Biography

Johan Santana was born on March 13, 1979 in Tovar, Merida State, Venezuela. In 1995, he was signed by the Houston Astros as a free agent. Four years later, the Marlins selected him in the rule 5 draft. The Marlins then traded him to the Minnesota Twins where he has remained since.

On April 3, 2000, Johan Santana made his Major League debut. He started his career as a long reliever before becoming a starting pitcher that he has now become famous for.

After August of the 2003 season, he got his chance as a starter and went 8-0, earning him the right to pitch the first game in the playoffs for the Twins.

The beginning of the 2004 season verified that Johan Santana was ready to be a starting pitcher. The second half of the 2004 season verified that he may be the best pitcher in baseball. During that second half of the season, he went 13-0, breaking the Major League record. He also had a 10 game starts streak in which he gave up four or fewer hits. He compiled 11.1 strikeouts per nine innings, a 1.21 ERA, and only 4.74 hits per nine innings during his incredible run.

His incredible second half of the season helped spur him to a 20-6 overall record. Johan Santana led the American League during the 2004 season in strikeouts, ERA, strikeouts per 9 innings, batting average allowed, on base percentage allowed, slugging percentage allowed, and several other categories. His domination of the American League earned him the American League Cy Young Award in a landslide, in which he earned all 28 of the first place votes.

Johan Santana followed up his Cy Young winning year with another solid year in 2005. He finished the 2005 season with a 16-7 record and a 2.87 ERA, second lowest in the American League. He also finished third in the Cy Young Award voting.

Johan Santana has been named to the All-Star team twice, in 2005 and 2006. On June 13, 2006 he also collected his 1,000th career strikeout in a very short amount of time.

During the offseason the Twins wanted to trade Santana due to only a year remaining on his contract. The favorites to snag Santana were the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees, with the New York Mets being longshots of getting him. The Red Sox were offering Jacoby Ellsbury and Jon Lester, but not in a package together, while the Yankees on the other hand were offering Philip Hughes and Melky Cabrera and/or possibly Ian Kennedy. Despite many rumors of the Red Sox being favorites a deal never happened. The Yankees also were close to a deal but Hank Steinbrenner had said the Yankees pulled out. A deal finally happened on January 29, 2008 when the Twins agreed to trade Santana to the least likely of the three teams, the New York Mets, for OF Carlos Gomez and pitchers Phil Humber, Deolis Guerra, and Kevin Mulvey, all of whom are Mets minor league prospects. After agreeing to the trade the Mets were given a 72 hour negotiating window in which to work out a contract extension with Santana. On February 1, 2008, after negotiations that took the entire 72 hour window plus an additional two hours, the Mets gave Santana a new six year, $137.5 million contract, with an option for 2014. The trade became official when Santana passed his physical with the Mets on February 2, 2008. It is the largest contract for a pitcher, fourth largest contract, and second highest salary per year among multi-year contracts.