| Brandon Contes. 8th December, 2006 - 10:40 pm
 The Cubs are showing they have a lot of money to spend.
After giving $73 million to Aramis Ramirez, followed by $136 million to Alfonso Soriano, the Cubs went out and signed pitcher Ted Lilly to a four-year, $40 million contract.
Ted Lilly is an average to above average starting pitcher and a great back of the rotation guy, a solid number three at best, but there is no way he deserves $40 million. Lilly should be making six or seven million dollars per year at best.
Last season, Lilly went 15-13 with an ERA of 4.31 in the difficult AL East. He had very comparable numbers to Greg Maddux, who also will be making $10 million next season.
However, Maddux’s deal is only for one season, whereas Lilly is locked up for four years (age obviously being the determining factor). Regardless of the numbers though, we all know that you cannot compare what Lilly brings to the table to what Maddux brings to the table.
Lilly has not even pitched 200 innings once in his career, he will get a fair amount of quality starts, but he does not bring any veteran leadership.
Lilly is being terribly overpaid, continuing the trend of a high market this off-season. If Lilly is truly worth $10 million, then Barry Zito should be getting $20 million.
Grade: C
Lilly is a solid starting pitcher who deserves more like $6 million a year, but certainly not $10 million. The Cubs were right in what they gave to Ramirez, Soriano, and even Kerry Wood this off-season, but they made a mistake with Lilly. |
