By all accounts, Mark Walter is rare among baseball owners. When he says he lets the baseball people make player personnel decisions because he is not a baseball expert, he actually means it. 
 
 However, in his early days as the Dodgers' controlling owner, Walter expressed skepticism about long-term contracts for starting pitchers. 
 
 "Pitchers break," he said. 
 
 On Wednesday, the Dodgers agreed to make Clayton Kershaw the highest-paid pitcher in baseball history. Walter declined to confirm the $215-million deal — the Dodgers are expected to make an annoucement Friday — but he was succinct in explaining why he would even consider approving it. 
 
 "Greg Maddux," Walter said. 
 
 Walter lives in Chicago, where the Cubs abandoned Maddux to free agency in 1992, when he was 26. He had just won the Cy Young Award. He won the next three years too — for the Atlanta Braves. 
 
 In the 21 years since they let Maddux go, the Cubs have won one postseason series. In Walter's first full year of ownership, the Dodgers won one postseason series. 
 
 Kershaw is coming off his second Cy Young Award, the first pitcher since Maddux to lead the major leagues in earned-run average in three consecutive years. Kershaw would have hit free agency next fall, at 26. 
 
 For all the good Walter and his ownership group have done — close to $1 billion in player investment and luxury-tax payments, $150 million in Dodger Stadium renovations, the launch next month of an all-Dodgers, all-the-time TV channel — that could have rung hollow if Kershaw had left the building. 
 
 Kershaw is the face of the franchise, and of the strategy for Walter and Co. to turn the Dodgers from a machine that spits out cash into a machine that spits out prospects. You cannot import high-priced talent from Boston and Miami, from Cuba and South Korea, then draw the line at the guy who might turn out to be the best pitcher ever produced by the Dodgers' distinguished player development system. 
 
 Kershaw has been so consistent in his excellence that his catcher, A.J. Ellis, put the record contract into perfect perspective. 
 
 "He's the highest-paid pitcher of all time, and it still feels like he's underpaid," Ellis said Wednesday. 
 
 There is no hometown discount in $215 million, but Kershaw might have gotten more in free agency, with the New York Yankees and his hometown Texas Rangers among the potential bidders. On the other hand, Kershaw would have had to endure a season of reporters from two dozen cities pestering him about whether he might like to play here, there or everywhere. 
 
 "It would have been a huge distraction the entire season," Ellis said. "You wouldn't have been able to get through a series, or a start, without somebody wanting to talk to him about it. Clayton doesn't need distractions while he's performing. He's single-minded. I think it's great for everybody that it worked out. 
 
 "It's really awesome for the team to have Kershaw, [Hyun-jin] Ryu and [Zack] Greinke wrapped up, and to have those three guys locked up in the prime of their careers. We should win a lot of games." 
 
 This is about winning, as it should be, not about branding and not about a cost-benefit analysis. Kershaw would defy the track record of every big-money pitcher if he is not injured or ineffective, or both, at some point during the life of the contract. 
 
 There might be more glamour in Yasiel Puig or Matt Kemp or Hanley Ramirez or Brian Wilson. For now, Kershaw is the most reliable, responsible and successful of all the Dodgers, on and off the field. 
 
 By committing to stay in Los Angeles and starring for the dominant team in town, Kershaw could become a civic icon. Magic Johnson, one of the Dodgers owners, knows a bit about that. 
 
 "When I see Mark Walter, I see the next Dr. Buss," said Johnson, referring to Jerry Buss, the owner behind the Lakers' dynasty. 
 
 The way Johnson tells it, the Dodgers are poised to reclaim their stature as kings of L.A. sports, pun intended. 
 
 "This town is fired up and ready," Johnson said, "because of the Lakers' situation. Everywhere I go, that's what we talk about: 'What's wrong with my Lakers?' and 'I can't wait for my Dodgers.' " 
 
 Kershaw's Dodgers, for this year and beyond. 
 
 bill.shaikin@latimes.com 
 
 Twitter: @BillShaikin ||||| Clayton Kershaw won two National League Cy Young Awards, three earned run average titles and two strikeout titles and made three trips to the playoffs before turning 26 years old. Now he has another distinction: Kershaw is baseball’s first $200 million pitcher. 
 
 Kershaw, the Los Angeles Dodgers’ ace left-hander, reached an agreement Wednesday to stay with the team for seven years and $215 million, according to a person with direct knowledge of the deal. The deal will not be officially announced until later this week. 
 
 Kershaw, who turns 26 in March, becomes the first player with a contract averaging at least $30 million per season. He was eligible for salary arbitration and could have been a free agent after the 2014 season. Instead, he will be the long-term leader of a rotation that had the best E.R.A. in the majors last season, at 3.13, as the Dodgers advanced to the N.L. Championship Series. 
 
 “Big winner today ... me,” the Dodgers’ catcher, A. J. Ellis, said on Twitter. “I am blessed to catch best in the game for foreseeable future God willing. Congrats Kersh!” ||||| Add a location to your Tweets 
 
 When you tweet with a location, Twitter stores that location. You can switch location on/off before each Tweet and always have the option to delete your location history. Learn more ||||| The Los Angeles Dodgers and Clayton Kershaw have agreed on a seven-year, $215 million deal, according to sources with knowledge of the situation. 
 
 It is the richest deal for a pitcher in Major League Baseball history, eclipsing the seven-year, $180 million contract Detroit gave Justin Verlander last winter, and his average annual salary of $30.7 million is the highest ever for any baseball player. Kershaw will also have the opportunity to become a free agent again in five years, if he chooses. 
 
 Sources told ESPN's Buster Olney, that because Kershaw agreed to an $18 million signing bonus, with just a $4 million salary for 2014, his salary for 2014 -- for salary arbitration purposes -- is at $6.57 million (calculated as $18 million divided by 7 years and adding $4 million salary). 
 
 The 25-year-old Kershaw has won two of the last three National League Cy Young Awards, as well as a Roberto Clemente Award for his charitable work. 
 
 Kershaw and his wife, Ellen, founded an orphanage in the African nation of Zambia called Hope's Home that they visit every offseason. They co-wrote a book about their experiences last winter titled, "Arise: Live Out Your Faith and Dreams on Whatever Field You Find Yourself." 
 
 Kershaw went 16-9 with a 1.83 ERA and 232 strikeouts last season, his sixth with the Dodgers. The left-hander has a 2.60 career ERA and recorded at least 212 strikeouts in each of the past four seasons. 
 
 Kershaw had recently completed a two year, $19 million deal. He filed for arbitration on Tuesday and could have become a free agent at the end of this season if the club had elected to go through the arbitration process and signed him to a one-year deal. 
 
 The Dodgers have long intended to keep Kershaw as the face of their franchise for the rest of his career. The team had discussions with Kershaw and his representatives for more than a year before coming to an agreement Wednesday. The length of the negotiations was more about Kershaw's desire not to negotiate during the baseball season, a source said. 
 
 The team offered Kershaw a deal in the range of $300 million this past season, a source with knowledge of the talks told Olney in October. Although Kershaw initially was uncertain about committing to such a deal, the sides were confident that a long-term contract would be completed at some point in the offseason, according to the source. 
 
 The Dodgers drafted Kershaw seventh overall in 2006, choosing the hard-throwing high-school lefthander over future Cy Young Award winners Tim Lincecum (who went 10th overall to the Giants) and Max Scherzer (who went 11th overall to the Diamondbacks), both of whom were older, more developed college pitchers. 
 
 But the Dodgers saw something special in Kershaw, and he quickly rose through their minor league system, debuting in the majors less than two years later on May 25, 2008. During his first spring training with the club, legendary Dodgers announcer Vin Scully called his devastating curveball, "Public Enemy No. 1" and he quickly began drawing comparisons to another legendary Dodger lefty, Sandy Koufax. 
 
 The two have since become friends. Koufax came into the Dodger clubhouse to congratulate him after Kershaw started and won Game 4 of the National League Division Series against the Atlanta Braves on short rest this fall. 
 
 "It's gratifying that I think of him as a friend and hopefully he thinks of me the same way," Koufax said. "He's just such a good person." 
 
 The Dodgers now have five players with an average annual value of $20 million or more. Among active contracts (or contracts signed that have not yet started), the Dodgers now have five of the 22 largest average yearly salaries in the sport on the roster -- Kershaw, Zack Greinke, Adrian Gonzalez, Carl Crawford and Matt Kemp. 
 
 Kershaw wasn't the only Dodgers player to enjoy news of the deal. Catcher A.J. Ellis took to Twitter to congratulate the team's ace.
– The Los Angeles Dodgers' Clayton Kershaw has smashed salary records with a new 7-year, $215 million contract, sources tell ESPN. The deal makes the two-time Cy Young award-winner the first $200 million-plus pitcher in Major League Baseball history, and his salary of $30.7 million is a record for any baseball player, the New York Times notes. "Big winner today ... me," tweeted his catcher, AJ Ellis. "I am blessed to catch best in game for foreseeable future, God willing." The 25-year-old left-hander is "the highest-paid pitcher of all time, and it still feels like he's underpaid," Ellis tells the Los Angeles Times. He might have been able to get an even better deal as a free agent, but "it would have been a huge distraction the entire season," Ellis says. "You wouldn't have been able to get through a series, or a start, without somebody wanting to talk to him about it. Clayton doesn't need distractions while he's performing. He's single-minded. I think it's great for everybody that it worked out."