He's having a great season, and I love Crawford, but I'm not wild about this.

I don't think it's too high a price to reward a long-time contributor as well as maintain clubhouse harmony and cohesion during a contending stretch. The Giants don't need contract distractions right now.

It’s a perfectly cromulent deal. 2 years betting on 2-3 WAR per year. They didn’t have to make a 5 year commit which is the big win

As if a 5-year contract for a 35-yo was remotely in play here.

@2: Yeah, that's fair. But he is a risk...

I don't think Crawford is THAT big a risk, especially considering a legitimate in-house replacement is still at least two years away. The base salary is only a small raise, and if he earns any of the bonuses, the Giants would be more than happy to pay them. Besides, wouldn't Giants fans like to see Crawford retire a career Giant? I would have thought hometown fans would have been pretty pleased with the deal.

He'll be a little overpaid, but probably post about 2 WAR each year. There are worse things to do than to reward a career Giant with a small overpay.

I don't think it's too high a price to reward a long-time contributor as well as maintain clubhouse harmony and cohesion during a contending stretch. The Giants don't need contract distractions right now.

That is the point I would take. Ultimately based upon his performance this year, he's very unlikely to be a below average player (2 war over a full season) for the length of the contract, and if he remotely repeats his current season, he's a bargain, and if he tanks, all you have done is shown to the other players that you are serious about treating the players fairly and trying to compete.

I'm not seeing any way the Giants lose out here, everything they do, regardless of what happens forward can be spinned as a positive.

Ok, you guys convinced me.

yeah, this is sort of anti-Cubs.

guy has been a solid if not great player for multiple championship seasons and is killing it this year. fans like him.

from cold hard data, not sure it's justified.

but the players and the fans are real, live people, and they'll all like this. I imagine the Giants have made a profit on Crawford over the years, so he gets a friendly deal that still might work for the home team.

Crawford's extension deserves further research. It's rare for a veteran with an established level of production to have a career year at age 34. I wonder how teams in the past have handled similar situations (widening the net to ages 31-35, let's say) in the past.

Just a couple of players who jumped to mind as reasonably comparable

Bret Boone signed for 3/25 in 2001
Mike Lowell signed for 3/37 in 2007

Both had sentimental ties to the organization, and both had been established as good, not great players prior to their big years. The Mariners got two good years out of Boone, while the Sox got and average year out of Lowell. When adjusting for inflation, Crawford's contract looks fairly similar to those two. In fact it's probably better - that third year isn't adding anything of value, and 32 million today is a lot less in baseball numbers than 25 in 2001.