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« Astros Sign Soler | Main | Blocked Prospects: Jed Lowrie »
Sabathia's Future Value Remains Strong
Jon Heyman weighs in on C.C. Sabathia, his early season struggles and his impending free agency. Heyman notes that Sabathia and his 13.50 ERA are "costing himself millions by the pitch", even going so far as to say that CC could stand for "Complete Choke."
Heyman lists four players that had huge walk-years (Adrian Beltre, Alex Rodriguez, Alfonso Soriano, B.J. Ryan) and four players that struggled in their walk year (Andruw Jones, Jason Jennings, Jermaine Dye, Jeff Weaver). The problem with this list, is that there is not a single player similar to Sabathia. That is, there is not one left-handed ace in the bunch. As far as free agents go, there is nothing more valuable than a left-handed power pitcher in his prime.
The one player that Sabathia should be compared to is Barry Zito.
Zito had win totals of 14, 11, 14 and 16 and ERA+ of 134, 101, 113 and 116 in the four years prior to free agency and still managed to collect a 7-year, $126MM contract. On the other hand, Sabathia's last three seasons included win totals of 15, 12 and 19 and ERA+ of 104, 140 and 143. In addition, Sabathia is a year younger in '08 than Zito was the year prior to free agency.
Sabathia may indeed be costing himself a few million dollars, but in the end he is still a left-handed power pitcher in his prime and will almost certainly eclipse the $126MM contract signed by Zito.
Cork Gaines writes for Rays Index and can be reached here.
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Like the insight here, but I gotta say that Zito's a pretty poor comparison; the only thing he and CC really have in common is that they're left-handed (and the whole Cy Young thing...). As you note, CC is a power pitcher, while Zito's never been overpowering (overwhelming, maybe, when there was more disparity between the speed of his hook and fastball). Plus, Zito reached "Cy Young form" much much sooner than CC (1.5 seasons compared to 6 full seasons). I'm having trouble coming up with a pitcher that's a good comparable myself, but it most certainly isn't Barry Zito. Zito's contract seems to be a good barometer for what CC should expect, but they're really nowhere near the same type of pitcher regardless of whether they had somewhat similar experience prior to their free agent years.
Posted by: cjhel | April 19, 2008 at 03:44 PM
not so much "style" as much as I was just showing how valuable teams consider left-handed starters with a proven track-record. If anything Sabathia looks stronger than Zito did and is a power-pitcher to boot. so he is more valuable than Zito.
Posted by: Cork Gaines | April 19, 2008 at 04:25 PM
I'm sure that CC will point to the Zito contract and demand that it be used as a starting point. The only problem is that the Zito contract was bad before the ink dried. Just because the Giants were stupid enough to pay Zito that cash doesn't mean that other teams would have made that same mistake.
If I recall correctly, there weren't any substantiated offers over $100m besides the Giants. That would have made the market for Zito more like 7/90.
If CC has a mediocre year I would bet that he will see a Zambrano type contract. If he's aces then expect a Santana like deal.
Also, when CC pitches good nobody cares about the weight. When he pitches bad weight becomes a major issue. I'll bet you will start hearing people raising the flag of caution around his weight as a way to drive down his cost.
Posted by: bjsguess | April 19, 2008 at 05:16 PM
Yeah I would agree with bjsguess on this:
"If CC has a mediocre year I would bet that he will see a Zambrano type contract. If he's aces then expect a Santana like deal."
I think that worse case scenario, Sabathia gets the 5/91 offer that Zambrano got
Posted by: scribbletone | April 19, 2008 at 06:41 PM
If Sabathia keeps this up, he'll want that deal that the Indians put on the table...but will it still be on the table?
Posted by: MickS | April 20, 2008 at 12:21 PM
“If Sabathia keeps this up, he'll want that deal that the Indians put on the table...but will it still be on the table?”
…They left the offer on the table for Pronk even though he was eating sand during his contract talk season last year.
And I think years (not straight cash) is where the real difference will be seen for CC if he continues like this. How many GMs will be willing to go 6-7 years at 20M-ish a year for a guy off a season like this one so far? Its much more likely that he would receive the same dollar commitment, just a shorter contract. And possibly much shorter if he keeps this up. Kinda like Andrew Jones ~ he still made the same amount of (if not more) cash, its just over 2 years instead of the 5+ years he was rumored to probably end up getting.
But when putting paragraph 1 with paragraph 2, and thinking about the fact that the Tribe and CC were only apart on guaranteed years ~ well, then I think the team contacts him soon and wouldn’t be surprised to see a deal worked out. They were offering 5 guaranteed with a vesting option from what I remember; well if he keeps this up then it might look really good to him…
Posted by: darkstar1661 | April 20, 2008 at 02:10 PM