This isn't the Boston Red Sox lowballing Jon Lester with a $70 million offer back in 2014. There have been only a dozen $200 million contracts in Major League Baseball history. Only four of those were contract extensions Ryon Healy Jersey , and three of them went to players (Joey Votto, Miguel Cabrera and Clayton Kershaw)who were more accomplished than Bryant is now.The one exception is Giancarlo Stanton, whose 13-year, $325 million dealin 2014 with the Miami Marlins still stands as the largest in MLB history. He owned 21.3 career wins above replacement through five seasonsat the time. Bryant owns 21.6 career WAR through one fewer season. This is not to mention his National League Rookie of the Year Award, NL MVP or World Series ring.Ah, but the catch: Whereas Stanton was coming off his age-24 season and a career year, Bryant is 26 and coming off a career-worst season.The numbers tell half the story. Bryant played in only 102 games and set new career lows in batting average (.272), slugging percentage (.460), OPS (.834) http://www.marinersfanproshop.com/authentic-dee-gordon-jersey , home runs (13) and WAR (1.9).The other half of the story is couched in Bryant's trouble with the injury bug. His left shoulder started bothering him relatively early in the season and put him on the disabled list June 26. He played in only 10 games between then and Sept. 1, when he was finally back for good.The left is Bryant's lead shoulder when he's in the batter's box. Such injuries are known to sap power from sluggers. Bryant proved to be no exception, as his isolated power (extra bases per at-bat) took a huge hit in the latter half of his season:It's possible鈥攑erhaps even likely, in light of Kaplan's apparent walkback of his "last several months" remark鈥攖hat the Cubs made their $200 million offer before Bryant's shoulder fell to pieces and that he therefore had no idea that his sky-high value was about to take a hit. If so, there's no scolding him in retrospect.On the chance Bryant said no to their offerafter his shoulder woes began, his and Boras' insistence on waiting for free agency looks all the more risky.According to Teddy Greenstein of theChicago Tribune, Bryant took his shoulder injury as an excuse to alter a practice routine that may have been overtaxing his body. That could resuscitate his power. Or, the cure may be worse than disease. After all, whatever he was doing before coincided with him slamming 94 home runs between 2015 and 2017.If Bryant's shoulder saga doesn't precipitate a lasting power decline Robinson Cano Jersey , the natural order of things might. Although power ages well relative to other skills, FanGraphs' Jeff Zimmerman found in 2014 that modern power hitters peak early and then start declining in their late 20s.With his 27th birthday on January 4, 2019, Bryant will be there soon. He'll be 29 when he reaches free agency and looking to sell his age-30 season and beyond. At that age, any and all red flags are going to be heavily scrutinized. Perhaps enough to leave him well short of the contract he and Boras have in mind now.Of course, this is the sky-is-falling take on a report of questionable veracity. If it is true, maybe Bryant has alternative reasons for turning down the offer鈥攅.g., waiting to see if the Cubs sign his good buddy Bryce Harper or for some resolution with the service-time grievance he filed in 2015. And either way, things may go swimmingly for him in his final three seasons under Cub control.But if a guy is going to say no to $200 million Felix Hernandez Jersey , he'd better have every assurance that he can do better in the near future. Bryant doesn't. Stats courtesy of Baseball Reference and FanGraphs. Locked in a battle with Houston for the AL West crown and in the middle of one of the most challenging stretches of the schedule this season, Oakland A’s manager Bob Melvin plans to be creative with his starting rotation for the time being.That will start Sunday when Chris Bassitt is recalled from Triple-A Nashville to start against the Minnesota Twins at Target Field.That will allow Melvin to give all his starters an extra day before their next turn.Article continues below ...“What the schedule allows you to do this year is give some guys some extra rest,” Melvin said Saturday. “We have been leaning on them a little more here recently. So, we want to make sure these guys are fresh down the stretch. ‘Bass’ is pitching pretty well down there at this point, so he’ll get the start tomorrow. We won’t go with a six-man rotation.”Bassitt has a 4.25 ERA in 17 appearances for Nashville this season and 2-3 with a 3.39 ERA and 25 strikeouts in six starts for the A’s. His last big league appearance came on July 11 when he allowed three runs over five innings in the A’s 3-2 victory over the Astros.Melvin also has the luxury of a deep and relatively rested bullpen at his disposal to spell his starters or cover innings in the event of a short start.He’ll also try and get some of his position players a break, too, during this run of 20 games in 20 days. Matt Olson was held out of the starting lineup Saturday after playing in all 129 of Oakland’s games to that point.“We’ll see where it goes,” Melvin said. “He doesn’t want anything to do with it, but talking to the training staff Hisashi Iwakuma Jersey , there are a few guys that we will look to maybe try to do this with. (Saturday) was his day.”Sunday will mark the first time that Minnesota right-hander Jose Berrios faces the A’s during his three seasons in the major leagues.Berrios took no decision his last time out despite holding the White Sox to a run on four hits and a pair of walks while striking out four over five innings of work in a game that included a 52-minute rain delay.“Give Jose a lot of credit,” Twins manager Paul Molitor said. “We were right on the edge there of putting him back out there. Just concerned about how much time went by. He did a nice job of putting up some zeroes after the delay.”Berrios had just started throwing his warmup pitches for the second inning when the game was delayed but Molitor decided to send him back out when play resumed.“I didn’t want to come out of the game,” Berrios said. “I kept myself warm, and that’s why they kept me in the game. I didn’t really play catch. Just move around, stretch myself, roll out my arm. When (Molitor) figured out what time we were going to start, I went into my routine: play catch and then go to the mound.”He’s looking for his first victory since Aug. 4. In three starts since, he has a 5.68 ERA over 12 2/3 innings of work.
