Prior to the 2020 season the Minnesota Twins needed to shore
up their starting rotation. Rather than giving Jake Odorizzi a multi-year
contract they handed him a qualifying offer. Agreeing to the $17.8MM deal may
have left something on the table, but new developments mean Odorizzi could be
in an interesting spot.
We have no idea what baseball is going to look like this
year, or whether it will look like anything at all. Make no mistake, Major
League Baseball will get creative to capture some of those revenues, but
ultimately the season could be lost. With the agreement between the league and
MLBPA that would mean Odorizzi becomes a free agent once again.
Going into 2021 the Twins could not extend Jake a qualifying
offer. He’d have no draft pick compensation tied to him, and he’d be free to
negotiate with any other organization. It’s one thing to say he’d be coming off
a 3.51 ERA 3.36 FIP and career best 10.1 K/9. That’s a bit disingenuous though
given then numbers were posted back in 2019. The 2020 season is and was an
opportunity for substantiation, and should it not be played it’d be fair to wonder
what true value actually is.
It would be foolish to suggest that Odo wasn’t an already
solid pitcher prior to the season he had in making his first All-Star Game. In
seven big league seasons he had posted a 3.95 ERA 4.22 FIP and 8.3 K/9. With a
102 ERA+, he was just slightly above average, but right in the general
consensus of what you’d expect from a mid-rotation arm.
You aren’t paying $20MM per season for what Jake Odorizzi
was, but you’d certainly pay that for the 29-year-old’s performance, and what
you hope lies ahead. Now he’ll be 31 in 2021 but that obviously comes with the
caveat of a full season having been spared in terms of mileage. Projecting
forward is definitely an exercise that teams will need to be both bought into
and have a general consensus as to what expectations will be.
I think Minnesota saw the qualifying offer as a likely acceptance
from the former Rays arm, and it always made sense for them to go down that
path first. They could have pursued a long-term deal had he denied it but
saving themselves future risk made sense as a first course of action. Should
they be pushed into a long-term scenario a few months from now, I’d also wager
it’s a pact they’d likely make.
Derek Falvey and Thad Levine have pushed the Twins chips
into a win-now mode of sorts. Kenta Maeda and Josh Donaldson are both stars on
the opposite side of 30. Failing to continue pairing them with an overall talent
level near the top of the big leagues doesn’t seem indicative of the current
direction. Odorizzi could certainly have a hefty price tag should he be able to
renegotiate a lengthier deal, but Minnesota already has helped him to take the
next step and keeping him hear to make an even greater one seems sensible.
Maybe Odo will never receive the $17.8 million payday he
agreed to for the season hanging in the balance. He should be in line for an
even greater sum, and while there will be plenty of projecting it’s value, the
Twins would seem wise to be a destination for him.
