Carl Crawford Confirms The Angels Are Weird

In a story by Sports Illustrated’s Jon Heyman Carl Crawford confirms what we already knew. The Angels pursuit of his services this off-season was really weird. When asked about the Angels courtship Crawford had this to say:

"“They obviously didn’t want me that bad because I’m a Red Sox,” Crawford said. “I don’t know what happened.”“Everything’s good,” Crawford said. “This is a good team, they obviously wanted me and the financial situation was good.”“It was weird,” he said. “I heard they said my contract was too much. Then they paid more (per year) to Vernon Wells. I didn’t understand that.”"

The story confirms what Arte Moreno said earlier this off season. It wasn’t necessarily the $$ amount that scared the Halos away it was the 7 years with that $$ amount tied up. The contract was too long more so than it was too much. While Crawford is correct, the Angels will pay more per year to Wells , the  Angels can take solace in the fact that Wells will only be 35 when his deal is up. The Red Sox ( or someone else) will be paying 20 plus million dollars for a 36 -37 year old outfielder,whose biggest asset is speed. Crawford is a great talent so there’s no reason to assume he’ll fall off by that age, but at the same time 7 years is 7 years and 36 years old is well… 36 years old.

So while Carl is correct,  the Angels did handle his pursuit strangely , at least we know there is a method to their madness.