The Atlanta Braves made another move towards locking up their young core of players, signing The Best Closer On The Planet Craig Kimbrel to a four-year, $42 million extension, maxing out at $45.5 million over the first four years, that will buy out all three of his arbitration years and his first year of free agency. The contract also contains an option for the 2018 season, which would have been Kimbrel's second year of free agency, and would max the contract out at $58.5 million over five years.
The 25-year old (26 in May) Kimbrel has been baseball's best relievers since debuting in the majors. Including a 20 2/3 inning stint as Billy Wagner's set-up man in 2010 before taking over as the stopper in 2011. Over his young career, Kimbrel has a 1.39 ERA in 227 1/3 innings along with 381 strikeouts and 82 walks, saving 139 games for the Braves. Since debuting, no reliever has surpassed Kimbrel's 9.2 fWAR, his 1.39 ERA, his 381 strikeouts, or his 139 saves. So yes, by any measure you can imagine, he's been the best reliever in baseball since debuting.
The $46 million falls just shy of the $50 million that Jonathan Papelbon got from the Phillies in the free agent market, and is nearly identical to the four-year, $46 million contract that Francisco Cordero got from the Reds heading into the 2008 season. Based on those contracts, signed when each player was on the wrong side of 30, Kimbrel's contract is paying for more of his prime years and fewer of his decline years, something numerous teams have failed at taking advantage of when paying free agent relievers.
The biggest point of contention that people have with signing relievers is the breakdown factor. And sure enough, two of Kimbrel's bullpen-mates in Atlanta that have also been very good during his run with the Braves (Eric O'Flaherty, Jonny Venters) required Tommy John surgery in 2013, though both players were older than Kimbrel when they got hurt. That uncertainty with relievers has resulted in many (myself included) urging Atlanta to trade Kimbrel before he makes a ridiculous amount of money through arbitration.
But in reality, could the Braves even get a reasonable amount of value in return for Kimbrel in a trade? How many elite relievers have been traded over the last three years? Koji Uehara was dealt from the Orioles to the Rangers for Chris Davis, but neither player was at the level they were at in 2013 at the time of the trade. Sean Marshall, a set-up man, was only able to get the Cubs Travis Wood along with a pair of middle of the road prospects. These same Braves got a below-replacement level reliever from the Rays for Rafael Soriano. Mike Adams got the Padres a pair of mid-level pitching prospects. Just this offseason, the Padres were only able to get Seth Smith for Luke Gregerson. Andrew Bailey got the A's Josh Reddick, and Joel Hanrahan got the Pirates *another* reliever in Mark Melancon, who the Red Sox acquired for Jed Lowrie.
As you can see, there haven't exactly been a lot of great returns for closers. Could Atlanta have even received proper value in a trade for their relief ace? We'll probably never know after this extension – but the Braves have now inked three key members of their roster to long-term extensions, and Kimbrel is one of them. They're set up pretty well for the future, even if it's looking more and more like Justin Upton and Jason Heyward will be leaving down when their contracts expire after 2015.
