Tigers should follow Colt Keith extension with this move after Roman Anthony payday

On Wednesday afternoon, Jeff Passan dropped a rare, post-trade deadline bombshell: the Red Sox were finalizing an eight-year, $130 million contract extension with former No. 1 overall prospect Roman Anthony.

After a lot of weird stalling, Anthony made his debut on June 9 and is just about matching expectations. He's batting .283 with an .828 OPS, 15 doubles, a triple, two homers, and 19 RBI in his first 46 games. Although he was the last of the Red Sox's Big Three (Anthony, Marcelo Mayer, and Kristian Campbell) to get his major league debut, he's the first the team is locking up this early.

The Tigers doled out an extension themselves ahead of the 2024 season; Colt Keith got a six-year, $28.64 million deal before he'd ever taken an at-bat in the majors. It's a paltry $4.77 million AAV in comparison to Anthony's $16.25 million (Anthony's deal also includes major escalators), but it was a big move for the Tigers at the time, as they hadn't finalized an extension to a position player since Miguel Cabrera's in 2014.

However, the Tigers might have an opportunity to one-up themselves and maybe even the Red Sox. Tigers' No. 1 prospect Kevin McGonigle is the sixth-best in baseball, and could very well make an argument to enter the top five this season. He's in Double-A, but the Tigers gave Keith his extension after just 67 games in Triple-A, and McGonigle looks even better. So far, he's giving the front office every reason to start thinking about paying up.

Tigers could give No. 1 prospect Kevin McGonigle an extension to rival Roman Anthony's bombshell deal, surpass Colt Keith's

Anthony can make up to $230 million through 2034, which makes this rather small deal make more sense for him in the long-term. McGonigle is looking almost just as good in his first 17 games with the SeaWolves as Anthony did in his first 17 games in Double-A Portland.

There's already reason to believe that McGonigle will surpass Keith on the field, though Keith has improved a lot this season and is earning his keep. McGonigle's .318/.416/.495 career line through the minors is, in a lot of ways, better than Keith's (.300/.382/.512) in almost as many games.

The Tigers are definitely going to want to see how McGonigle fares after some time in Triple-A, and then maybe even through a few months in the majors, but if he works out as swimmingly as Anthony has, there's no reason he shouldn't be making a similar amount of money. Detroit already proved that they can open their purses for guys they really love, so let's kick it up notch.