Joey Votto, Reds Finalize 10-Year Extension

These stories aren’t over. Joey Votto is still a freak. Might as well give it the StoryStream™ treatment because he’s just going to keep on being a freak.

The first update: Joey Votto almost hit another infield pop-up. There was an alert sent out on the Joey Votto Infield-Pop-Up Emergency-Broadcast System here, but it was a false alarm.

We knew that Joey Votto had signed a ten-year contract with the Cincinnati Reds worth $225 million. We knew that Votto was getting a no-trade clause as part of the deal. Now, courtesy of C. Trent Rosecrans, we get the yearly salary breakdown. Votto was already under contract through 2013. After that:

2014: $12 million

2015: $14 million

2016: $20 million

2017: $22 million

2018: $25 million

2019: $25 million

2020: $25 million

2021: $25 million

2022: $25 million

2023: $25 million

2024: $20 million option ($7 million buyout)

Everything about this, we pretty much already knew, but we hadn’t heard of the option before. The Reds don’t have Votto under contract for only the next twelve seasons. The Reds might have Votto under contract for the next thirteen seasons, provided the twelfth season is good enough. It would be interesting if the club option for 2024 automatically vests if Votto reaches 17 XHHes in 2023. There isn’t such thing as an XHH now but 2023 is a long way in the future.

As noted before, Votto’s getting a no-trade clause, giving him double protection, since his contract is already effectively a no-trade clause. There are whispers that the contract was pushed through by Reds owner Bob Castellini and that other executives are worried, but we needn’t acknowledge whispers. Speak up!

But at the Red Reporter, they’re not thinking about the marginal cost of a win right now. They’re thinking about their favorite team acting like one of the big boys for once:

Votto’s already under contract for the next two years. Nightengale reports that he’s agreed to be under contract for the next ten after that, with a full no-trade clause. Put another way, if Nightengale’s report is true, Votto will turn 40 a few weeks before this contract extension is up.

So it looks like something’s getting done. There isn’t much in the way of available details, but here’s Jon Heyman with something in case you’re desperately thirsty for knowledge:

Votto’s 28, which means that, if he’s signed through 2021, he’ll be 38 at the end. That’s an age by which pretty much all players have begun declining. But of course, the Reds would be most interested in what Votto could do over the next several years, and by the end of such a potential contract, who the hell knows what advances we might have made? They could have a Tommy John surgery for bad knees or slowing swings. I’m pretty sure that we’re about 15 years away from athletes being immortal so neither Votto nor the Reds should worry too much about the future right now.

MLB Trade Rumors is usually in the business of passing along transaction rumors rather than breaking them on their own, which for some reason makes me believe this one even more, probably because they wouldn’t be messing around with a friend of a guy who knows an agent. It looks like Joey Votto will be a Red deep into the next decade, and for a lot of clams.

^{*Number of times he’s seen Strange Brew.}