Scherzer discusses decision to leave Detroit
Righty knew club couldn't keep everyone, says he maximized his worth
DETROIT -- At some point two years ago, Max Scherzer said, he and fellow Tigers starter Rick Porcello looked at each other and saw this time coming, when Detroit's rotation would have to be broken up.
"We sat on the bench and we saw this coming really two years ago," Scherzer told Matt Shepard on WDFN Friday morning. "We saw where everybody was at in their contracts. We sat there and realized this team is going to get a major facelift in the next two years. There's just no way you can keep everybody on board.
"We looked at each other like, 'Which one of us is going to go?'"
Turns out, it was both of them.
Much like Scherzer's decision to sign his seven-year, $210 million deal with the Nationals last month, he said, it's part of the business. Scherzer tried to explain his side of it.
"I realize how fortunate I am and how blessed I am to be in this position," he told Shepard. "This was never about greed or I need more money per se, but it was about a business decision and trying to maximize what you're worth. And for me, I was in the position to take full advantage of that, and the Nationals came through and put a contract offer in front of me that … was jaw-dropping.
"... It's the business part of the game. The business part of the game is ugly. I mean, look at it from the other side. I've seen so many of my friends get cut and released and all taken advantage of because at the end of the day, we say it's the business part of the game. I just took advantage of the business side of the game to benefit me."
Scherzer said the six-year, $144 million offer from the Tigers last spring was the last of their negotiations.
"There was a point in time when we reached out to the Tigers to see if they were still interested," Scherzer said, "and they conveyed to us that they weren't, that they were fine with where their rotation was at moving forward. And that's just kind of how we left it."