While Cleveland traded Francisco Lindor away to the New York Mets ahead of his contract year, the franchise is hopeful to avoid a similar conclusion with José Ramírez.
ESPN's Jeff Passan reported Wednesday that Cleveland "would love" to do another extension with Ramírez, one of the league's preeminent infielders. Ramírez is entering the final guaranteed year of an extremely team-friendly four-year/$26 million deal, though Cleveland does possess $12 and $14 million options for the following two seasons that they'll almost certainly exercise.
Unless Ramírez could convince Cleveland to give him more money in 2022 and/or 2023, the 28-year-old wouldn't seem to have a ton of motivation to sign a new deal right this minute. Indeed, Passan says that Ramírez "has resisted" to this point, but notes that Cleveland "isn't losing sleep over it."
While Lindor was the most well-known player on some loaded Cleveland teams the past few years, FanGraphs says that since the start of the 2017 team, Ramírez has been the most valuable offensive player on the team, and the fourth-most valuable offensive player in baseball. Considering he's finished in the top three in American League MVP voting three times in the last four years, that shouldn't be especially surprising, but it feels like it is.
With Lindor, Carlos Carrasco and Brad Hand having departed in the offseason, Ramírez and Cleveland have their work cut out as they attempt to navigate through a division where the Chicago White Sox and Minnesota Twins both could win north of 90 games.
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