Los Angeles – The top pitcher on the free-agent market is heading to the defending World Series champions.
Reigning National League Cy Young Award winner Trevor Bauer announced that he’s signing with the Los Angeles Dodgers in a YouTube video posted on Friday.
“This season is about making sure history remembers us as we wish to be remembered,” Bauer said at the end of the video. “This season is about adding to our legacy. And I can’t wait, Dodgers fans.
Multiple reports stated the deal is for three years and $102 million, with opt-outs at the end of each of the first two seasons. Bauer would earn $40 million in 2021 and $45 million in 2022. The 30-year-old’s 2021 salary would make him the highest-paid player in MLB history.
In the 2020 season, which was shortened to 60 games by the COVID-19 pandemic, Bauer was 5-4 with a 1.73 ERA, 100 strikeouts and 17 walks over 73 innings in 11 starts. He became the first Cincinnati Reds pitcher to win the Cy Young and the eighth player to become a free agent immediately after winning the award.
In nine seasons with the Reds, Cleveland Indians and Arizona Diamondbacks, Bauer is 75-64 with a career 3.90 ERA. He has 1,279 strikeouts and 454 walks in 1,190 innings pitched. He was an All-Star and finished sixth in the Cy Young voting when he went 12-6 with a 2.21 ERA for Cleveland in 2018.
Bauer will be one of three Cy Young winners in the Dodgers’ rotation, joining Clayton Kershaw, who won the NL Cy Young in 2011, 2013 and 2014, and David Price, the American League winner in 2012. Price opted out last season, when the Dodgers went 43-17 in the regular season and defeated the Tampa Bay Rays in six games to win the World Series.
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Source : Baseball – The Japan Times