By Tom

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Let’s take a quick quiz to make sure none of you have been in a coma recently.

Carlos Correa is a _____________!

1. New York Met
2. San Francisco Giant
3. New York Yankee
4. Chicago Cub
5. Colorado Rockie
6. Cleveland Guardian
7. Texas Ranger
8. Los Angeles Dodger
9. Minnesota Twin
10. San Diego Padre

And the correct answer in this week’s Carlos Correa’s sweepstakes is!

Source confirms: Carlos Correa in agreement with Twins on six-year, $200M contract. Deal can max out at $270M with vesting options for four additional years. Pending physical. First: @JeffPassan, @JonHeyman.

— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) January 10, 2023

Well howdy-doody! After watching their star shortstop opt out of a contract and head into free agency aiming to lock down a serious payday, the Minnesota Twins have lucked themselves into regaining that prized shortstop and at a premium. 

Prior to last season, Correa signed a 3-year $105.3 million deal with the Twins with an opt-out clause that he took after just one season. The Twins were somewhat competitive in the atrocious AL Central, before faltering toward the end, along with the White Sox as they watched the plucky Cleveland Guardians and their criminally low payroll snatch the division. Correa, to his credit, whacked 22 homers and posted a 140 OPS+ for the season.

Prior to the Twins scooping him up, Carlos had just penciled in a 12 year $315 million deal with the New York Mets, a team that’s currently at war with the luxury tax. Prior to that deal, Correa had signed a 13 year $350 million contract with the San Francisco Giants. Both deals went up in smoke because of concerns raised during his physical.

What has plagued Correa his whole career has been his health, despite a very fine season in which he rang up a 5.4 bWAR, Carlos missed 26 games with a fractured finger–and Covid 19–and hasn’t played in 150+ games since his sophomore 2016 season. Despite all this, Correa has racked up nearly 40 bWAR, a 7.2 rate for a 162 game season. It’s no doubt that when he is healthy he is not just very good, but flat-out elite. 

I’m sure it’s why he bet on himself this offseason. Despite his injury-plague past, Correa has been healthy enough to qualify for every major batting category the last three seasons. His finger fracture was a freak incident in which he was hit on that very same hand twice. His past trips to the IL have been for a litany of other issues: in 2017 he injured a ligament in his left thumb, in 2018 he suffered a back injury, and in 2019 he had a rib fracture–which he received from his wife giving him a massage. 

Okay what is it? Did these physical-inspecting doctors find issues with his back? 

That 2014 ankle injury cost Carlos Correa a guaranteed $150 million after the #SFGiants original 13-year, $350 million proposal

— Bob Nightengale (@BNightengale) January 10, 2023

No? Oh that’s interesting.

Obviously if you’re a baseball nut you’ve been following the Correa saga, and the Giants and Mets medical staff raised concerns over an issue that has yet to crop up into Correa’s MLB playing career. In 2014 then minor-leaguer Carlos Correa slid into second and fractured his right fibula along with ligament damage. This lower-leg injury has caused considerable concern between the Mets and Giants, who, after discovering these concerns, opted to put Correa’s deal on hold with plans to restructure it. 

It has been nothing short of a PR nightmare for Correa and his agent Scott Boras. While it would be nice to know exactly what is wrong with Correa’s leg–so much so that the Minnesota Twins don’t care or in fact playing 4-D chess right now–there is this thing call HIPAA that prevents hogs like us from feasting. Conjecture aside, it’s worth pointing out that Correa’s injury history does not feature anything pertinent to that leg until, well recently, when Correa left a game in September for what he described as a “numb” and “vibrating” sensation. 

Carlos Correa bet on himself and lost. And that’s sad, even though we here at Worst Fans Inc. think he’s a cheater because of the whole Astros thing and want to laugh at him; we can’t put our pettiness first when a clearly gifted and talented athlete is losing out on getting paid somewhat more equitably for the production and wealth he provides for these organizations.

We’ll laugh at the Mets though. LOL, loooooooosers.

The Twins, meanwhile…well, if you truly love something let it go, and if it comes back then it’s meant to be. God I’m going to throw up.