The Phillies GM and his hair-plugged sidekick held a press conference today to announce the signing of Joe Blanton to a 3-year, $24 million deal which will award him with a base salary of $7 mil this year and $8.5 mil in ‘11 & ‘12. The $7 mil salary in ‘10 is actually less than the $7.5 the Phillies offered in arbitration, and considerably less than the $10.25 mil Joe was asking for. Obviously, the comfort of a guaranteed, multi-year deal was more attractive to Joe than going through the whole arbitration process and risk getting a similar deal next season with some loser team.
Then after Joe was formally re-introduced, special assistant to the GM Scott Proefrock was asked how close the Phillies are to signing Carlos Ruiz and Shane Victorino to multi-year deals. This is what he said:
“The negotiations are continuing. We hope to have them done well before we go to a hearing, in both cases. We’re still talking and hopefully within a week we’ll have them locked up as well.”
So what he’s saying is, those two are basically signed.
UPDATE, 6:40 pm: I just heard Jim Salisbury on SportsNite say he thinks the Phillies will sign Shane Victorino to a multi-year deal, possibly within the next 24 hours. Carlos Ruiz’s deal could take a couple days to finish.
UPDATE, 8:20 PM: Welp, that didn’t take long. According to Todd Zolecki, the Phillies have signed Shane Victorino to a 3-year deal as well. The terms of that deal haven’t been released yet.
23 Comments on “Phillies lock up Blanton and Victorino for 3 years, Chooch up next”
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January 21st, 2010 at 6:01 pm
Firsttttt
January 21st, 2010 at 6:07 pm
I suppose I should be happy they’re retaining so many once and future WFC’s, but all these long-term deals make me worry that Werth is essentially gone.
January 21st, 2010 at 6:32 pm
I’ll be glad to have all three locked up, and I’m ecstatic to get Blanton on the cheap. However, I do agree with the coyote that this probably means Jayson is bye-bye.
January 21st, 2010 at 7:04 pm
Meh, if we keep 5 players to lose Werth, its 100% worth it. Us (we?) fans tend to get all caught up in every little move. Let’s be realistic about Werth, too. We signed him for nothing, and we still get to vastly underpay the man. He’s turned his career around significantly here with us and made a great name for himself. He’s earned the right to go find a huge bag of cash. If he wants to go that route, there’s not much we can do about it. He helped us get the coveted ring we all wanted and he is going to help us do it again next year.
With that said, he’s not the superstar we drafted or traded a ton of prospects for. He was a nice little addition that paid off HUGE. If we want to be a legit organization, we need to continue to replace aging talent with the next “Werth” especially since we are not the Yankees. I’ve all but conceded Werth is long gone, and I fully support the plan to distribute the money to 3/4th starters and other, cheaper options. It’s how it has to work.
(Please let Werth take some crazy discount to stay here?)
January 21st, 2010 at 7:08 pm
another solid deal. cant complain about this one except with the werth issue. theres a minor possibility that we could see a payroll bump for 2012 (with ibanez coming off the books in 2013) that they could sign werth, but he’ll be 34 at that point, would they keep him for high dollars? its possible. either way im happy to see our WFCs are locked up together for at least 2 more seasons.
January 21st, 2010 at 8:05 pm
Keep 5 of the WFCs, lose Worth, and call up some kid named Domonic Brown. This may work. Werth has certainly been worth his money, but this is a pretty good alternative. It’d be great if he stays, but not tragic if he goes off and makes a billion dollars from the Red Sox.
January 21st, 2010 at 8:27 pm
I really wish that they had made extending Werth a higher priority than extending Vic. Domonic Brown is a better fit to take over for Ibanez than Werth imho. There really is NOBODY that can fill Werth’s role on the team, and we have a lot of guys who could potentially be good Centerfielders to take over from Vic.
January 21st, 2010 at 8:37 pm
@7 – You make a good point. I’m sure management has never considered asking Werth if he wanted to stay around. Also, there’s no chance they offered him any type of extension. They are just ignoring the situation altogether. Is Werth going to become the next Lee? If Werth wants to stay, he will. If he wants to leave, he will. I might have to ask Rube to start a blog to explain to the fans every little decision he makes.
January 21st, 2010 at 9:30 pm
Just seen on ESPNEWS that it’s been reported that the Phils and Vic have agreed to a 3 year 22 mil extension.
January 21st, 2010 at 10:00 pm
great, 3 more years of NQA pissing off fans in restaurants…
January 21st, 2010 at 10:09 pm
Rube and Joe look THRILLED
January 21st, 2010 at 10:53 pm
Yeah this makes it seem like re-uping Werth is a long shot but as Eric said we got more than we could have ever hoped for from him so it’s hard to get too mad. One thing that does concern me is I think Werth fills a huge role as the right handed bat that can make a team think twice about putting in a lefty vs our heart of the order. His right handed bat has been key and Brown will be another lefty, so hopefully they keep that in mind when next offseason rolls around.
January 21st, 2010 at 11:26 pm
I really hope that they find some way to work out an extension with Werth, since he really has played a huge role in our teams success. There is a chance that Werth really likes it here, and will take a discount to stay with the team that needs him, and he feels most comfortable with. Let’s just hope something gets worked out, because otherwise… we may be looking at a Center-fielder playing as a Corner-fielder.
January 21st, 2010 at 11:46 pm
I still miss Cliff Lee.
January 22nd, 2010 at 1:21 am
@WFSCC
You are absolutely right about Werth being more valuable at this point…but its at a steeper price. If the Phillies have to choose Vic over 3 years at 22 million or Werth making 15 million a year after this year, they are going to pick Vic every time. With that being said, we are definitely going to have the same lefty troubles we have had with no legit righty to back up the Big Piece in the lineup.
January 22nd, 2010 at 8:57 am
3 yrs / 25M for Blanton is a so/so deal, I think. Not great, but not bad. It’s hard to get even decent pitching in the FA market. Look at the deal Ollie Perez signed. Granted, Minaya is a fucking idiot, but still. Randy Wolf got 3/30 this offseason, and while he had a great year last year I sort of doubt that at 33 he’s all the sudden reinvented himself as something other than a dependable middle of the rotation guy. Blanton sort of takes over the role Myers should have had if he hadn’t spent most of the last 3 years injured.
3 yrs / 22M for Victorino is a pretty darned good deal.
I’d love to see them keep Werth but if he has another good year this year he’ll probably be looking for at least what Jason Bay just got, considering he’s basically Bay with better speed and a better arm.
January 22nd, 2010 at 9:02 am
Thank yoooooooooou Joe Blanton. You’ve set the ground work for my meeting with Ed Wade today!
January 22nd, 2010 at 9:56 am
Look at that picture. Now nobody can say my boy Country Joe don’t clean up good.
January 22nd, 2010 at 10:31 am
@ 11 haha my thoughts exactly.
January 22nd, 2010 at 3:04 pm
The Blanton deal is pretty good, but why would they sign Vic for three years? There are a bunch of center fielders who will be ready in the minors in a year or two.
Another thing. Vic only asked for $5.8 million, is his contract backloaded or something, since it’s $22m?
January 22nd, 2010 at 5:59 pm
If it’s Gose and Gillies you’re talking about, there is no guarantee they’ll even turn into legit everyday MLB players (although they both project well), and neither have the power that Victorino is. You can draft a million toolsy, speed-oriented outfielders every year, but only .05% of them ever turn into anything. That skill set isn’t rare.
January 23rd, 2010 at 12:13 pm
Phillies lock up Blanton and Victorino for 3 years. it is good contract for him and team.
January 23rd, 2010 at 1:16 pm
Lets not whine about losing Werth even before the season starts. I’ll worry about losing him when it looks like, ya know, we would be actually losing him.