Detroit Tigers sign prospect Colt Keith to 6 yr deal

[Parfigliano]

https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/39409250/tigers-sign-infield-prospect-colt-keith-6-year-286m-deal

Crazy.

[ashbury]

The player gives up on a speculative possibility of $100M+ career earnings like the big stars get, for a safety net of $28.6M and the potential of $50M+ in addition if that dream of $100M proved viable in terms of his performance.  You'd have to be an extreme "bet on myself" player to turn down that offer, in the hopes of a quarter billion or whatever.  The Tigers for their part guarantee themselves their choice of 9 years if he really pans out, those final years still well below market rate today (to guess nothing about what the market will be then) if he becomes and remains a star  Presumably they really like his intangibles, and feel it's a good gamble on their part.

In the very short term, the Tigers didn't cover 3B well in 2023, so he's their guy in 2024 and a possible long-term answer.

If he busts, the Tigers are "handcuffed" by a mere $5M a year until the contract runs out.  It's not a franchise-altering risk; nor does it get a FO fired if it goes totally bad.  Worst case is barely worse than Randy Dobnak.

Intriguing.

[Mike Sixel]

It's almost a rounding error for the team, especially if salaries keep rising. It's life altering money, with the small risk you give up even MORE MONEY........this seems like a much better deal than the Atlanta players signed, for sure.