On a day where the Red Sox may have become the biggest losers of the MLB off-season by missing out on San Diego’s Adrian Gonzalez, Jayson Werth worth became the clear-cut winner. The Winter Meetings are a day away, but the former Phillies outfielder is going to go down as baseball’s luckiest man of the year after signing with the Washington Nationals on Sunday afternoon.
Washington signed Werth to a seven-year, $126 million deal. It’s a big splash for the Nationals, who are trying to add some established stars to their crop of young talent, but the length of the deal is outrageous. Werth will be 32 years old in May. He’s hit over 80 RBI and surpassed 25 home runs only twice in his career. Werth also struck out more than 140 times during those two seasons, which were his last two with the Phillies.
I guess that’s why Scott Boras is the best in the business. Ryan Howard is the same age as Werth and a perennial 40-plus homer 125-plus RBI guy, yet the Phillies caught a ton of flack for signing him to a five-year, $125 million extension. Somehow Boras convinced Washington to sign Werth through age 39 at top dollar. Come to think of it, I may even assume someone from the Nationals’ front office was drunk when this entire thing went down.
