At last, we can do away with "according to reports." Yadier Molina and the St. Louis Cardinals have made official a five-year contract extension worth $75 million that locks up the catcher through 2017.
Yadier Molina Contract Extension With Cardinals Official
A previously unknown detail is that the contract includes a mutual option for 2018, worth $15 million. For those who might not know, a mutual option is an option that needs to be exercised by both the team and the player. Mutual options are seldom mutually exercised, but it has been known to happen.
Molina also gets a no-trade clause in his deal. A no-trade clause doesn’t mean Molina can’t be traded; it means the Cardinals would need Molina’s permission to trade him. Suffice to say, the Cardinals didn’t just sign Molina to a huge contract because they intend on dealing him later.
At $15 million, Molina's contract has the second-highest average annual value in the history of catcher contracts. In first is Joe Mauer's contract, at $23 million. So just a slim difference.
Not knowing how Molina’s going to age, the most we can say is that Molina’s a good player and this contract is risky. But even if Molina ends up overpaid, it’s unlikely he’ll be overpaid by that much, so an awful lot of things would have to go wrong for the Cardinals to regret this decision in any serious way.
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