Rays, Longoria reach deal - 9 years, $44-million

Tampa Bay Rays third baseman Evan Longoria, left, and Andrew Friedman, Rays executive vice president for baseball operations, answer reporters' questions at a Tropicana Field news conference today after announcing Longoria's new contract. [SCOTT KEELER | Times]

Update, 2:36 p.m.:
Longoria's salary starts at $500,000 this season and maxes out at $11.5-million in his ninth season if the Rays pick up the option. The breakdown:
2008 - $500,000
2009 - $550,000
2010 - $950,000
2011 - $2-million
2012 - $4.5-million
2013 - $6-million
2014 - $7.5-million or $3-million buyout
2015 - $11-million or $1-million buyout of two-year option.
2016 - $11.5-million
Longoria will also donate up to $725,000 during the contract to the Rays Baseball Foundation.

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The Rays have signed 3B Evan Longoria to a long-term deal that could be worth more than $44-million over nine years. The first six years are guaranteed for $17.5-million ($14.5-million in salary and a $3-million buyout on the first option) and the Rays hold a one-year option for 2014 and a two-year option for 2015-16, when Longoria would likely be a free agent for the first time.

"This signing further signifies our commitment to developing and retaining the nucleus that we have in place and reaching our ultimate goal of winning a championship,'' Rays executive vice president Andrew Friedman said at a 1 p.m. press conference at Tropicana Field. "And we feel like Evan is the kind of player and person that can help lead us to that goal.''

Longoria, 22, is considered among the game's elite prospects. He was called up last weekend, and has played just six major-league games, hitting .300. The deal is unusual, if not unprecedented, for a player with such little major-league experience, but Rays officials said it was in place and would have been announced even if he had not been called up from Triple-A.

There were questions raised when Longoria was sent to the minors during spring training if the Rays were more concerned with his arbitration or free-agency eligibilty, but they said at the time those were non-issues because they planned to pursue a long-term deal with him at some point.

"I'm really excited to be part of what's going on here,'' Longoria said.

Longoria, as other players in his situation, opted for the security of the long-term deal in exchange for the potential to earn more money in the future, especially during his arbitration-eligible seasons.
"Obviously that comes into the question, at the same time it's fair for what's going on right now,'' Longoria said. "If I want to play in a place that I enjoy, I'm willing to take whatever that little price cut or whatever to play somewhere I enjoy.''

The Rays are guaranteeing $17.5-million to a player who two years ago at this time was still in college and a week ago was in the minors. As for the risk? "Obviously with a guy that has seven days of (major-league) service, (it's) performance,''  Friedman said. "But, again, we believe in Evan as a person and as a player or we wouldn't do this.''

Comments

[cw]

"Major Announcement"? My only hope is that Friedman finally comes to his senses and cans our clown of a manager who can't seem to teach fundamentals (throwing to the correct base, plate discipline, bunting, stealing bases, etc.) to our young players.

[CharlieRay]

I heard that there is a deal with Bonds brewing also. I'm not sure that's good or bad?

[Dave]

Seriously? I'm as optimistic about Longoria's future as anyone, but come on, he hasn't proven anything in the major leagues yet. Can't the Rays at least wait until he has a good season or two before giving him a huge contract? What's the rush? This sets a dangerous precedent...

[Gene]

CW, take a Zanax and relax! Yes, your points have some validity, but something does not happen just because you want it to! BJ is still young and thinks he can make every throw. Remember that he has only one year total CF experience. As much as it aggrevates me, I'll keep his bat in the lineup and hope that the veterans in the clubhouse will have an effect. This team has had so many MAJOR needs for so long, like getting players with EL's skills, that they have not had the luxury of game subtlties. They have come further in Joe's two plus years than at any other time in club history.

[Dennis]

I can't understand why someone would write, "why pay him now", the same with Shields. These are calculated risks, but if they waited with Carl Crawford a few years back, they might not have been able to sign him when the time came. Locking them up when they are young guarantees your cost between now and then. If Longoria win ROY and a batting title, it won't matter, his price will be fixed. Wake up and see that this is a good thing, good players under managable contracts is something the Yankess wished they had with A-Rod. Is he really worth ALL OF THE RAYS (almost)? That is the type of cost uncertainty that the Rays have to guard against unless you want any player you loved watching gorw with this team leave for a huge contract with NY or Boston. In 6 years, this could be the best 17 million ever spent, and while it is hard for the lay person to say 17 million over 6 years, it is less than 3 million per year, who would you trade for right now that plays 3rd base and makes less than 3 million per year, I have not researched it, but I would guess such a player does not exist and if they did, you could not trade for them becuase the team that has them thinks they are getting a huge bargain.

[Amanda]

CharlieRay-
General consensus is that the Bonds rumor is total B.S.

[Hollow Man]

Hey! That’s not fair... where’s BJ's long-term deal?

[Bill]

Why are Baseball stories always front page news at the St Pete Times? How many people care that much about this boring sport that costs us all so much.
If you don't think it hits your wallet consider the cost added to products for huge adverting endorsements. And how about the taxpayer supported stadiums and other facilities. I sometimes wonder what business interest the SPT has in all this.

I think of professional sports as show business. Nothing more.

[Shango Wango]

Amanda -

Aren't you that paralegal that spends all her time badgering people who support the new stadium?

If so I think you should buy one of those shirts from the link in comment #2.

[Shango Wango]

Hey Bill -

Here's an idea...Take your dirty Birks and get the hell out of town. People like you make me vomit. You probably spend Saturday mornings rain dancing with the Uhurus...errrrrrrr I mean selling eggs.

You're everything that's wrong with this city and with every city for that matter. Go braid hemp somewhere else.

[LP]

Now let's just hope he doesn't subscribe to the Josh Hamilton Prospect Newsletter!!

[ben]

good for Evan. congrats to him. Dang, I thought major announcement was they were firing Merlot Joe Maddon.

[Scot]

I am glad to see the rays are doing things to build for the future of the club,and trying to make the team a more competative team on a consistant basis.

[Pete]

Well put, Dennis. The Rays, Marlins, Pirates, and Royals are in the same boat. The Marlins, for instance, had absolutely no chance of signing Miguel Cabrera to a long-term deal, so they little choice but to trade him for prospects. If the Rays had not locked up Longoria, and if he had performed like a star, then he would have been shipped off for prospects as his artibration-eligible years approached.

Is there risk? Yes. There is always a risk when we're talking about this amount of money to a young, unproven talent. I'm glad the Rays are taking this risk. Better to lock up a young 3B with superstar potential than spend the same kind of money on a veteran 3B retread like Joe Crede or Brandon Inge.

[Amanda]

Shango Wango-
Nope, not me; I'm a USF St. Pete student. Different Amanda, I guess.

[Brad]

Wonder what this means for Kazmir.

[Amanda (NOT the paralegal)]

Bill-
It's called "breaking news". If you can't grasp that, it means news that just "broke", or was announced. Am I going to fast for you? Good. Now you see, what newspapers do is announce the news. It's kind of even in their name. Therefore, if there is news that just happened, especially in the immediate area, it's the job of such a publication to announce the news. I hope that wasn't all over your head.

Secondly, how does a company paying the Rays to advertise cost me? I don't see how it does. Maybe you can explain this to me, and we'll have an old-fashioned teach-in. If you don't want to spend your money on Rays tickets or merchandise, then don't. It's really that simple, Bill, and then the advertising beasts won't hit you at all.

Third, baseball has been known for decades as "The American Pastime". I think that should answer your question as to how many people care. The answer: a whole heck of a lot.

Finally, take a course on grammar and punctuation. If you're going to make ridiculous posts for the sake of seeing your own words in print, maybe you should figure out where a question mark or period belongs in a sentence.

[chux2]

Amanda,
It's too fast.

[Brian]

I love it. This guy is going to be an All-Star very soon and will anchor our line up for years to come!

[Amanda]

I love the irony. I call someone out on the grammar, and make a typo in my spelling. First it said "tooo fast" (the "o" on my keyboard sticks), so I tried to fix it, and somehow managed to change it to "to". Brilliant. I'll have some humble pie, please.

[jb]

This is another attempt to get the New Stadium. They have to show that they are trying to win... What is funny is they sent him down to start the year and then realized they made a huge mistake..

Dont fall for the New Stadium BS Get some wins and get out of the CELLAR FIRST

[Rex]

Dear Rays Haters - MOVE AWAY.

Take you and your pathetic life and go back to where you came from.

Please - I'm begging. You're the type that whines about the beaches being too sandy, or the sunset too bright, etc, etc. Move or stay home and complain to your pets. Your only friend. Poor lil guy.

[Bodog]

@ CW - let me ask you a question.....Did you ever play any level of baseball....If you didn't, then you should know that fundamentals, bunting, throwing to correct base, stealing, plate descipline, and whatever else - these fundamentals are taught from sandlot, whiffle ball, little league, pony league, high school, instructional leagues, A, AA, AAA, so at what point does this player(and you)not comprehend that when a player hits the BIGS these fundamental should ALREADY be in place, granted there are players that are more fundamentally sound than others. Maddon's responsibility at this level is NOT to teach a MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL PLAYER fundamentals. When you look at it, I now wonder if these are reasons certain young ball players,IE: Upton, Young, and Dukes, were held back in AAA ball before finally being called up.....Talented but fundamentally unsound as well as immature lil bastards. Get with it man, if BJ or any other Major League ball players needs to be taught how to bunt, steal, throw to the right base, plate discipline, he should be sent back to the minors and those fundamentals drilled into his head. Mind you, certain players on the team have the green lite to do what they please, swing away, steal, but it doesn't negate the fact that he should play SMART in certain situations. By the way, the Longoria move was outstanding. If Friedman wants to show me something, let him toss out the finally two options(2009 / 2010) years of Crawford's contract sign him to a new deal, sign BJ and Kaz to long term deals.

[Carsvin]

I think they signed him to a long term deal so soon because he is the new ownership groups first prospect to make it. He is the hope of the new group, not BJ or Kaz

[Sean]

Solid move by Rays management IMO. They need to lock up guys like Longoria, Upton, Crawford, Shields, Kazmir, Pena, Niemann, and Price for the long term.

This team is starting to remind me of the 1975-1985 KC Royals with their commitment to youth. For those unfamilar, those Royals teams were perenially in the playoffs and played in two World Series (winning one).

As for those upset with Joe Maddon, I disagree with you. Joe's the perfect person to work with these young kids. Are they going to make mistakes? Absolutely. As someone pointed out, Upton's in his second full season as a CF - he's still learning the position. Yet he's hitting over .300 (again). Give it another year or two and he'll be an all-star. I just hope the Rays can sign him like they did Longoria.

Go Rays!

[mlm]

This is fantastic news.
By the way, the best thing that can happen to the Rays is to get to .500 and have the St. Pete voters regect a stadium plan. That way all of us in Tampa can see Crawford, Upton, and Longoria lead the Rays to a pennant at Al Lopez Park in Channelside. St. Pete can go back to being a minor league city. Your choice.

[cw]

Hey Bocat-

Not sure if you've followed managerial firings over the last several years, but managers loose their jobs when fundamentals aren't executed by the players on the field.

[Woobie]

I'm all for keeping younger players, but this is ridiculous. Insane even.

I think Longoria will live up to hype, but pay him ONCE he realizes it. As Dave said earlier in the thread, this sets a dangerous precedent.

[calmer than you are]

jb,

so, we shouldn't support the team signing top prospects to long-term deals because they're just doing it to try to win so that people will support the stadium? maybe. but then you say we shouldn't support the new stadium until the team starts to win. and then i went back and read your first sentence. and that's when i realized that you are insane.

[the 6-4-3]

This is great, but maybe premature? I just posted the story on my blog and would love to get some comments like these on the main stage.
http://the6-4-3.mlblogs.com

[Sean]

Woobie, why is it dangerous to sign their top prospect who is now in the bigs and hitting .300 (albeit very early in the year) to a bargain 6-year contract? $17M over 6 years is a huge bargain for a player of Longoria's ability.

If I'm Rays' management I'd do that contract every day of the week and twice on Sunday.

IMO the dangerous thing would have been to wait and see him win ROY and then not be able to sign him for less than $25M over those same 6 years.

[Kipp]

Some of you guys are so whiny! This is a good thing, accept it.

[Jimbo]

This is a great signing. He's a freakin' witch with the glove at the corner. I thought moving Aki was a risk as he showed an excellent glove there too...but only 6 games in and you see why it was Aki that was to be moved. Longoria is also showing very good composure and confidence at the plate showing a .417 OBP to go along with that potential 25-30 homer/90 rbi potential that we possibly could see this year. He looks like a 4 year vet out there.

This is a good thing people. The numbers will speak for themselves and the Rays will have saved millions by doing this now.

Now...let's get a couple more pieces locked up.

[Craig]

Wow the same five people are all over the comments section whining about the Rays again. And water is wet.

This will prove to be a smart move down the road... no point trying to convince anyone. The true fans get it, and the rest just need something to cry about. So everyone is happy.

[Bodog]

Hey Clueless (CW) managers lose their jobs because of lack of winning, not because of fundamental not being taught at the Major League level. One exception (Joe Torre). Name me one baseball coach that lost his job because of lack of player fundamentals.

[phenomenal smith]

jb,

There was a reason for keeping Evan in the minors for the first couple weeks; it was to keep his service time down and delay his free agency status for another whole year. They didn't "realized they made a huge mistake." They knew exactly what they were doing. This contract makes it a non-issue now but they had every intention of bringing him up as soon as they got the extra year of his service time.

Also, it is not the manager's job to teach "fundamentals" to the players. If the players already didn't know the fundamentals, they wouldn't be in the big leagues in the first place. The Rays are a young team and as such, are still prone to the occasional bonehead play. If Carlos Pena has gotten this far in the game and hasn't learned how to bunt, well, then, Joe sure can't help him.

[Bodog]

@6-4-3, I was on your blog earlier this morning, read some of your stuff and it was great, however; my friend, I will disagree with you on Longy's signing being premature. As a matter of fact, I'm totally AMAZED that they got him to sign. WOW! This is a win win situation for the Rays as well as Longy.....Guaranteed money for the first six years. If you look at the breakdown of the first six years and monies paid, Rays management is stealing. I think to a man (or woman) we all agree that the potential of Longy is off the charts and they're getting that potential for little or nothing at this stage of his career. They got balls!

[phenomenal smith]

Absolutely, Bodog, and it's a great deal for Longy, too. If he falls down the stairs tomorrow, he'll still be a millionaire 17 times over.

[Brent]

Great Move and Go Rays....

[Bodog]

@PS.....Outstanding, I'm liking Stu and his boys from Wall Street more and more each day. I think these guys got something going on. You stadium haters - WE are gonna get that waterfront stadium.

[Joe DiMaio]

From a management standpoint this is a coup. If he's a fraction of his hype this
will be a true bargain.

Joe
http://fantasyplayersedge.blogspot.com

[Scott]

Yes, yes, and yes!! Super-smart move by the Rays.

[Dave]

Great signing by the Rays. This kid will be amazining. Also, just for the record Longoria's nickname by the team is Longo, not Longy.

[Russ]

I'm not certain on MLB. If he gets injured tomorrow and can't play ever again, is his money guaranteed? What if they release him?

[CGT]

Amanda,

Did you go to PHUHS?

[Tuck]

"Bodog" "Bodog" "Bodog", all of these comments, except for the topic I want you to address.

Remember when the Rays sent Longoria down to AAA to start the season? I wrote that he needed more seasoning, and that it wasn't a money issue because the Rays would sign him to a long-term deal well before 2012.

Andrew Friedman actually said that they would sign him to a long-term deal before it was an issue; the SPT printed his comments; and I actually pasted them into my comments in parenthesis.

Remember how you suggested that I was naive and that you had some Everglade property that you wanted to sell me?

Well, Gary Shelton was an idiot for suggesting that money was an issue - particularly given the Rays history of locking up young talent.

And you my friend were closed-minded, naive, and dense for believing what you read. Sometimes it's best to actually think for yourself. Contemplate about that next time before you criticize someone else’s beliefs and intelligence.

[chux2]

Dear Rex,
And some more whining for you:
1. Why did they drop Devil from the name?
2. Rays of sunshine--barf. Too cutesy, let's put little stars and teddy bears, and flowers on the unis also.
3. I liked the old unis, colors, logos better.
4. And Jason Bartlett is better than Harris in what way? Oh well, he makes 50 per cent of the plays.
5. Young is a real jerk, but he also has potential close to Griffey or Bonds. Should have gotten much more. That of of Crawford, Upton, and Young had unlimited potential.
6. Bill Evers was the man the Rays needed. He was so close, they couldn't see him.
7. New ball park is a royal shafting for St. Pete and P. County.
8. Trop has 20 years left on lease?
should make them honor 19 years.
9. New park will turn downtown in to Utopia? Just like Trop did for Central Ave? Good, in 20 years, then we can build a new park on 20th. Ave. South to revitalize that area.
10. I guess some people haven't heard there is an economic downturn? I can list about 10 ways to spend all that money.
11. Oh, that's right, there will be no cost to taxpayers. Read Rick Baker's lips.

[jb]

Now the Rays are asking the County and us the Tax payers to help with the New Stadium.. Just like
I said these New Owners would.. They will take you guys to the cleaners.. They are liars and Losers

[Silent Majority]

Why not just put Tampa Bay back on the road uniforms as the major announcement?!

[Amanda]

CGT-
I was invited to PHUHS for IB, but no, I opted for CHS.

[Bodog]

@Tuck, The dog will admit that you were right on with the Rays signing Longo to a long term contract, but Tuck - you must admit the signing did come out of no-where. I don't think anyone in baseball world saw a signing 6 - 7 days after being called up. Gotta give it to Stu and his boys. Good call Tuck.

[Sky]

The base deal boils down to $6MM per year for three arbitration years. League-average players will get that much money. Odds are that Longoria is better than league-average.

The three option years average $10MM per year, $11MM if Longoria's an MVP candidate. Would you pay that much for his potential? It's a no-brainer. If he's not worth the money, then you don't pick up the options. On the reasonable chance Longoria is a stud, you're saving $10-15MM per year (2015 salaries will be much higher than they are today).

If the Rays had waited a year or two, the price would have gone way up. The only motivation for Longoria to sign a deal this cheap is that his family is now guaranteed $17.5MM. That money is worth more than the next $50MM he might make. Great signing for the Rays.

[Doc’s Sports Picks Guru]

Longoria is just loaded with talent. I watched several of his first games up with the Rays and I liked what I saw. Patient at the plate, but he can distribute the ball all over the field with average and power.

[JH]

I'm planning to not only vote yes for a new stadium, but I'm also going to give the Rays my hard earned cash for season tickets when we're finally playing under the beautiful 95 degree Florida sun. You see, I support my local teams with whatever they need. The Bucs needed a world class stadium and not for just themselves but for fans of Tampa Bay. Ray Jay is a great place for fans to watch all sports. The Bolts needed to get away from "The Dump of St. Pete" and now they too have a world class arena to call home. Unfortunetly the people of St. Pete are more worried about museums and parking than giving thier only major sports attraction left an up to date facility. It's thier own damn faults they built a terrible stadium that sat dormit and nonprofitable for so many years and now that it's even more obsolete, they need not to make the people of The Bay Area (Hills, Pasco, Manatee, Sarasota and Polk) that didn't vote for that dump to be built in the first place suffer anymore and either build us a new park or allow them to follow the Lightning and Storm to Tampa where the people care more about thier local sports than they do "art" from Salvador Dali.