Herges "sees" the light

I like Herges - he was aces for us in 2003 - but what is it about multi-year contracts that tell athletes that they can let it up? In an interview on sfgiants.com, he talks about how he used to be a workout fiend but then let up before last season and, as a result, could not get the movement he normally had on his fastball, which made him into a live batting tee (my words there :^). So he vowed not to let that happen again and worked out this off-season and is raring to go.

Funny how a contract year gets athletes to "see the light" and think "gee, I would really do better if I work out over the off-season". The classic boom and bust example was Greg Minton, who, prior to Nen, was the best reliever in San Francisco history. Every year he fought for a contract raise and he was pretty pissed off about how SF dealt with him. He finally free agents and signs a long-term deal with the Giants and immediately loses it. Never could find it back as a Giant so he was eventually released, probably in his last contract year. Whereupon he goes to the Angels and suddenly finds it again and pitches productively for a number of years. (Dana Stubblefield of the 49ers and Erick Dampier of the Warriors are other good examples of contract-year-stupenditis/first-year-stink-itis)