July 1 is known as Bobby Bonilla Day in some circles because it is the day that Bonilla receives his annual deferred salary payments from the New York Mets.
Bonilla last played for the team in 1999 and they bought out the remaining $5.9 million in his salary in 2000. Rather than pay Bonilla a lump sum, the Mets proposed deferring the compensation making annual payments of just under $1.2 million over 25 years starting in 2011. Mets ownership at the time believed they would make a profit from the arrangement because they would invest the money in the interim and they had been receiving double digit returns on their investments at the time.
That plan hit a snag because Bernie Madoff was the financial advisor overseeing those investments and the returns the Mets thought they were generating were never actually realized.
It worked out well for Bonilla, however, and his payment this July 1,…
