By Dejan Kovacevic | 12:40 a.m. Thursday
No matter how it was spelled out in the news coverage of Ryan Doumit getting close to an extension and Nate McLouth getting nowhere near one, there will be a misunderstanding. There always is. The email will come about how the Pirates either a) are great for keeping their core players from leaving or b) are too cheap to do the same.
The more grounded view is this: Neither is going anywhere, anyway, barring a trade. At least not for three years.
For those unfamiliar with baseball's economic system, here is the most basic of primers:
1. Your first three full years in the majors, you make however much money the team feels like paying, which usually is at or close to the major league minimum. That was $390,000 this year, but it goes up annually.
2. Your next three years, you are eligible for salary arbitration. If the team tenders you a contract, that means you are guaranteed to get paid something for at least the following year. You and the team can figure that out between yourselves -- which is how most of these get done -- or an independent arbitrator picks either your preferred salary or the one the team thinks you should get.
One way or another, extension or not, the team can tender you like this for each of those three years. Doumit, McLouth and Paul Maholm are just entering this second phase. So, if the Pirates extend them through these three years, they are doing nothing more than setting cost certainty for themselves, guarding against dramatic potential increases in that span. For the players, guaranteed money is the prime benefit.
3. After six years are up -- and that means six full years of actually being on a major league roster, hurt or not -- that is when the player can become a free agent. If Doumit, McLouth and Maholm stay on their current career paths, they can become free agents after the 2011 season.
Linkage to the general coverage ...
Much ground to cover, from the Doumit/McLouth developments to injury updates from Kyle Stark on a couple of prospects to some other stuff.
A couple Pirates topics pop up in the boss' chat.
And from other realms ...
Finally, Rafael Furcal makes up his mind and goes back to the Dodgers. Paul Kinzer, Furcal's agent, has some explaining to do after a crazy week.
Henry Schulman, who covers the Giants for the San Francisco Chronicle, writes that he expects the Pirates to "go hard" after Ty Wigginton. I am told that it might not matter how hard they go. Apparently, Wigginton was not all that thrilled with his time here, players who know him say, and has no wish to return.
Jenifer Langosch of the Pirates' official site writes that management "had its eye" on Ray King in the Dominican. Not independently confirmed.
Charlie Wilmoth at Bucs Dugout had no use for the Q&A answer I gave yesterday about the Jason Bay trade, and I respect his views as much as anyone in the blogosphere. But I do feel compelled to note, before you click over there, that I never once have written that I thought the Bay trade was a good one, regardless of the actual return. Some national outlets and others did express that, as Charlie notes, but I never did.
Pat Lackey at Van Slyke disagrees with me, too, and he uses some statistics to make his point.
Posted
Dec 18 2008, 12:40 AM
by
Dejan Kovacevic