Clearing Up Magglio Ordonez's Option Years

In the comments of one of my last posts, John B., appeared to have some confusion over Magglio's options years and I think I can word it better than I had previously.

Magg's contract runs out after this year. He has options for the 2010 ($18 million) and 2011 ($15 million) seasons -- both of which are club-options. However, the option years can be guaranteed if he reaches a couple of benchmarks via the wording in his deal.

The 2010 option automatically triggers if:

-He accumulates 135 starts OR 540 plate appearances in 2009.

Or

-He accumulates 170 starts OR 1080 plate appearances in 2008 and 2009 combined.

The 2011 option automatically triggers if:

-He accumulates 135 starts OR 540 plate appearances in 2010.

Or

-He accumulates 270 starts OR 1080 plate appearances in both 2010 and 2011.

In 2008 he had 144 starts and 623 PA's.
In 2009 he has 70 starts and 294 PA's.

I'm no mathematician, but by my count, he's at 214 starts and 917 PA's over the last two years. For his option for 2010 to trigger, he must have one of the following two:

53 starts in the final 79 games of the season to reach 270 starts in 08-09 or accumulate 163 PA's to reach 1080 over 08-09.

Thus far, he's averaged 4.14 PA's per game. With his 1st half participation (53 starts in 83 games) and you assume no pinch hits, he'd be on pace for 50 more games and 207 plate appearances.

However, he's apparently going to platoon with Clete Thomas. I don't believe that this situation will continue the entire 2nd half because, well, Jim Leyland manages the ball club. But, we faced 28 left-handed starters in the 1st half out of 83 games -- about 1 in every 3 games. If that rate stays the same (we faced 48 left-handed starters in 2008 which was about 30% of the time), then we should face another 27 lefty starters. At 4.14 PA's per game for Magglio, and assuming he only plays against left-handed starters, you can assume around 112 more plate appearances for the 2nd half.

That would put him at a total of 406 plate appearances in 2009. Remember, he only needed 163 more PA's in the 2nd half to reach the 1080 PA plateau to trigger his option for 2010, automatically. that would leave him about 51 PA's short of automatically triggering his 2010 option.