You want to get a pretty good baseball argument going? Then ask a front office executive what he thinks Jose Reyes will receive as a free agent.
I have been doing exactly that for months, and as recently as this week (but before Reyes officially was placed on the disabled list), I had two executives I respect diverge by $70 million on a final price. One said Reyes would get “no more than $90 million,” and the other predicted seven years at $160 million.
Undoubtedly the latest hamstring injury is going to impact the Reyes market. It interrupted an MVP-caliber season and reminded the industry — if such a reminder were necessary — how susceptible Reyes has been to leg injuries.
It also does not help Reyes’ value that Carl Crawford has been on the DL since mid-June with a hamstring strain, or that two players with a similarity to Reyes in that they are speed-based, switch-hitting infielders — Rafael Furcal and Chone Figgins — have fallen apart in their early 30s during long-term contracts.
Crawford’s seven-year, $142 million pact, signed last offseason with Boston, has been viewed as the key comparable in the eventual Reyes negotiation. Reyes is a year younger than Crawford, switch-hits and plays a more premium position. But until this year, Crawford had been the more consistent, durable performer.
As I reported last week, Mets general manager Sandy Alderson has come to believe that making a significant offer to try to retain Reyes is critical. Nevertheless, the organization always was going to be hesitant to go to six years with an offer, and certainly not seven. Thus, the injury could be a blessing in disguise, because it should lower the bids around the game and, all things being equal, Reyes almost certainly would favor staying a Met.
The Mets’ problem would come from one of these two areas: 1) So many teams are in it that the bidding slowly climbs and climbs; 2) Injury or not, there is at least one team that will blow away the field. For example, no one saw the Nationals coming before they grossly overpaid for Jayson Werth (seven years, $126 million).
“Clearly four or five teams were not in on Crawford,” an AL official said. “The Angels were the other team and offered $108 million with a sixth-year option that could have gotten it to $123 million. Boston was a motivated buyer, wanting the player and afraid that if the Yanks failed on Cliff Lee they would jump in on Crawford. Crawford was about what one big-market team was willing to do. Will that happen with Reyes? And, if it doesn’t, is the price well under $142 million? Or does having four to five teams bid, which Reyes will probably have, force the price up?”
So which teams should the Mets fear either being aggressive within a large pool or bidding way more than expected to blow away the field? It helps the Mets that the Yankees and Red Sox are not expected to be serious contenders. Yankees GM Brian Cashman already has said the team will not pursue Reyes (of course, he said the Yankees would not sign Rafael
Soriano either, so who knows what his bosses do, especially if the Yankees and Derek Jeter falter the rest of the way).
The Red Sox will be leery after this problematic season with Crawford, plus they spent more than $300 million in long-term deals last season for Crawford and Adrian Gonzalez and do not seem to have the financial boldness to go there again for another position player.
So with a half season to go until free agency, this is what the field looks like:
PHILLIES
On one hand, they have tons of dough already tied up in a veteran lot. But their window for success is the next 2-3 years while players such as Roy Halladay, Cliff Lee, Ryan Howard, Chase Utley, Cole Hamels and Shane Victorino remain at or near their peak. As the additions of Halladay, Lee and Roy Oswalt have shown, the Phillies are willing to invest to keep the best period in franchise history going. One AL assistant GM said, “[GM] Ruben [Amaro] is wired for the big deal, and this would be a body blow to the Wilpons.”
Jimmy Rollins is the Phillies’ Jeter — central to the team’s success, but also slipping. His contract and that of Raul Ibanez expire, and if the Phillies don’t pick up the options on Oswalt and Brad Lidge, that would give them nearly $50 million in evaporating deals just among those four.
BREWERS
Their owner, Mark Attanasio, doesn’t accept that a small market has to go into dip cycles and has shown an aggressive bent. Prince Fielder is going to leave as a free agent. They do not have much of a farm system to draw from to sustain success or make trades to reconstitute.
“You could argue they are a better team with Reyes at shortstop and Mat Gamel at first than Yuniesky Betancourt at short and Fielder at first,” an AL executive said. “And Reyes is going to be less expensive long-term than Fielder.”
GIANTS
They have been burned by big deals to Barry Zito and Aaron Rowand, and they have to figure out what to do long-term with Matt Cain (free agent after 2012) and Tim Lincecum (after 2013). But they have a win-now rotation, a horrible crew of position players and are selling out every home game, something they want to extend with more success. The Giants have more than $23 million coming off the books in bit players such as Miguel Tejada, Cody Ross, Mark DeRosa and Jeremy Affeldt, and Rowand and Zito expire in the two subsequent years.
One GM called the Giants “the obvious choice” and sees San Francisco bidding $120 million to try and land Reyes.
MARINERS
The Figgins debacle could keep them out, and the word within the sport is that payroll is not going to be dramatically expanded. But they are surprisingly in the race, have excellent starting pitching and two infield building blocks in first baseman Justin Smoak and second baseman Dustin Ackley. They desperately need more offense.
NATIONALS
They are much more closely associated with Fielder because of their proven willingness to do big deals with his agent, Scott Boras. They are in win-now mode. They know landing Reyes would devastate a fellow NL East team.
Do the bad results of the Werth deal keep them out on Reyes?
TIGERS
Owner Mike Ilitch has shown fearlessness with big deals and has $23 million coming off the books with Carlos Guillen and Magglio Ordonez. Detroit could move revived shortstop Jhonny Peralta to third, make Brandon Inge a jack-of-all trades and have Reyes turn spacious Comerica Park into his triple factory.
ANGELS
Owner Arte Moreno has shown an aversion to going the last mile to land a mega-free agent. Erick Aybar is a pretty good shortstop. But their offense is way down, and they have more than $25 million disappearing with the expiring contracts of Joel Pineiro, Scott Kazmir and Fernando Rodney. Reyes’ two-way skills and speed game fit manager Mike Scioscia’s style of play.
CARDINALS
No shot if Albert Pujols stays. But if he leaves, St. Louis will have to reconfigure and has been looking for a shortstop for a long time.
ORIOLES
They have two good shortstop prospects in the minors, notably Manny Machado, and have shown a desire to want to re-sign walk-year shortstop J.J. Hardy. But Machado has the frame to move to third when he arrives, and the Orioles see that they cannot break through the bottom rungs of the AL East unless they add difference-making players.
The O’s also see the Nationals starting to gain traction in their backyard, and if the Pirates follow through with a winning season this year, the organization with the longest stretch of losing seasons would be Baltimore, dating to 1998.
DODGERS
Not unless the ownership situation is resolved, and that seems unlikely by the winter. A new owner could make a Reyes splash, but they do have young shortstop Dee Gordon and a clear memory of Furcal going rotten on their payroll.
ASTROS
I was shocked, but three different executives threw Houston in as at least long shots because of an infusion of money with a new owner and new cable deal. One executive also mentioned the A’s, saying the perception is Oakland likes Reyes a great deal and hungers for long-term offense. However, where do the A’s get the money?
joel.sherman@nypost.com