could scrounge up the money to pay him. I don't know if Fielders going to necessarily want the most money possible and I'd think playing with Braun and Weeks (who was his friend since he was a kid!) is worth something to the man.

― frogbs, Wednesday, August 10, 2011 6:09 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark

all of this is nice, but no way

i think them giving braun a massive extension pretty much for no reason was the final signal that there's no way they get prince

they'd prob be better off signing, like, carlos pena & then trying to keep greinke & gallardo & weeks etc

I think Pujols will retire.

i think them giving braun a massive extension pretty much for no reason was the final signal that there's no way they get prince

they'd prob be better off signing, like, carlos pena & then trying to keep greinke & gallardo & weeks etc

Yeah, they'd probably be better off doing this. I'm not saying it's likely to happen but I'd give it at least, like a 3% chance. The market for superstar 1B really isn't great right now.

Gallardo and Weeks are already signed for the next few years. Grienke would definitely be awesome to lock down especially since he seems to love playing for small market teams and has already said something like "I already have all the money I'll ever need"

if the J's signed Fielder i'd eat my hat...
i'd buy a hat and then eat it.

the guy is everything AA has said he's not interested in. a high-priced and relatively unathletic 1B/DH. it's just not a thing that will happen.