Time For Prince Fielder Deal

Every day I wake up and expect to hear that Prince Fielder has signed a multi-year contract for multi-million dollars with some team that surprises me.

Like the Milwaukee Brewers. Oops. Maybe not. But Fielder should be promoted to king by someone soon. Who? That’s the question. Not being privy to the big man’s thinking process (and I’m not in the least upset about that), I don’t know what’s going into his decision. Does he want to be loved like Albert Pujols? Or does he just want to be paid like Alex Rodriguez?

Does he want to stay in the National League where he is familiar with the pitching staffs? Does he want to keep playing the field, since after all his name is Fielder? Is he ready to become a full-time designated hitter? Or does he just want to have the option to become a DH with the team that signs him?

Fielder is roughly the size of my three-bedroom house, so that makes me wonder if some teams that ordinarily would be willing to give him $20 million a year might be hesitatant because they fear he will expand into the Goodyear Blimp.

The Prince wants to be paid a princely wage and with the market being what the market is he surely must believe he is worth at least 20 million smackers a season and there is probably someone out there willing to pay that freight. But is some team willing to pay that kind of money for 1o years? Probably not. How about five years? Probably so.

Fielder is just 28 so this probably won’t be the last contract he ever signs. If he believes in his ability to be a consistent 35-homer, 100 RBI man for five years, then when this contract expires he may still be close enough to his prime at 33 to look for another big bucks arrangement.

I’m guessing that Fielder is leaning towards a National League team to sign with now if the contract is going to be for something in the five-year range. If he and his agent can actually talk some team into providing an 8-to-10-year contract he will probably go for the American League so he can at least ease into a designated hitter role down the line.

So who has the money, the interest and the need to woo Fielder? In the NL I’m thinking the Chicago Cubs, for sure, especially now that Aramis Ramirez has driven himself up I-94 to Milwaukee. Perhaps Fielder could join the San Francisco Giants. They need a big bat so desperately maybe they will cut a deal to let Fielder play two sports and he can moonlight for the 49ers. Fielder may fancy himself a bright lights guy and no one can offer brighter lights than the New York Mets.

Over in the DH league, I would assume the Indians, who wanted Jim Thome to stick around, would probably wrap the Prince in one gargantuan bear hug. The Baltimore Orioles probably entertain the occasional fantasy of signing him. Ordinarily, the Red Sox and Yankees, being the big spenders and overspenders that they are, would be in the thick of the fight, but it just so happens this year neither of them really need Fielder’s bat. If the Detroit Tigers or Minnesota Twins were a little bit richer I would think they might take a serious run at Fielder. The Mariners could be in there pitching.

But here’s a Wild Card thought. Now that the Angels have made it clear that they are sick of the Texas Rangers’ two-year domination of the American League West Division with their acquisition of a nuclear weapon (aka Pujols), perhaps Texas will feel the need to add to its arsenal. This would be just like the U.S. and U.S.S.R. during the Cold War and the theory of mutally assured destruction. If one side developed more powerful weapons, the other side had to have them, too.Just thinking out loud.

I fully expect Fielder to send me a note thanking me for these helpful ideas. I’ll let you know when that happens.