Written by Guest Contributor – Abraham Frohman

Einstein said that “the definition of insanity was doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”. With the announcement of Miguel Cabrera’s outrageously large 8 year extension yesterday, it appears the owners and GM’s of Major League Baseball continue to look for the “10 year deal that works”. Under the terms of the deal, Cabrera will make as much money as it cost Detroit to build the palace in which he plays. He will make over $49,000 PER AT-BAT over the next decade in a state where the median household income is closer to $48,000. Miguel Cabrera is the best pure hitter of my generation, and might be one of the greats of all time. I can’t blame the Tigers for wanting to keep their shining star, but let’s be honest they are paying $300 million dollars for 4-5 productive years and are praying he won’t be a total liability by the end. If anyone has the ability to still be productive in the twilight of his career, it’s probably him, but unfortunately I believe that this will be just another in the long line of massive, bloated contracts doled out to superstars in their 30’s that will become unbearable dead weight by the end of it, dragging down the very franchises they were the face of for years.

Cabrera’s deal is just the latest record-breaking contract in a long history of deal in which players got paid “what the market is willing to bear”, regardless of common sense. There are plenty of other examples just from recent memory of these misguided deals. The 8-year, $136M deal the Cubs made for Soriano continues to choke the payroll of that club, as does the massive deal the Angels gave to Albert Pujols. This off-season saw mega deals for Robinson Cano, Shin Soo Choo, and Jacoby Ellsbury, not a single contract I would want on my books if I were a GM. I just don’t understand how you can justify this kind of money to guys who either will be far past their prime during the most expensive years, or will never again reach the stats and performance levels that helped them land such lucrative paydays.

For me, the worst contract of all time, but one of the great stories, is still the deal that Bobby Bonilla made with the Mets in 1999. On July 1^st, 2013 the NY Mets paid Bonilla $1.2 million, which was more than any other outfielder on the team… pretty remarkable since Bobby hasn’t swung a bat in 10 years!   How did this come to be, you ask? Bobby Bonilla was a 6-time all-star, 3x silver slugger, and member of the 1997 Marlins championship team. He was brought to NY in the twilight of his career under a multi-year $29 million dollar contract. Unfortunately time caught up with Bobby, and his Mets career was largely a disappointment. By 1999, with one year left on his deal, the Mets were looking to part ways with Bonilla, who had become a clubhouse cancer, however they still owed him $5.9 Million on his contract. In probably the most genius, forward-thinking agreements in sports history, Bonilla and his agents offered the Mets a unique compromise. The Mets would release Bobby, and they would delay payment on that last $5.9 million for 11 years with interest. In essence, The Mets agreed to pay Bobby a total of $29.8 million (instead of $5.9 million) in 25 annual installments of $1.2 million starting in the year 2011.

That was my first experience with the weird world of MLB contracts and aging superstars. Based on the last few years, it doesn’t seem like this crazy train is going to stop any time soon. In Cabrera’s case, if the Tigers hadn’t given him this kind of money, there would be plenty of other suitors who would have. I expect similar for Mike Trout when he comes up for contract renewal. My hope is that at some point owners and GM’s will just say “no” to these kinds of deals, and common sense and economics will win out…but for now, guess your favorite teams will have to PAY to PLAY.