CBS Sports is reporting that the Philadelphia Phillies have interest in former Tigers' OF Magglio Ordonez. The six-time All-Star held a workout today for several MLB teams to prove that he's healed from the ankle injury that plagued him last season. Reports are that his agent, Scott Boras, is looking for a two deal in the area of $8 to $10 million per year for the 36-year-old slugger.
Boras says that the interest in Ordonez has increased since Jayson Werth came off the market.
"Magglio is a guy that has gotten a lot of interest from a lot of teams, now that Jayson has signed. He’s a middle-of-the-order guy. Great batting average. Productive guy. A veteran player. A winner. There are a lot of things about Magglio that fit a broad base of teams. Once Jayson signed, a lot of teams interested in Jayson are now interested in Magglio."
Ordonez is a right-handed bat and as a hitter is superior to Jayson Werth. He's one of the better pure hitters in the last decade period.. but he is 36 years old now. While he may not be likely to regress significantly as a hitter, there are legitimate questions about how many games a team can reasonably expect him to play in the outfield for the rest of his career. For a National League team that doesn't have the option of DH-ing him, it makes the potential $20 million price tag prohibitive. You need a guy to play pretty much every day if you're investing $10 million a year in him.
For that reason, I'm pretty skeptical of the Phillies interest in Ordonez. Most likely, the Phillies are being mentioned by Boras because they're a team with some money and in need of a right outfield bat. He's going to want other teams to think the Phillies are in the mix.
That said, the Phillies did give 36-year-old Raul Ibanez a three-year deal worth $10 mil a year. So in that sense, maybe they don't see two years for $20 mil as too much for Ordonez, who's a better hitter than Raul.