Zimmerman, Nats Take Leap of Faith

WASHINGTON – It took the one player already most identified with baseball in Washington to put an exclamation point on the Nationals' efforts to change.

Ryan Zimmerman, the Nationals' first-ever draft pick and all-time leader in runs, hits, doubles, home runs, extra-base hits and RBI, signed a five-year, $45 million contract extension Monday at Nationals Park, culminating a busy month and a half for the organization.

"This is where I want to be for a long time," Zimmerman said at a press conference Monday. "It's a family atmosphere and there's nowhere else I'd rather be."

Former general manager Jim Bowden left the organization on March 1 after he was linked to a scouting scandal and came under federal investigation. Acting GM Mike Rizzo and team president Stan Kasten have moved swiftly in the wake of Bowden's departure to make the Bowden era seem like a distant memory.

They optioned talented, but struggling, center fielder Lastings Milledge to Triple-A last week, cleaned house in the bullpen after it blew late leads in three consecutive games over the weekend against the Marlins and finally secured Zimmerman's future with the club through the 2013 season.

"We have been stepping up and I think doing the right things in the last few months, and continuing, I think, to do one right thing after another, hopefully to complete the puzzle," Kasten said. "[Signing Zimmerman] is a big thing ... to demonstrate our commitment to building a team the right way."

It is all too easy to look at Zimmerman's extension as a move smacking of desperation. The attendance figures in the second year at Nationals Park are not pretty. Washington has sagged into the lower third in the major leagues early in the season, a reflection of the team's 102-loss campaign in 2008 and 1-10 start to this year. Inking the most recognizable player in the team's short history to a big-money extension is an awfully good way to distract fans and media from another humiliating sweep at the hands of the Florida Marlins, after all.

But in reality, the groundwork for Zimmerman's extension was laid beginning back in December 2006, after his first full season with the club. Zimmerman and his agent, Brodie Van Wagenen, began talking to Bowden, Kasten and the Lerner family then, but negotiations only accelerated this year, when the third baseman first became eligible for arbitration.

Though Zimmerman and the team avoided arbitration, he wound up with a one-year, $3.325 million deal that established a baseline for the rest of the contract negotiations, the terms of which were only agreed upon 20 minutes before Zimmerman's hard deadline to halt talks -- first pitch on Opening Day -- well before he or the Nationals knew things would get so ugly so early in 2009.

The third baseman was adamant about not discussing an extension during the season, a source told FanHouse.

"It just sort of happened organically because we were moving in the right direction," Kasten said. "I don't think we or Ryan ever felt the crushing time pressure ... even if it didn't get done this year."

Though he is considered a cornerstone of Washington's ongoing rebuilding effort, Zimmerman's $45 million deal -- which will pay him a base salary of $3.325 million this year, $6.25 million in 2010, $8.925 million in 2011, $12 million in 2012 and $14 million in 2013 -- represents an enormous show of faith by the Nationals in his abilities.

It is the largest guaranteed contract in the history of the Nationals or the Expos, and the first five-year deal the franchise has handed out since Vladimir Guerrero signed a five-year, $28 million extension in September 1998. And it is one of the largest pre-free agency extensions given to a player who has never made the playoffs or been named an All-Star.

Zimmerman struggled with injuries in 2008, playing only 106 games, and his OPS has fallen every season, dipping all the way to a pedestrian .774 last year. In other words, his recent performance on the field hardly justifies such a gaudy payday.

But, still just 24, Zimmerman seems to have the Nationals convinced there are great things in his future. Likewise, he is taking his own leap of faith -- counting on the fact that he can accomplish great things in Washington, where rebuilding has come so far in fits and starts, with two steps forward and too often one step back.

All he has known with the Nationals is losing, and most players wouldn't tie themselves to a team long-term if they thought it would stay that way.

"I've been convinced that [the organization is] on the right path for awhile," Zimmerman said.

"This offseason was a huge step," he added, referencing the signing of Adam Dunn and the trade for Scott Olsen and Josh Willingham.

Though Zimmerman and Kasten are both uncomfortable with third baseman's almost universal designation as the face of the franchise, the extension solidifies his status as precisely that, tying his fate -- his successes and failures on the field -- inextricably to Kasten, Rizzo, manager Manny Acta and even the Lerner family itself.

"I guess I'm the other guy now," Zimmerman joked, referencing the major league debut of pitcher Jordan Zimmermann Monday, which was overshadowed by his contract news.

No such luck, Zim No. 1. Not when you're the highest-paid player for a franchise desperately searching for traction.

FanHouse's Ed Price contributed to this story.