The Dozier extension

Brian Dozier's negotiating stance:
Give me $20 million or ...

The Twins announced Tuesday morning a four-year contract extension with Brian Dozier. The deal buys out the second baseman's arbitration seasons but doesn't delay his entry into free agency.

As such, it represents a smoothing of the risks. The Twins' risk: If Dozier's knee gets blown out by a baserunner in April, they're still paying him $20 million through 2018. Dozier's risk: If he hits .320 with 45 homers, he can't cash in on that level of production.

$20 million is a life-changing sum, to be sure, but it is a reasonable, maybe a bit low, approximation of what Dozier figured to make in his arbitration years. The Twins didn't add to their years of control of his contract, and they can plug a precise figure into their spreadsheets when figuring salary totals for the next four years.

None of which matters much to me. I'm more concerned about this: Dozier turns 28 in May. The typical peak season for a major league player comes at age 27. So Dozier is already past his theoretical peak year, and the Twins chose this moment to deepen their commitment to him.

The Twins apparently don't see it that way:

Ryan: "We anticipate he's in the prime of his career, suspect it's going to spike, some of numbers he has put up."
— Mike Berardino (@MikeBerardino) March 24, 2015

Put this contract in the list of reasons to believe the Twins are more resistant to the analytic approach to running a team than they think they are.