Giants, Bumgarner agree to one-year deal

According to Henry Schulman of the San Francisco Chronicle, the Giants have signed left-hander Madison Bumgarner to a one-year contract, close to $575,000.

Bumgarner is only 22, and like I have been saying for months now, there’s absolutely no reason the Giants should sign him to a long-term deal. He’s under the team’s control until 2015. By then, if he continues performing the way he has so far, he’ll start making so much through arbitration the Giants will want to sign him long-term.

But for now, the young lefty (who made $450,000 last season) will fall in line like the rest of baseball’s whipper snappers.

Schulman does a very good job explaining the reasons why young players don’t earn that much:

For the first three years of your big-league career, you basically play for the league minimum (now $480,000) or slightly above. Then you become eligible for salary arbitration and your paychecks rise exponentially until you reach six years of service time, when you can cut your own deal with anybody as a free agent.

Bumgarner might become arbitration-eligible next season as a “Super Two” player, and the Giants could work out a deal to buy out some of his arbitration years as they’ve done with Matt Cain, Tim Lincecum, Brian Wilson and now Pablo Sandoval. There is no urgency to do so, but if Bumgarner has a monster year the Giants will have to pony up more dough in arbitration.

Meanwhile, there is still no word on the Matt Cain contract situation. Cain is eligible to become a free agent at the end of this season and will either: a) wait until the season ends and play the market, or b) sign a contract extension before the regular season starts (it’s rumored he wants 5 or 6 years and at least $100 million dollars).