Duke Contract Puzzling

Zach Duke signed a one-year deal today Dejan tweets.   The deal was $4.3 million. 

And it had no performance bonuses.   This blows my mind.

Some players get hotel suites, round trip plane tickets.  The Bucs paid Aki more and he gets an interpreter.  Curiously Duke’s agent, Mark Pieper got nothing other than a fair contract for Duke. 

No drama.  No arbitration.

But how much was left on the floor by Pieper?  And wouldn’t the Pirates want to provide an incentive for Duke to perform this year?  If it can’t be K/9, WHIP, BB/9…  HELL how about a bonus based on the amount of times Duke can connect with a swinging backfist when Manager John Russell attempts to pull him with a ten-run lead?

We took a look at Paul Maholm’s contract because he is a good comparision based on previous career results.   Surely, Maholm didn’t let the Bucs off the hook in his contract negotiations.  Bang.  He didn’t.  We saw some details on Cot’s Contract website  that we anticipated.

We saw a line that I thought Pieper would surely use when negotiating with the Bucs:

"3 years/$14.5M (2009-11), plus 2012 club optionsigned extension with Pittsburgh 1/30/09 (avoided arbitration, $3.8M-$2.65M)$1.5M signing bonus09:$2M, 10:$4.5M, 11:$5.75M, 12:$9.75M club option ($0.75M buyout)2012 option may increase by $1.3M to $11.05M based on performance award bonuses"

The 2012 option may increase…….[read it again], it’s not huge, but   that is certainly something that would benefit both parties in the Bucs and Duke 2010 contact.  It’s another one year deal for Duke and the Bucs.   Why wouldn’t both sides want to motivate the other with a few performance clauses?

A vanilla deal.  No sprinkles.  No specialty cone.  Hmmm….sure makes him appealing to other clubs.

I don’t get it.  Why would Duke who was in the power seat let the Pirates off the hook like this?

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