MKRob Sports

One year from today, the Mets will add to their payroll a 47-year-old, past-his-prime power hitter who has a reputation as a malcontent—a player who has been retired from professional baseball for nine years and won’t play another game again.

Nevertheless, starting on July 1, 2011, Bobby Bonilla will remain on the franchise’s payroll for 25 years, collecting an annual salary of $1,193,248.20. Those are the terms the Mets agreed to Jan. 3, 2000, when they bought out the final year of Mr. Bonilla’s contract.

This unusual arrangement between him and the Mets, though, is characteristic of his time with the team—4½ years marked by controversy and unmet expectations. By the time Mr. Bonilla departed, the Mets were so eager to be rid of him that they agreed to defer payment—with interest—of the $5.9 million they owed him in the final year of his contract.