Royals sign Guillen

[Elbren]

FoxSports Link

3 years, $36 Mil.

eewww.

[byrdz]

This is a previous O's FO style move so I'm glad to see someone else sign him to a crazy deal like that. Shows me things are changing little by little.

[ChrisP]

Wow....after the Gil Meche deal last year...At least KC is spending money.

[rooter]

wow, talk about a garbage contract.

[DrungoHazewood]

Wow....after the Gil Meche deal last year...At least KC is spending money.

Thus the fallacy of the salary floor. You might force teams to spend, but it's much harder to force them to spend wisely.

[Frobby]

Twelve. Million. Dollars.

PER YEAR!

For Jose Guillen?

That's insane.

[orioles77]

I'm glad we stayed away from him. That contract is ridiculous!!!

[Boy Howdy]

Good for Guillen for getting what he could, and good for the Orioles for letting someone else give it to him.

[Ruzious]

Anybody still believe Tejada may have trouble finding a multi-year 10+ mil per contract for 2010-2012? Unless he falls off the edge of the earth in the next two years, he'll have no issue at all.

Only if he's injured for the next 2 years.

[mapierce]

So how many teams has that guy played for now? And thank God the O's didn't sign him.

[NewMarketSean]

This just proves to me that Tejada is not a salary dump or not worth his contract, like some "baseball people" are saying. He's still a 30 HR, 100 RBI guy over the course of a 162 game season. $16 mil might be a tad too much, but it's nothing outrageuous.

[DrungoHazewood]

Twelve. Million. Dollars.

PER YEAR!

For Jose Guillen?

That's insane.

Especially when you can get a guy like Jon Knott for free, pay him league minimum and probably get 90% of the production.

This continued escalation of free agent prices with no corresponding increase in the MLB minimum has to drive teams to platoons and guys like Knott eventually, right? Someone has to wake up and realize that the incremental cost for going from .250/.325/.440 to .270/.340/.460 isn't worth $11.5M a year! Especially when the expensive guy is an oft-injured headcase.

[Leitch]

All I can say is "Whew" and gesture as an umpire would to indicate a runner is safe and then also gesture as if I am wiping sweat off my brow

EDIT: I might also comically tug at my collar as if to let heat escape

[Ruzious]

Especially when you can get a guy like Jon Knott for free, pay him league minimum and probably get 90% of the production.

This continued escalation of free agent prices with no corresponding increase in the MLB minimum has to drive teams to platoons and guys like Knott eventually, right? Someone has to wake up and realize that the incremental cost for going from .250/.325/.440 to .270/.340/.460 isn't worth $11.5M a year! Especially when the expensive guy is an oft-injured headcase.

Yeah, and for a small market team like the Royals to do this makes it all the more puzzling.

[DrungoHazewood]

Yeah, and for a small market team like the Royals to do this makes it all the more puzzling.

I think they're trying to prove to the world that they're now a real MLB team.

But most folks will just think they're signing adequate players at pretty-please-come-to-KC prices instead of becoming a legitimate destination for high-caliber players at market rates.

My take is that instead of becoming the Tigers, which was probably their goal, signings like this inch them towards the recent Orioles model.