The allure of both Harper and Machado is that they are relatively young as free agents hitting the market since they both started in the bigs as teenagers. Hence the huge money. I don't think either is a generational player deserving $300M. Neither has an AROD type resume entering free agency.
Bryce has two monster seasons (.330 BA and 1.109 OPS in 2015 and .319 and 1.008 OPS in 2017) and then a few just OK seasons mixed in. Just a weird roller coaster of a career thus far. Shows superstar talent and then has weird clunker seasons. With plenty of questions about being a good teammate etc.
In my opinion Machado has a much weaker case than Bryce for the big money. He has similar questions about being a good teammate / head case. But he's never had a monster year. And the best OPS of his career was last year at .905. Career .822 OPS guy gets $300M? Defense can't possibly be THAT good. I understand you have to overpay to as a small market team (my Ms did the same thing with Cano), but I just don't understand the allure of Machado as a huge $ player, especially given his antics in the playoffs last year.
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