The Best of 2014: Giancarlo Stanton’s $325 Million Dollars in perspective

This article was originally published on November 15, 2014:

Giancarlo Stanton will, likely, get $325 million dollars in exchange for playing for the Miami Marlins for 13 more years (assuming he doesn’t get traded or opts out).

That, scientifically, is known as a buttload of money. How much money? Let’s go through it…

$500 Million: The value of the Miami Marlins, according to Forbes. Yes, Jeffrey Loria is basically saying that Giancarlo Stanton represents 65% of the value of the team itself.

It is over 20 times Babe Ruth‘s career earnings after inflation.

It is over 1.6 times Ken Griffey Jr.’s career earnings after inflation.

It is over 1.2 times Barry Bonds‘ career earnings after inflation.

$311 Million: The GDP of Sao Tome and Principe, a island nation in the Gulf of Guinea

$785.20: The amount of money every person in the City of Miami would receive if Giancarlo’s next contract was split up equally amongst them.

Giancarlo would be able to buy eight 1962-63 Ferrari 250 GTOs (which sold for $38 million dollars in August) with his proposed new contract’s money.

$294 Million: The cost, adjusted for inflation, of Titanic, the second most expensive (when adjusted for inflation) movie production of all time.

812.5 years: How long the President of United States would have to be in office to make that amount of money ($325 million) from the job.

$292,198,327: Total salary earnings (without inflation) of Shaquille O’Neil over his entire NBA career.

10: The number of NHL franchises, according to Forbes, with a value below $325 million dollars.

All of them: The number of MLS teams, according to Forbes, with a value below $325 million dollars. If he were in a soccer sort of mood, Giancarlo could afford to buy both the most and the third most valuable MLS team at the same time with the money he will earn over his next deal.

The original cost to build Fenway Park was $650,000 dollars, which is $15.9 million dollars when adjusted for inflation. That means that Giancarlo Stanton over the span of his hypothetical new contract would be able to build 20 Fenway Parks circa 1912, and he’d have enough money left to do just under half of a 21st.

$25 Million: How much Giancarlo would make in an average year under his new contract.

$10 Million: GDP of the island country of Niue. It would take Niue two and a half years of it’s entire gross domestic product to pay for one year of Giancarlo Stanton.

I don’t think anyone can imagine how big Mike Trout‘s deal will be if this is anything to go on.

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Giancarlo Stanton’s $325 Million Dollars in perspective

Giancarlo Stanton will, likely, get $325 million dollars in exchange for playing for the Miami Marlins for 13 more years (assuming he doesn’t get traded or opts out).

That, scientifically, is known as a buttload of money. How much money? Let’s go through it…

$500 Million: The value of the Miami Marlins, according to Forbes. Yes, Jeffrey Loria is basically saying that Giancarlo Stanton represents 65% of the value of the team itself.

It is over 20 times Babe Ruth‘s career earnings after inflation.

It is over 1.6 times Ken Griffey Jr.’s career earnings after inflation.

It is over 1.2 times Barry Bonds‘ career earnings after inflation.

$311 Million: The GDP of Sao Tome and Principe, a island nation in the Gulf of Guinea

$785.20: The amount of money every person in the City of Miami would receive if Giancarlo’s next contract was split up equally amongst them.

Giancarlo would be able to buy eight 1962-63 Ferrari 250 GTOs (which sold for $38 million dollars in August) with his proposed new contract’s money.

$294 Million: The cost, adjusted for inflation, of Titanic, the second most expensive (when adjusted for inflation) movie production of all time.

812.5 years: How long the President of United States would have to be in office to make that amount of money ($325 million) from the job.

$292,198,327: Total salary earnings (without inflation) of Shaquille O’Neil over his entire NBA career.

10: The number of NHL franchises, according to Forbes, with a value below $325 million dollars.

All of them: The number of MLS teams, according to Forbes, with a value below $325 million dollars. If he were in a soccer sort of mood, Giancarlo could afford to buy both the most and the third most valuable MLS team at the same time with the money he will earn over his next deal.

The original cost to build Fenway Park was $650,000 dollars, which is $15.9 million dollars when adjusted for inflation. That means that Giancarlo Stanton over the span of his hypothetical new contract would be able to build 20 Fenway Parks circa 1912, and he’d have enough money left to do just under half of a 21st.

$25 Million: How much Giancarlo would make in an average year under his new contract.

$10 Million: GDP of the island country of Niue. It would take Niue two and a half years of it’s entire gross domestic product to pay for one year of Giancarlo Stanton.

I don’t think anyone can imagine how big Mike Trout‘s deal will be if this is anything to go on.

 

Long-Term Deals: The Way to the Future

Two things caught my eye this morning, and while on first glance you would think they aren’t related, in fact they may be tied together.

The first is an article by Jeff Passan on how the money involved with regional sports network deals, such as the one the Dodgers are expected to take that will be between $6 and $7 billion dollars, are going to widen the gap between the rich and poor in baseball.

The second is the news that Evan Longoria has signed a $100 million dollar extension with Tampa that will keep him with the team until as late as 2023, depending on options.
How are these connected? Well, in a word, the events of the first article will probably lead to us seeing more deals like the Longoria deal of the second article.

Consider: the bubble of money that Regional Sports Networks will bring the big market teams- amounts of money that not even revenue sharing will dent all of that much- will make it extremely hard for teams to keep top free agents from leaving. A team like Tampa will just simply be unable to outbid, even on a good day, one of the top markets. While of course there will be some exceptions such as “hometown discounts” and big markets botching negotiations, the fact is that the best way for a smaller market to keep talent will be to make sure that they never leave in the first place. The way to do that? Sign them up early, and sign them up often.

Longoria, for example, had already been signed to a contract extension early in his career, before he became his MVP self. That was a deal extremely kind to the Rays. This second deal is more in line with Longoria’s value, but is also good for the Rays (at least in the short-term), since it means that he won’t be leaving.

Longoria’s deal is just the latest in what has become a trend… but expect it to become the norm as time goes on.