Mattingly at Top of Game but Not Pay : Baseball: Yankee first baseman in final year of contract averages $2.23 million a year in the world of $3-million superstars.

Ask any baseball fan to pick the game’s 10 best players, and he’ll almost certainly include Don Mattingly.

The perennial all-star Yankee first baseman--a veritable hitting machine--seems destined for the Hall of Fame. It figures, then, that he would have one of the 10 highest salaries. I mean, fair’s fair.

But take a look at the top 10 highest-paid players. They range from Will Clark, who will make an average of $3.75 million over the next four seasons, to Kent Hrbek, who will average $2.8 million over the next five.

Mattingly’s name isn’t on the list. Entering the final year of a three-year contract with the New York Yankees, he makes an average of $2.23 million.

Of course, there’s a simple reason: Salaries keep going up . . . and up . . . and up.

When Mattingly signed his latest contract--three years for $6.7 million--he climbed to the top of the salary ladder. There were only a handful of $2-million men.

But now there are $3-million men--eight, in fact. And there is one $4-million man: Clark will earn $4.25 million in 1993, the final year of his four-year, $15-million deal.

By the time spring training starts--if it does--Mattingly may find himself even farther down the list. Darryl Strawberry, for one, is demanding a new contract that would pay him at least $3 million a year, and the New York Mets may be stupid enough to pay it. After all, Strawberry did hit .229 last year.

So where does that leave Mattingly? Not in the poorhouse, of course. But you do have to wonder how he feels about all these other guys passing him by. The other day I asked Mattingly, who is from Evansville, if he ever considered asking the Yankees to renegotiate.

“Renegotiate? I don’t believe in it,” he said. “I signed a deal, and I’ll live with it. When you sign a contract, it’s your word.”

When Mattingly signed his most recent agreement, he had the option of a one-year contract or a long-term deal. He picked the latter.

“I know I could have made more if I’d signed year-to-year,” he said. “But I don’t feel like I’ve been cheated. It was my decision, and I decided to trade security for a little money.”

Mattingly is eager to sign a contract extension. He and his agent have had preliminary discussions with the Yankees, but they haven’t gotten very far.

He said if he doesn’t sign by the end of the winter, they won’t talk again until next fall.

“I’m not going to mess around with it during the season,” he said. “That wouldn’t be fair to the team.”

The team means a lot to Mattingly. He was drafted by the Yankees out of high school and is one of the few players to have spent his entire career with them. He’d like to keep it that way.

“I’d like to stay. And if the Yankees want me, I might consider a five-year deal.”

Mattingly said that wouldn’t necessarily be his last contract, but it probably would keep him in New York till his playing days are over.

“I’d be 34 then,” he said, “and after that I’d probably take it one year at a time.”