A Contract That Only Makes Sense on Planet Zito

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A Contract That Only Makes Sense on Planet Zito

 

Barry Zito was just awarded the richest contract ever for a pitcher, 7 years/126 million with incentives that could bring the deal to $144 mil. What the hell? To me, I see Zito as a premium version of Ted Lilly and would pay him accordingly. He is not the best pitcher of all time nor even close to being the best pitcher in the game, so why is he getting this amount of coin?

 

Okay, he is a lefthander. Thats good. What else? His fastball is weak, his strikeout rate is horrendous, he walks a bunch of guys and has a mediocre ERA.  He makes all his starts, I will give him that but he is a finesse guy so he is somewhat expected to.   I think this messes up the Giants because most long term contracts to pitchers end up in shambles. Think Mike Hampton, Kevin Brown and Chan Ho Park.  Terrible signing and I feel a lot better about Vernon’s contract if Zito is getting that kind of money. This is going to have a ripple effect which will make it all that much harder for JP to land any sort of decent arm for the 2007 season.

 

Callum Hughson
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6 replies on “A Contract That Only Makes Sense on Planet Zito”
  1. says: Early

    Good Zito pic. The seven years is the killer in this one I think. Zito, though durable like you said could blow out his arm one day and be useless. Mets wouldn’t give him more than 5 years and thats why it fell apart. Again, I am not worried too much about worth because the G-Men can spend their money on whomever they please. They gave Bonds big money but they also lost their ace Jason Schmidt who signed to be with his old clubhouse trainer.
    Zito going to SF makes sense. He give them instant credibility in a bad division. He will be playing games in pitcher friendly PNC and div rivals in LA and SD also play in pitcher friendly parks this should cut down on his horrendous HR ratio. Even though the Rocks don’t have the offense they used to I still wanna see what happens in his 3 starts at Coors.

  2. says: Kman

    I agree that he’s not worth the coin, so I would have 100% not made this deal if I’m the Giants. But here are some things I do like;

    35 Starts a Season (as you point out)
    HR, fly ball pitcher in tough HR AT & T
    More consistant than Hampton, Chan Ho

    But I do agree with the Ted Lilly+ analogy, to a point. His ERA should drop in NL, but he’s pretty much a 3.25+, 1.30 WHIP kinda guy who can win 16+ every year. Good, but not $18 million a year good. His H/9 increased in 2006, and his BB/9 has gone up in each of the past three seasons. One could argue that he’ll be the second best pitcher on the team after the 2007 season, behind Matt Cain.

  3. says: Callum

    This just in, Zito has a full no-trade clause. That means if he starts to suck, the Giants can’t pawn him off on the Yanks ala Raul Mondesi. Things are different defensively across the Bay as well. Klesko at first, 40y/o Omar Vizquel at short, Barry Bonds in left, Ray Durham at 2B and Dave Roberts in the OF.

  5. says: Jeeves

    I’m already scared to see what next season’s crop gets. Is it possible this season isn’t even the highwater mark when it comes to ridiculous salaries?

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