The White Sox have locked up lefty Jose Quintana to a five-year deal worth at least $21MM, announced the team. The guaranteed money in the deal is contingent on Quintana's arbitration status: $26.5MM if he qualifies as a Super Two after 2014, and $21MM if not. Quintana will have two years and 133 days of Major League service after 2014, which would have qualified him for Super Two in two of the last five years. The deal includes club options at $10.5MM for 2019 and $11.5MM for 2020. A White Sox press release has the full salary breakdown. Quintana is represented by MDR Sports Management.
Quintana, 25, broke out last year with a 3.51 ERA, 7.4 K/9, 2.5 BB/9, 1.04 HR/9, and 42.5% groundball rate in 200 innings. "Jose quickly has established himself as a quality major-league starting pitcher, and along with Chris Sale, we expect him to be an important piece of our rotation for the foreseeable future," said White Sox senior vice president/general manager Rick Hahn in the statement. Sale, 25 this month, is potentially under team control through 2019.
Quintana has taken an interesting path to this $21MM+ deal. Signed by the Mets out of Colombia for $40K in 2006, he was eventually released for a violation of the Minor League Baseball drug policy. The southpaw signed with the Yankees, but never ranked among their top 30 prospects as ranked by Baseball America. The Yankees offered Quintana a minor league deal after 2011, but White Sox scouts Joe Siers and Daraka Shaheed "made him stand out on the six-year free-agent list," Hahn told Joel Sherman of the New York Post in June 2012. The Sox separated themselves by offering a Major League deal, and now they have a rotation mainstay.
Quintana's contract falls squarely between the last two deals done for one-plus service starting pitchers, as you can see in our Extension Tracker. In November, the Rangers' Martin Perez signed a four-year, $12MM deal with three club options, which was in line with previous deals for pitchers in this service class. In February, however, the Braves gave Julio Teheran a six-year, $32.4MM deal that included only one club option. Quintana and Teheran have similar career ERAs (3.61 and 3.44), but Quintana has pitched 336 1/3 innings to Teheran's 211 2/3. Perhaps the discrepancy is because Quintana never enjoyed Teheran's status as a top prospect, or perhaps Teheran's deal simply didn't reset the extension market for this service class as some speculated.
MLB.com's Scott Merkin first broke news of the extension, with Dan Hayes of CSNChicago.com providing the salaries. Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Another AWESOME deal for the White Sox. Even if Quintana doesn’t become a superstar, five million or so for a starting pitcher in the Bigs is a great deal. I love it. Sale and Quintana COULD be (down the road) the best bang for your buck 1-2 starters in the game. GO SOX! AND RICK HAHN!
Jose Fernandez/Andrew Heaney in Miami will probably be better.
Andrew Heaney has never thrown a pitch in the Majors, so it is kind of hard to argue that.
You mentioned “down the road” in your first post. Present day, I’d take Fernandez over Sale. Heaney is obviously wait-and-see, but I think most would value him over Quintana long term.
Dang, man. Can’t we just be happy with our signing? There are a lot of great pitchers in this league, and this is how we’re building our foundation.
There is argument to be made that Sale is the best pitcher in the AL and top 5 in baseball. Present day you should take Sale. Down the road maybe Fernandez.
Until the marlins trade Fernandez for prospects
Very fair deal. If he is great: steal. If he is just average or a bit below average, it doesn’t hurt the team. Imagine if they had been able to sign Tanaka too. They’d be able to afford one high priced contract in the rotation while others are making bread crumbs (Sale and Quintana on great deals and also Johnson will also be making the minimum the next 3 seasons).
John Danks disagrees with this post.
Danks is making like 13 mill which isn’t as bad annually as other pitchers have gotten this off season. He is coming off that shoulder injury so you can throw last year away. Now that he has had a normal off season to prepare for this upcoming off-season, he should pitch better and possibly dealt at the deadline.
Why deal him? The plan is to compete in 2015 or 2016. If Danks looks good this year, he makes that a greater possibility.
That’s a big ‘if’…in my opinion he’s never looked like a $13mm per year pitcher.
Were you not around for 2008, 2009, 2010, or 2011?
Probably right on the mark.
If it runs through 2018 then it includes this year. So for $21.5MM it includes 2 pre-arb seasons, or $20.5MM for 3 arb seasons. He probably could outearn it if he keeps going this way, but if he washes out he has some nice security.
Pretty good rule 5 pick, really wish he was still on the Yankees now.
He had some good numbers in the Yankee farm system, that’s surprising he never ranked that high.
The White Sox claimed him from the Yankees. Later it leaked out that he was acutally a ptbnl that was slid under the table, but was never confirmed
the ptbnl idea makes no sense.
yeah. I’ve seen enough to have the opinion he isn’t a big-game, big-money, top-of-the-rotation pitcher. An awesome year would totally change my opinion, though! I’m looking forward to this year on the south side.
2005 called to let you know that the going rate for “big-money, top-of-the-rotation” pitchers is quite a bit more than 13m.
Some pitchers who got “big money” with multiyear deals this offseason:
Matt Garza ($12.5M/year)
Ubaldo Jimenez ($12.5M)
Ricky Nolasco ($12.25M)
Scott Kazmir ($11M)
Scott Feldman ($10M)
Bartolo Colon ($10M)
At the time Danks signed his extension, he was way better than all of these guys are now.
Not a big-game pitcher? What part of Gm 163 don’t you remember?