According to Eduardo A. Encina, the Rays explored a contract extension for ace Scott Kazmir last year. Nothing came of it, and now Encina says "there’s already talk that Kazmir’s days as a Ray are numbered."
The dominant lefty, who turns just 24 in January, has three years left before free agency. His monster second half in ’07 (2.39 ERA) may indicate an upward trend that could result in Cy votes in ’08. It seems that Kazmir is represented by Brian Peters (rather than Scott Boras as I previously stated). If he does decide to go year to year with the Rays, he’d be in line for a massive free agent payday preceding his age 27 season in 2011.
Back on November 5th, Joel Sherman of the New York Post said the Rays were even considering shopping Kazmir this winter, depending on the bounty for Johan Santana. Marc Lancaster suggested the following day that the declaration of Kazmir’s availability was "dubious at best."
