MLB Bullets is an Angel forever

From spending the last week or two talking about baseball players who aren’t getting paid to today talking about baseball players who are getting paid.

Since I’ve written this, the MLB season started in Tokyo between the Mariners and Athletics at 4:35 am Chicago Time.

• MIke Trout, the greatest baseball player of his generation (and maybe of any generation), has agreed to a ten-year, $360 million contract extension that will keep him in Orange County for his entire career. (Well, unless the Angels move to Long Beach, I suppose.) When you add in the two years that Trout has yet to go on his current deal, the total value is 12 years and at least $426 million. That’s a record for a sports contract. There is a no-trade clause (which is pointless since he’ll soon be a 10 and 5 player) and there are no opt-outs.
• Bob Nightengale writes that for all the talk about Trout playing for the Phillies one day, Trout never wanted to leave Southern California and now he won’t have to.
• Ken Rosenthal writes that Angels owner Arte Moreno could not bear to be known as the man who let Trout leave, so now he has to build a winner around Trout. (The Athletic sub. req.)
• The Angels players reacted to the news that their star is sticking around. Trout himself was told to stay away from Spring Training yesterday, so his teammates got to talk about Trout’s new deal for now. (Peter Bourjos said that Trout “might be a better human being than he is a baseball player, which says a lot considering he might be the greatest baseball player of all time.”)
• Athletes throughout the sports world reacted to Trout’s extension.
• Tim Brown writes that Trout was never about the money which, paradoxically, is why he got the money.
• Tom Verducci writes that Trout’s extension is indicative of two things—Trout’s loyalty to the only club he knows and how the balance of power between owners and players has shifted to the owners’ favor in recent years.
• Bill Baer thinks that the Angels were rewarded for being open, honest and generous with Trout throughout his career.
• Most observers think the Angels got a huge discount. Sam Miller explains why Trout may be worth a billion dollars.
• Craig Calcaterra agrees that Trout is worth the money.
• Craig Edwards says for the second time in his career, Trout accepted a lot less money than he’s worth.
• Ben Lindbergh agrees that Trout is worth a lot more than $430 million.
• Neil Paine and Travis Sawchik do the math and think there’s some risk here at the end of the contract but add that Trout is likely to more than make up for it earlier in the contract. Also, they don’t believe that Trout’s contract (or any other contract) will prevent the Angels from competing in the future.
• Zach Kram reminds us of how good Trout has been and says between Trout and Shohei Ohtani, the Angels have a strong foundation for the future.
• Michael Baumann agrees that the Angels are well-positioned to stop “wasting” Trout’s talents, if not in 2019 then in 2020 and beyond.
• David Schoenfield has five reasons why the Angels can win the World Series with Trout.
• Matt Snyder outlines a path to a title for the Angels going forward.
• Mike Axisa has some winners and losers from the Trout extension.
• Will Leitch has the nine teams (other than the Angels) who are most affected by Trout’s extension.
• Nine fun facts about Trout’s extension.
• What could Trout buy with $430 million? Probably the Weather Channel, which just sold for $300 million.
• And here are the ten biggest contracts in MLB history.
• He probably could have timed this better to get a little more attention, but Astros third baseman Alex Bregman has agreed to a five year, $100 million contract extension. The deal buys out his arbitration years and the first two years of his potential free agency.
• The Astros have also signed reliever Ryan Pressly to a two-year, $17.5 million extension.
• Tigers pitcher Michael Fulmer has been recommended for Tommy John surgery and the Tigers 2019 season just got a little bleaker.
• There was a report that the Phillies clubhouse problems came to a head when Carlos Santana said he smashed a clubhouse television because he was upset that some younger players were playing Fortnite during games.
• Jake Arrieta disputes that anyone was playing video games during games (saying it was well before the games) and says that Santana smashed the TV hours after a tough loss. Arrieta does say that the communication between the players was poor at the end of the season.
• Phillies outfielder Bryce Harper talks to Tim Keown about his career, his thoughts about the game and signing with Philadelphia in his first major interview after signing. Unfortunately for him, he also talks about recruiting Trout to Philly and that’s not going to happen now.
• The Yankees are reportedly about to sign pitcher Gio Gonzalez to a minor league deal.
• Alden Gonzalez looks at how MLB is trying to create more two-way players like Ohtani.
• On the eve of the beginning of the MLB season in Tokyo, Marly Rivera talks to four Japanese MLB players (including Yu Darvish) about what Ichiro Suzuki means to them and Japan.
• Here are some things to know about the Japan Series, which I guess is half-over by the time you read this.
• Tim Brown notes that the Rays’ “opener” system of managing a pitching staff is here to stay.
• Buster Olney breaks down the early season schedules for several teams. (ESPN+ sub. req.)
• Sam Miller looks at 12 “unbreakable” records and examines whether any of them could be broken in 2019.
• MLB is working on a system where catchers and pitchers could communicate electronically through a watch.
• Devan Fink notices that it looks like MLB is not enforcing the pitch clock in Spring Training.
• Michael Clair ranks all 30 fanbases by how happy and content they are. He’s wrong. Red Sox fans will never, ever be content and happy.
• And finally, alongside getting into pitching shape for the start of the season, Mets ace Noah Syndergaard is spending Spring Training trolling the beat writers.

And tomorrow will be a better day than today, Buster.