The Giants’ offer of $700 million to Shohei Ohtani was almost the same as the Dodgers’.
Shohei Ohtani turned down three offers from the San Francisco Giants. The final offer, which president for baseball operations Farhan Zaidi called “very comparable, if not identical,” compared to the record $700 million, 10-year deal the Japanese two-way star signed with the rival Los Angeles Dodgers was the closest.
Ohtani met with Zaidi, Greg Johnson, Buster Posey, Greg Johnson, and the newly hired Bob Melvin for two hours at the field on December 2. Zaidi said that San Francisco changed and raised its offers to satisfy Ohtani’s needs.
“The offer that was made was very similar, if not the same, to what he ultimately agreed to,” Zaidi said on Tuesday during a conference call. “We made what would probably have been the biggest offer in the history of the Major Leagues.”
I think our team wasn’t the only one that did that. We wanted to show right away that we were serious and interested, though.
Zaidi wanted to show Ohtani within the Bay Area to look at neighborhoods and homes for sale, but the meeting was kept to Oracle Park so Ohtani wouldn’t be seen.
When it became clear to the Giants that Ohtani wanted to stay to Southern California, Zaidi said they knew it might be hard to come to a deal, even with the money that was offered.
By the afternoon of Saturday, a few days shortly after the club’s most recent offer, San Francisco’s officials still hadn’t heard back from Ohtani’s agents. When the Giants had to wait for the man to make his choice, that made them nervous.
Last but not least, Ohtani decided to leave the Los Angeles Angels, where he had played since 2018, as well as sign with the Dodgers. The team made the announcement on Monday.
Last offseason, the Giants missed out on Aaron Judge. They also chose to refrain from finalize a $350 million, 13-year deal with shortstop Carlos Correa because of concerns about his health related to surgery on his right leg in 2014.
When asked to explain if the Giants’ offer was similar to what Los Angeles made, Zaidi said, “Yes, in terms of structure and total compensation.”
All of Ohtani’s offers were said to be “in a similar range” by the end, or the Giants tried to stay in touch to see what they could do to improve their chances of getting him.
“I think we felt extremely confident about our chances during certain points; at other points, just like you always do, you have a few uncertainties or doubts because you’re aware it’s very competitive,” said Zaidi.
“We felt like we pulled a lot of strings to try make things happen, and I think we were hurt in some ways by player preferences and geography in particular.” In the end, this is kind of like free agency.
After a long search, the San Francisco Giants finally got the big-name free agent they wanted on Tuesday night.
They signed Korean star center fielder Jung Hoo Lee to a six-year deal. The Giants are spending more than $130 million on the 25-year-old Lee, who has great bat-to-ball skills. The deal is worth $113 million plus a $18.725 million posting fee.
The Giants really wanted two-way star Shohei Ohtani before they signed Lee, but Ohtani signed with NL West rival Los Angeles Dodgers.
Ohtani, who has a $700 million deal, but there are a lot of payments that aren’t due until later.
Ohtani will only get $2 million a year for the next 10 years. This brings the total value of the deal down to $460 million, but it is still the biggest contract in MLB history.
Farhan Zaidi, the president in baseball operations for the Giants, revealed on Tuesday that Ohtani visited Oracle Park to look for a job during his free agency.
The club offered Ohtani the same contract that he eventually signed for the Dodgers.
It was a $700 million deal with huge payments put off, which would have given the team a lot of money to improve the club around Ohtani.
“The proposal that was put forward was very comparable, if not identical, to the one he wound up agreeing to,” Zaidi stated Tuesday. “We said we were okay with it. At that point, the person had to make a choice.
Of course, Ohtani made it obvious that winning is important to him, and the Giants haven’t been winning much lately.
But they did go 81-81 in 2022 and 79-83 within 2023 and miss the playoffs both years. In 2021, they won 107 games and the NL West.
In the past seven years, they’ve only been to the playoffs once, in 2021. The Dodgers, on the other hand, have made the playoffs each year since 2013.
The Giants haven’t had much luck as a team in recent years, so they knew they would have a hard time with Ohtani. However, they were smart to try to get him.
They had to try hard to get him because they couldn’t get a deal on their own terms. The worst thing that could have happened was that they made a rival team pay Ohtani’s asking price to get him. The Giants tried very hard, but it wasn’t enough.
There are a lot of teams interested in Japanese right-handed pitcher Yoshinobu Yamamoto.
At this point, Yamamoto is expected to want a $300 million deal. Even though they are up against tough competition, getting him would be a huge win for San Francisco.
Yamamoto is also being chased by the Dodgers, the New York Mets, the New York Yankees, and other big-market teams.
Once more, over the course of ten years, one player will get 70% of a billion dollars. It would be too mild to say that the deal breaks MLB records for the biggest contract and the biggest average yearly value.
With one stroke of the pen, Ohtani will change the rules of what we thought was possible in the business of sports.
One thing that should be noted is that the deal has a lot of deferrals, which make the deal less valuable because of inflation.
Yes, $700 million seems like a nice round number, but in deals this big, round numbers aren’t usually used.