THINK About The Timing of Inevitably Losing Francisco Lindor
Does it matter?
I know, you know, we all know…
The Indians will trade shortstop Francisco Lindor sometime in the final two remaining years of his contract. A lot of people, including myself, have come to the conclusion that trading him this offseason would be the right idea. The reason being it would allow the benefactor to get two entire seasons with the star before he goes on the market as a free agent.
Let me be clear.
I hate our owners and I hate even more how baseball works in this way where the best players end up going to teams that have the ability to pay up. Recently, starting pitcher Gerrit Cole just signed a $324 million dollar deal with the Yankees, around $36 million a year. I’m not sure Lindor is going to get that much, but it will be a sizable amount. At least something to the level Indians brass will not (cannot) give to him.
What I’ve seen is the Indians are essentially asking teams to send their best offer this weekend and the team is going to take those and decide if there is anything worthy of pulling the trigger on a deal this offseason. It’s like Tinder, but with our best player…fun.
Last year, Lindor had a .284 average, 32 bombs and 74 RBI. He’s also a stellar defender and simply a positive spirit within the organization. Losing him would truly be a stab in the heart for any Indians fan.
The bottom line is this…Why not give it some time?
Let Lindor start the year with the Indians, see how the team does for the first half of the year. If they are complete garbage as a whole, deal him at the deadline. There’s always a chance for a playoff run and Lindor would be a huge asset to any Tribe team trying to get to the postseason in the upcoming year.
My guess is that the return in a Lindor trade with 1.5 years left or even a single season remaining will be relatively close to what the Tribe would get if they let him go now. So why not keep the stud in Cleveland for the time being? See where this season goes and then work from there.
Finally, what if we got owners that actually spent money and had the ability to keep players like Lindor in Cleveland for an entire career? Like Derek Jeter did with the Yankees. Playing these “games” with every star that ever wore the Cleveland Indians uniform is no fun and it would be great to end that trend in the coming years.
Regardless, thank you, Frankie, for everything…
