Former players and what their salaries would be in today's game?

The Tariff King

The Tariff King

Trade War Deadline Winner
Staff member
Because of the huge inflation of player salaries with the new TV deals, guys like Jacoby Ellsbury are getting bigger contracts than Chipper or Andruw ever got close to.

Just curious, what do you think former players from 15 years ago in their primes would've gotten in this market if they hit free agency?

Prime Greg Maddux - $25 million
Prime Tom Glavine - $18 million
Prime John Smoltz (starter) - $20 million
John Smoltz (closer) - $15 million
Prime Pedro Martinez (Boston) - $27 million
Prime Randy Johnson - $26 million (lefties always seem to get just a little bit less)
Prime Ken Griffey Jr. - $30 million
Prime Sammy Sosa - $32 million
Prime Mark McGwire - $33 million
Barry Bonds V2.0 (early 2000's) - $35 million
Prime Jeff Bagwell - $25 million
Prime Curt Schilling (Philly-AZ) - $16 million
Prime Tony Gwynn - $22 million
 
Maddux would get more because I think there would be no fear of injury with him.
 
Imagine prime Babe Ruth in the AL where he could pitch and DH? The negotiation would be something like this:

Yankees: "How much do you want?"
Babe's Agent: "How much have you got? By "you," I mean the whole state of New York."
 
Sosa and Big Mac wouldn't get 30+ million. Arod is still the highest annually at 27.5. That kind of contract or highest is going to be reserved for a big time hitter that can also do other things extremely well like field and run. They would both get mid 20's though. The only two position players from our era that would sniff 30+ would be Griffey and Bonds. And thats Bonds as he was leaving Pittsburgh not the one that used the needle.

As far as pitchers go. I think both prime Maddux and Pedro would get deals that surpassed Verlanders and not Johnson. When they started being elite they were at a young enough age to justify a monster cotract while it took Johnso awhile to reach that level.

But that's the thing with those contracts. To truly get the monster deals you have to have been good enough and a certain age to really get them. If Pujols was 5 years younger when he hit FA he would of rivaled Arods deal. etc.
 
Zack Greinke is getting $25m a year, and he certainly isn't in the Maddux/Pedro/Johnson class. He's not even in Schilling's class. I think you've got a good number of these guys pretty underpaid.
 
Metaphysicist said:
Zack Greinke is getting $25m a year, and he certainly isn't in the Maddux/Pedro/Johnson class. He's not even in Schilling's class. I think you've got a good number of these guys pretty underpaid.
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Greinke got 25m a year from arguably the only team willing to give him that much.

Kind of like how the Yankees inflated salaries in the early 2000's.
 
Metaphysicist said:
This is true for basically anyone who signs any free agent contract.
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I suppose so.

I don't think any other team was willing to give Greinke 20 million much less 25. With Cano, there were factors of taxes in Washington vs. New York, and years not so much yearly.

I mean Hudson would've stayed with us if we gave him another year guaranteed, but we didn't. Yeah the extra year the Giants gave him was more money, but I think if we gave him 2 years and less money he would've taken it (probably because of taxes too).
 
Maddux is almost certainly in his Prime over 25M. Verlander is over 25M, and Maddux when he signed his last contract with the Braves was then the highest paid pitche rin baseball.
 
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