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The Minnesota Twins selected Royce Lewis with the first overall pick in the 2017 Major League Baseball Draft. He was immediately a top-100 prospect, and seen as an athletic freak who would certainly influence the game at whatever level he competed. His road to the big leagues has been winding, but he’s here, and he looks incredible.
Having had a more productive start to his career than almost anyone in history, Lewis is in position to get extremely rich, if he can just stay a little bit more healthy. The Minnesota Twins would love to wrap up his services for the next decade. Lewis will become arbitration-eligible as a Super Two player after this season, and he'll be a free agent in the fall of 2028, after his age-29 season.
Should the Twins approach Lewis and Boras about a contract extension, the discussion would be something in the realm of a 10-year deal. That would take Lewis through his age-35 season and buy out the entirety of his arbitration, as well as six years of free agency. Certainly, that’s not going to come cheap, but they do have some leverage.
Despite making his major-league debut in 2022, Lewis has played a total of just 91 big-league games. Having dealt with multiple ACL injuries, an oblique strain, a hamstring strain, and a significant quad strain, the toll taken on his young frame is considerable. How he ages in that regard remains to be seen, and paying so much, well ahead of time would constitute the Twins buying virtually all of the risk--in exchange for getting his potential value at a significant discount.
Finding a comp for Lewis is difficult. The Arizona Diamondbacks extended Corbin Carroll on an eight-year deal just 32 games into his major-league career, but Carroll is 23 years old. Julio Rodríguez got a 12-year deal last season at 22 years old, but was coming off a Rookie of the Year award. Bobby Witt Jr. signed an 11-year deal this offseason that will pay him $288 million, and he just recently turned 24 years old.
The range of outcomes for Lewis on both years and dollars is vast. Fixing that spectrum of possibilities by agreeing on a single number is tough. We can roughly project what Lewis has a chance to make in arbitration over four seasons; it should come in around $50 million. For six seasons at free-agent rates, you'd expect a player of his caliber to make almost $200 million.
Obviously, the Twins are in no position to hand out a $250-million extension right now, but here's where we factor in the discount Lewis and Boras would have to accept to get a deal done, thereby avoiding the risk that further injury would significantly dampen the superstar's earning potential. Instead of forking over $50 million in the next four years, a deal should see the Twins pay only about $40 million, and over the six years after that, they should be willing to shell out $150 million. That comes out to 10 years and $190 million.
Whether that would move the needle enough for Lewis, or for Boras (who likes to entertain free agency in an effort to maximize earnings), remains to be seen. Aaron Judge debuted late, similarly to Lewis, and has dealt with injuries. He had a substantially greater track record by the time he reached free agency, of course, and his historic 2022 timed out nicely for him, but he inked a nine-year deal worth $360 million to stay in New York. That sort of money is something an extension candidate would be passing up, but they are handed much more certainty at the forefront of their careers.
For now, Lewis continues to make the major-league minimum of $746k in 2024. He can start to truly cash in next year, though, and he did sign for a $6.725 million bonus when drafted. It may be of interest to the talented third baseman to lock down a payday early on and settle in with an organization he has said he loves. Pairing Lewis with Carlos Correa, Byron Buxton, and Pablo López into the future seems like a great plan of attack.
There is a possibility that Lewis intends to bet on himself and his health, and despite being 30 years old when he would hit free agency, a gigantic deal will be out there for any player producing at the pace he has shown thus far. The question is whether he can get to that point healthy enough to merit such a deal.
No matter what, for an ownership group that seems intent on limiting payroll and being cautious into the future, finding every way possible to generate cost control on their greatest assets is a must. Like Buxton before him, Lewis presents a tantalizing possibility to do just that.
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