Carlos Beltran agreed to a two year deal worth 26 million with the Cardinals last night, making him the third major OF to sign within the last two weeks (the others being Willingham and Cuddyer). For Carlos, he goes to a National League team, avoiding his fear about being regulated to the DH and he gets to be on a team that still has playoff hopes. For the Cardinals, they get a bat to try to fill part of the hole left by Albert Pujols.
At the end of the Beltran Derby there were several teams left out in the cold: the Indians, Blue Jays, Red Sox and Rays. But none of these teams are the real losers of the Beltran Derby. In my opinion, the losers of the Beltran Derby, using hindsight as a tool, would be the San Francisco Giants.
From a purely hindsight perspective, we can say they are the losers because they gave up a prospect, had to spend some money, only to have Beltran to come over injured and not get the team to the playoffs.
However there was something else I learned yesterday that convinced me that the Giants were the losers of the derby. Even in Beltran did nothing for the Giants, I thought it was good move for the Giants because they brought in a big player, gave up talent, but even if they couldn’t retain Beltran, they would get two draft picks in return.
WRONG.
I had no idea that there was a clause in Beltran’s old contract that says if Beltran was traded, his new team cannot offer arbitration to Carlos. The Giants have a lot of young pitchers in the system, so losing Wheeler won’t hurt them too much, but basically since they could not retain Beltran beyond 2011, they “lose” the Beltran derby.
