Harper’s bizarre baseball deal

The Philadelphia Phillies deal with Bryce Harper is so long it’s basically as if they adopted a Galapagos tortoise.

Bryce Harper 13-year contract with the Philadelphia Phillies is worth $465 million. Picture: AP

Thirteen years!

I can’t be the only person who paused this week when word arrived that the Philadelphia Phillies were signing the free-agent baseball star Bryce Harper to an eye-popping 13-year contact with no player opt-out.

Thirteen years! No opt-out! A commitment that’s so committed, it’s as if the Phillies adopted a Galapagos tortoise.

Keep in mind: I didn’t pause at the $US330 million ($465m) the Phillies have agreed to pay Harper — that’s also a daffy number, a baseball record, but defensible moolah in the context of modern professional sport, and not even the most per-year money in the Major Leagues.

But a 13-year deal? Baseball has only seen one of those, to Yankee-via-Marlin Giancarlo Stanton, who was younger when he did his, and his contract does have an opt-out. I know the baseball wonks will give me reasons this Harper deal makes perfect sense. I’m sure they’re right.

I just don’t know if it’s possible in 2019 to commit 13 years in advance to anything. I can’t commit to lunch next Wednesday.

My wife and I are due to celebrate 10 years of marriage this year. Every anniversary, she looks me straight in the eye and says, “Yeah, we’ll see how it goes, pal.”

My kids? I love them, but they’re both on two-year deals, with a parent option. If they’re not out of the house within 13 years, I’m removing them both with a forklift.

Only our cat has a lifetime deal. Have you ever tried to negotiate with a cat?

This is a common dilemma. Few of us have security any more; loyalty is a dying quality. The Journal could toss me out the door at any minute, replace me with a nice, birdwatching column, maybe a crossword puzzle, and you’d all probably be better off.

I don’t mean to sound dramatic, but not a single one of us is promised tomorrow. This is life. When you think about it, we’re all technically on short-term deals.

But not Harper and the Phillies. They must really be in love. After a long off-season of waiting, stalling, and more waiting, this feels like a wedding. I feel like I’m supposed to buy Harper and the Phillies a blender. And give a boozy speech.

Baseball has seen more than a few decade-long contracts, and the Mets have a cockamamie arrangement to pay Bobby Bonilla until the year 4000. But Harper’s deal is far from the wildest in sport: the NBA Lakers gave a 25-year deal to Magic Johnson. Ice hockey has had some kooky contracts, like a 17-year one for Ilya Kovalchuk, which got thrown out by the NHL and replaced with a somewhat saner 15-year deal. (Kovalchuk wound up retiring from the NHL in 2013 and playing in Russia, though he’s now back in the league with the LA Kings.)

All of these long-term deals look pretty sharp at the beginning. Even the middle can be OK. It’s the end that’s the problem.

Bryce Harper is 26 years old, one of the most dynamic talents in baseball, even if 2018 was an off season for him. When his new contract with the Phillies expires in 2031, he will be … let me just check the maths here … 97 years old, with floppy grey hair, patrolling the outfield in a cherry-red Rascal cap.

Where does such dealmaking confidence come from? Nothing lasts any more. People rotate through jobs, houses, spouses, banks, cars, gyms, phones, hairstyles. That restaurant down the street used to be a pharmacy, which used to be a veterinarian’s office, which used to be a jail.

Who knows what the planet will look like in 13 years? It’s entirely possible we’ll all be living in space, drinking space juice and eating space pizza. The robots will have taken all of our jobs. The President will be Bill Belichick. The Marlins might be good. Or playing on an island.

Committing to 13 years! No disrespect to Harper (or Stanton), but it goes against all we know about sport, and all we know about society. I haven’t even gotten to the fact that Philadelphia sports fans can be occasionally hard to please. Thirteen years could wind up feeling like 1300.

But I don’t want to be a pessimist. I wish Bryce Harper and the Phillies the best, always and forever. Please let me know where to ship the wedding blender. I got them a nice one, with a 90-day warranty.