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Your soundtrack for this morning's links of note: Dispatch, Circles Around the Sun.
- The Dodgers will extend Clayton Kershaw. He'll be getting $215 million over seven years, and becomes the first professional athlete to make more than $30 million per season. In 2014 he'll get a $4 million dollar salary, along with an $18 million dollar signing bonus - although I'm not sure that distinguishing between them really matters. Kershaw just broke baseball. And maybe the internet. But regardless, the Dodgers could have him in their possession through 2020, when he'll be 32 years old.
- Over at FanGraphs, Dave Camerson compares Kershaw to other top-flight pitching talent in the game's history.
- SB Nation calls it "the safest of $215 million bets".
- Bless You Boys ponders how such a massive contract will impact on the eventual terms of new contracts for Miguel Cabrera and Max Scherzer.
- The Twins are scouting a pair of Cuban pitchers. You can read more about it here.
- Players putting in their counter-offers for arbitration must do so by noon tomorrow. The Twins can still negotiate with Trevor Plouffe, Brian Duensing, and Anthony Swarzak until their hearings, and so tomorrow's deadline doesn't mean much other than having the players actually put down a number. Minnesota doesn't go to actual arbitration hearings often, so it's still more than likely that we'll see all three players find a one-year deal before that happens.
Mark Reynolds, a possible bench fit for the Nats, is weighing several offers and will likely make a decision by the end of the week.
— Adam Kilgore (@AdamKilgoreWP) January 15, 2014
- Reynolds is also on Minnesota's radar, but a team like the Brewers could be a favorite if they offer him a shot at a starting job at first base. I still think he's one of the better players that the organization could bring in to shore up the bench, at least from a power standpoint, but we'll get into that a bit more later this morning.
