Pitchers we didn't get - updated

[cmathewson]

"At best"? That seems like a bit of a stretch. Sanchez is a lower class 2/high end 3. Which would all but make him our ace.

 

But you did actually compare Sanchez to the group you later posted right? Nolasco is a career 93+ ERA in a dominant pitchers park, Johnson can't stay healthy, Volquez is career 89+ ERA, and Ervin Santana is 98+. So you're after inferior pitchers on the assumption they will be cheaper. I'd like to suggest that that particular premise is dubious at best.

 

Point is, there are a lot more options. The FA market is supply and demand. With a better supply, they could afford to sign multiple pitchers. I like Sanchez fine. But that contract is way more than he's worth.

[cmathewson]

I'm not sure what "#8" means since you supplied no statistic to go with it. I'll toss a few out there though. Among starting pitchers:

 

2012

WAR - 22nd

ERA - 50th

xFIP - 22nd

 

2011

WAR - 27th

ERA - 47th

xFIP - 13th

 

2010

WAR - 19th

ERA - 34th

xFIP - 54th

 

The only number approaching "elite" status there is his xFIP in 2011. Now combined with his IP and he is a good starter. Still not elite though.

 

Right. Not elite. 2/3. 5/60 not 5/85.

[TheLeviathan]

Point is, there are a lot more options. The FA market is supply and demand. With a better supply, they could afford to sign multiple pitchers. I like Sanchez fine. But that contract is way more than he's worth.

 

How was that the point? You tried to argue Sanchez was inferior and actually managed to show how significantly superior he is to all the options you listed.

 

Again it appears the "Must...defend....payroll...no....matter...ridiculousness..." crowd ignores basic realities of baseball. Good FA pitching NEVER out-supplies demand. Never. It's an utterly ridiculous implication on your part. You are going to have to pay "more than he's worth" for any of those guys you named. All of which, in case you forgot, are worse than the guy you didn't want us to sign.

[snepp]

Right. Not elite. 2/3. 5/60 not 5/85.

 

You're not going to get a 3-4 WAR pitcher for $12 million per year, you're underselling his open-market value.

[ThePuck]

You're not going to get a 3-4 WAR pitcher for $12 million per year, you're underselling his open-market value.

 

very much so...fangraphs has his value at 17.1M in 2010, 16.1M for 2011, 16.3M in 2012. He was worth what he got...and likely will be his whole contract...probably a bargain when it's all said and done.

 

12M a year wasn't gonna come close...but it's a good belief if you're defending payroll

[gunnarthor]

very much so...fangraphs has his value at 17.1M in 2010, 16.1M for 2011, 16.3M in 2012. He was worth what he got...and likely will be his whole contract...probably a bargain when it's all said and done.

 

12M a year wasn't gonna come close...but it's a good belief if you're defending payroll

 

I think the bigger concern (for me, at least) is that he won't be a 3-4 WAR pitcher in 3 years when the team is actually built to win.

[ThePuck]

I think the bigger concern (for me, at least) is that he won't be a 3-4 WAR pitcher in 3 years when the team is actually built to win.

 

and you know this how? You don't.

 

Now, let's say he drops down to 2.0-2.5 WAR, what will be the going rate in three years for that? Maybe 16, maybe only 13. We gonna complain about overspending 3 million when payroll will be as low as it will be?

[gunnarthor]

and you know this how? You don't.

 

Now, let's say he drops down to 2.0-2.5 WAR, what will be the going rate in three years for that? Maybe 16, maybe only 13. We gonna complain about overspending 3 million when payroll will be as low as it will be?

 

Well, you don't know he won't be a zero WAR player in 3 years. Works both ways.

 

His WAR over his age 26-28 years was 3.2, 3.8, 2.4. That's good but not amazing and those are usually a pitchers' peak years. Still owing him 50m (assuming that the Twins had to outbid the Tigers by adding a year) doesn't seem that good of a move. He might grow old gracefully and put up a bunch of 2WAR seasons but since he hasn't shown to be that durable and his peak wasn't that high, he seems a bad bet.

[ThePuck]

Well, you don't know he won't be a zero WAR player in 3 years. Works both ways.

 

His WAR over his age 26-28 years was 3.2, 3.8, 2.4. That's good but not amazing and those are usually a pitchers' peak years. Still owing him 50m (assuming that the Twins had to outbid the Tigers by adding a year) doesn't seem that good of a move. He might grow old gracefully and put up a bunch of 2WAR seasons but since he hasn't shown to be that durable and his peak wasn't that high, he seems a bad bet.

 

 

 

I never threw a number out there as what he definitely would be and wouldn't be. I said, let's say he's this or that...you said definitively what he wouldn't be.

 

BTW, at ages 26-28, Fangraphs has him at 4.2, 3.6, 3.6

[snepp]

It sure would be awful to have the services of a very good pitcher now who may or may not be merely ok later, rather than lousy pitchers now and 2018's version of Mike Pelfrey later.

 

Oh the horror.

[johnnydakota]

I never threw a number out there as what he definitely would be and wouldn't be. I said, let's say he's this or that...you said definitively what he wouldn't be.

 

BTW, at ages 26-28, Fangraphs has him at 4.2, 3.6, 3.6

 

2 Things....

1 We had the money to spend....

2 We would have taken away from the division leader...

[ThePuck]

It sure would be awful to have the services of a very good pitcher now who may or may not be merely ok later, rather than lousy pitchers now and 2018's version of Mike Pelfrey later.

 

Oh the horror.

 

Horrible if we were overpaying the guy by 3, 4 M a year for the last two years of a 5 year contract when 30M+ of payroll that's on the payroll now is gone :-)

[ThePuck]

2 Things....

1 We had the money to spend....

2 We would have taken away from the division leader...

 

 

Exactly...a pitcher like that boosts our rotation by a lot AND hurts the Tigers' rotation at the same time...lots of value there

[gunnarthor]

BTW, at ages 26-28, Fangraphs has him at 4.2, 3.6, 3.6

 

Well sure, bWAR and fWAR differ. But yeah, I would usually predict that a pitcher won't be as good at 33 than he would be at 27.

[ThePuck]

Well sure, bWAR and fWAR differ. But yeah, I would usually predict that a pitcher won't be as good at 33 than he would be at 27.

 

and I'll refer right back to a previous post of mine...that allowed for that.

 

Now, let's say he drops down to 2.0-2.5 WAR, what will be the going rate in three years for that? Maybe 16, maybe only 13. We gonna complain about overspending 3 million when payroll will be as low as it will be?

[gunnarthor]

Exactly...a pitcher like that boosts our rotation by a lot AND hurts the Tigers' rotation at the same time...lots of value there

 

Great, we go from a 70 win team and a top 7 pick to a 74 win team and a top 13 pick. And then we have a big contract that might prevent us from adding pretty good pitcher when the team is actually ready to win. That makes sense.

 

But I guess this is where I say something about all the "spend money no matter what" crowd?

[gunnarthor]

and I'll refer right back to a previous post of mine...that allowed for that.

 

Now, let's say he drops down to 2.0-2.5 WAR, what will be the going rate in three years for that? Maybe 16, maybe only 13. We gonna complain about overspending 3 million when payroll will be as low as it will be?

 

And maybe he'll be a 0 WAR guy spending the year on the DL. But at least we both seem to agree that he won't be as good in three years (when we actually need him to be) than he is now.

[ThePuck]

Great, we go from a 70 win team and a top 7 pick to a 74 win team and a top 13 pick. And then we have a big contract that might prevent us from adding pretty good pitcher when the team is actually ready to win. That makes sense.

 

 

How in the world will it top us from signing a pretty good pitcher in 3 years with all the payroll going off the books by then?

[ThePuck]

And maybe he'll be a 0 WAR guy spending the year on the DL. But at least we both seem to agree that he won't be as good in three years (when we actually need him to be) than he is now.

 

We don't agree to that, but unlike you, I allow for the fact he could...and already accounted for it in my argument. Then again, I'm not sure I ever said he would stay at that level he's at now.

 

I noticed you avoided the question in that post, BTW. Here it is again:

 

Now, let's say he drops down to 2.0-2.5 WAR, what will be the going rate in three years for that? Maybe 16, maybe only 13. We gonna complain about overspending 3 million when payroll will be as low as it will be?

[TheLeviathan]

And then we have a big contract that might prevent us from adding pretty good pitcher when the team is actually ready to win.

 

And around we go again.

 

*double facepalm*

[cmathewson]

You're not going to get a 3-4 WAR pitcher for $12 million per year, you're underselling his open-market value.

 

Curses. My terseness foils me again. 2/3 refers to a number 2 or number 3 starter, which, with the vagaries of WAR might only be a 1 or 1.5 WAR pitcher. But yeah, maybe he costs 5/70. I don't know. At a certain point, you start to think, "oh, what the hell, just give him 6/96" or, to outbid the Tigers 6/100. It's only money, and it's not my money....

[gunnarthor]

I noticed you avoided the question in that post, BTW. Here it is again:

 

Now, let's say he drops down to 2.0-2.5 WAR, what will be the going rate in three years for that? Maybe 16, maybe only 13. We gonna complain about overspending 3 million when payroll will be as low as it will be?

 

He may be worth his contract in 3 years. He might be a slight overpay. Or he could be a big albatross.

[Oxtung]

He may be worth his contract in 3 years. He might be a slight overpay. Or he could be a big albatross.

 

Well let's hit for the cycle. He could be worth more than his contract in 3 years. There now we have all the possibilities accounted for.

[gunnarthor]

Well let's hit for the cycle. He could be worth more than his contract in 3 years. There now we have all the possibilities accounted for.

 

yep. 'Course, some are a whole lot more likely than the others.

[Oxtung]

yep. 'Course, some are a whole lot more likely than the others.

 

Just like with the free agent starting pitcher market then! We're making progress.

[Guest USAFChief]

I think the bigger concern (for me, at least) is that he won't be a 3-4 WAR pitcher in 3 years when the team is actually built to win.

1. We don't know the team will be "actually built to win" in 3 years, we do know they need pitching now.

 

2. We don't know they'll need starting pitching in 3 years, but I'd say that's a better bet than "they'll be built to win in 3 years."

 

3. I don't quite understand how someone can argue that it would be a foolish investment to invest in high quality free agents now, when the team can afford one or two, and can afford them for the next half decade at least because there are no players due for big paydays for that long...but then turn around and say they want the Twins to invest in big contracts 3 years from now, at which point the end years of those long, expensive free agent contracts will almost surely start to overlap with the arb and free agent years of the players that will have us "built to win."

 

If you're dead set against signing expensive free agents, fine. There's an argument to be made there. Same thing for handing out long expensive extensions to your own players.

 

But arguing "now is not the time, but some point in the future IS," seems to me like arguing just for the sake of defending some prior poor analysis. There's never going to be a time when signing an expensive free agent doesn't carry risks, never going to be a time where you're likely to get full value for all the years you give the player. But if there IS a time to do it, it's when you have needs to fill, current salary room, and a strong possibility of lots of available salary for the next half decade as well.

[snepp]

He may be worth his contract in 3 years. He might be a slight overpay. Or he could be a big albatross.

 

He certainly could be either of those things, or various others as well.

 

 

What are you going to have if you do nothing? Just more nothing. Payroll savings? Irrelevant at this point and for the foreseeable future. Blocked prospects? Yeah....not an issue.

 

I'm not looking forward to 2014's Mike Pelfrey, or 2015's, or 2016's, and so on. All largely wasted dollars that could have gone toward a single high quality player. But hey, we don't have to worry about overpaying them in year three! We'll just overpay them one year at a time instead.

 

You're way too hung up on the possibility of overpaying someone at the back end of a contract.

[jokin]

It sure would be awful to have the services of a very good pitcher now who may or may not be merely ok later, rather than lousy pitchers now and 2018's version of Mike Pelfrey later.

 

Oh the horror.

 

I just had an Apocalypse Now flashback.

 

 

"Do You Smell That!?"

[jokin]

Originally Posted by gunnarthor

He may be worth his contract in 3 years. He might be a slight overpay. Or he could be a big albatross.

 

San Francisco had a big "albatross" nearing the end of his career on their roster going into 07. What did they do? They signed what turned out to be a much worse "albatross" (Zito) for a long-term contract that is just now beginning to come to an end. Their payroll moved up to $89.7M before dropping in 08 with the departures of Bonds and Morris and the addition of Rowand (+). And then they added Renteria (+) and Johnson (-) in 09 to make it a payroll of $82.6M. And then they won it all in '10, with extensions, resignings and smaller acquired talented pieces, moving the payroll to a Twins-like $97M.

 

The point being, a bad signing or two is not the end of the world that you seem to assume it has to be. And as stated below by Snepp, actually doing things by shooting for acquiring legitimate quality WAR value, and missing occasionally and going to "Plan B', and continuing to build around your maturing talented youth... is a far better strategy than year after year of incessant dumpster diving for Sow's Ears with little more than Hail Mary Hope of turning that Pigskin into Silk Purses.

 

 

He certainly could be either of those things, or various others as well.

 

 

What are you going to have if you do nothing? Just more nothing. Payroll savings? Irrelevant at this point and for the foreseeable future. Blocked prospects? Yeah....not an issue.

 

I'm not looking forward to 2014's Mike Pelfrey, or 2015's, or 2016's, and so on. All largely wasted dollars that could have gone toward a single high quality player. But hey, we don't have to worry about overpaying them in year three! We'll just overpay them one year at a time instead.

 

You're way too hung up on the possibility of overpaying someone at the back end of a contract.

[jokin]

He's done it once, he's a bad pitcher and he's back on the DL. He hasn't had a WAR above 1 since 2009.

 

He's not a great pitcher, I never said he was, but the Twins wanted an innings eater, and they wanted something strictly from the bargain basement.

 

Hold on to your hat when you read this:

 

Kevin Correia Total WAR since 2008: 3.3 Contract: $10M

 

John Lannan Total WAR since 2008: 4.5 Contract: $2.5M

 

Lannan hasn't had a negative WAR rating in any season during that time, Correia has had 2 years with negative WAR.