Think of Giancarlo Stanton when it comes to trading Nolan Arenado.
The Rockies have again entered into talks with the Cardinals over the third man deal, as Ken Rosenthal first reported on The Athletic.
There are so many obstacles to completing these types of transactions, magnified by the financial uncertainty caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Among other things, this led to the NL Central being in an almost group of talent dumps in which players like Josh Bell, Yu Darvish, Raisel Iglesias, Jon Lester, Joe Musgrove, Jose Quintana, Kyle Schwarber, Jameson Taillon and probably soon Trevor Bauer will be on leaves. On Thursday, the Cardinals agreed to retain Adam Wainwright on a $ 8 million one-year contract. Does not sound like much. But at the moment, it was four times more than the rest of the division spent jointly on independent agencies before Joc Pederson agreed with the Cubs for one year and about $ 5 million on Friday.
So St. Louis decides that if the rest of the division withdraws, then the long-term risk will be on Arenado? The division could have been won without him.
But let’s pretend we are at a time when teams actually care about improvement. In this scenario, a blueprint exists for this type of trade and the Cardinals and Arenado’s agent is aware of it.
Joel Wolfe is the agent for both Arenado and Stanton. After the 2017 season, the Cardinals reached an agreement with the Marlins for Stanton, which relied on a no-trade clause. Stanton’s preference was to come to his hometown of Dodgers, but that was fine with the Yankees. Arenado would also like to come to his hometown of Dodgers, but he will be fine with the Cardinals.
Stanton signed a $ 325 million 13-year contract with the team that drafted him in the second round (Marlins). Arenado signed a $ 260 million, eight-year deal with the team that drafted him in the second round (Rockies). Both have committed themselves in the long run to the franchise promising to spend it to win the now-paid stars. But both were smart enough to know that this was not the history of the organization. So it could not have been more surprising if it had not happened. However, the players could not refuse the kind of guaranteed money, despite the history of the franchise. So these deals had the feel of an NBA situation in which the star takes the guaranteed money and then forces him out of town if he gets frustrated with the organization (did you notice James Harden in Brooklyn, for example?).
Stanton had ten years and $ 295 million left. The Marlins were desperate to offset as much of his salary as possible. Therefore, they agreed to tackle Starlin Castro for the remaining two years for $ 22 million, to eat $ 30 million if Stanton did not call his opt-out after the 2020 campaign and two prospects for the lottery ticket far from the majors. accepted.
In all, the Yanks saved $ 52 million. The equivalent would be for the Cardinals to save about $ 35 million over the six years at $ 199 million to Arenado. This is of course just a guideline. Stanton was coming off an MVP season but had less defensive value and another ten years ahead. Arenado is playing at 30 in 2021, but is recovering from his worst season and a shoulder injury. However, he remains one of the best defensive third basemen ever and finishes from 2015 to 2019 top eight for NL MVP.
The Cardinals have many Castro-like contracts to make a settlement. Miles Mikolas (three years at $ 47.25 million), Matt Carpenter (one year, $ 20.5 million) and Dexter Fowler (one year, $ 14.5 million) all have no trading terms to waive. Carlos Martinez (one year, $ 12 million) and Andrew Miller (one year, $ 12 million), but will receive a $ 1 million allocation bonus. Any of these, separately or together, offer a down payment on Arenado.
The Rockies can in theory do what the Red Sox only did by entering into most of Adam Ottavino’s contract to gain access to the prospective Frank German. Colorado can accept more contracts or eat more dollars to gain access to better prospects. The Cardinals, for example, could trade around one of the better prospects in the third base of the match, also coincidentally with the first name Nolan – Nolan Gorman.
Arenado can no longer perform after the 2021 season, but will likely push it back to facilitate a trade. If so, the Rockies could agree to eat a portion of the deal – as with Stanton – if the opt-out is not activated.