Jeff Passan of ESPN reports the Cleveland Guardians and All-Star 3B Jose Ramirez have agreed on a five year $124 million contract extension with a full no trade clause. Part of the extension talks included the Guardians picking up Ramirez’s 2023 option meaning the full scope of the deal is six years, $150 million.
Ramirez, 29, has long been one of the best players in the game finishing in the top six of MVP voting in three of the past five seasons. Since 2017, Ramirez has the third highest WAR in the game (28.0 fWAR) trailing only Mike Trout and Mookie Betts.
Notably, Trout and Betts recently signed their own contract extensions. In 2019, Trout, widely regarded as the best player in the game, signed a 12 year, $426.5 million extension with the Los Angeles Angels. In 2020, Betts signed signed a 12 year, $365 million extension with the Los Angeles Dodgers.
With respect to Ramirez’s extension, it does come as a bit of a surprise as the Guardians were having trade discussions with a number of teams this offseason. It also comes after the Guardians had traded big name players like Mike Clevinger, Corey Kluber, and Francisco Lindor over the past few seasons.
In fact, Passan noted the Padres were deep in trade talks with the Guardians on Ramirez, and they were optimistic in their chances to land him. Instead, Ramirez stays in Cleveland as the only player under contract past this season. This will make him the veteran leader of a team in a rebuild hoping to win their first World Series since 1948.
One other interesting note is Ramirez’s extension has an average annual value of $24.8 million. According to Spotrac, the Guardian’s active Opening Day payroll is $38.8 million, which includes the $12 million Ramirez is set to make on his previous team friendly extension. Put another way, Ramirez will make in 2024 about 64% of what the Guardians are paying their entire team this season.
From a purely New York Mets perspective, this puts to end any hopes for the team to reunite Lindor and Ramirez who starred with Cleveland as they won the pennant in 2016. Lindor had been vocal about how both players were good friends and how he’d hope to play with Ramirez again.
