Headlines

  • Astros To Promote Brice Matthews
  • Phillies Reportedly Targeting Controllable Relievers
  • Yankees Prioritizing Pitching, Also Searching For Infield Help
  • Orioles Trade Bryan Baker To Rays
  • Yankees Release DJ LeMahieu
  • Trevor Williams To Undergo UCL Surgery
  • Previous
  • Next
Register
Login
  • Hoops Rumors
  • Pro Football Rumors
  • Pro Hockey Rumors

MLB Trade Rumors

Remove Ads
  • Home
  • Teams
    • AL East
      • Baltimore Orioles
      • Boston Red Sox
      • New York Yankees
      • Tampa Bay Rays
      • Toronto Blue Jays
    • AL Central
      • Chicago White Sox
      • Cleveland Guardians
      • Detroit Tigers
      • Kansas City Royals
      • Minnesota Twins
    • AL West
      • Houston Astros
      • Los Angeles Angels
      • Oakland Athletics
      • Seattle Mariners
      • Texas Rangers
    • NL East
      • Atlanta Braves
      • Miami Marlins
      • New York Mets
      • Philadelphia Phillies
      • Washington Nationals
    • NL Central
      • Chicago Cubs
      • Cincinnati Reds
      • Milwaukee Brewers
      • Pittsburgh Pirates
      • St. Louis Cardinals
    • NL West
      • Arizona Diamondbacks
      • Colorado Rockies
      • Los Angeles Dodgers
      • San Diego Padres
      • San Francisco Giants
  • About
    • MLB Trade Rumors
    • Tim Dierkes
    • Writing team
    • Advertise
    • Archives
  • Contact
  • Tools
    • 2025 Trade Deadline Outlook Series
    • 2025-26 MLB Free Agent List
    • Contract Tracker
    • Transaction Tracker
    • Agency Database
  • NBA/NFL/NHL
    • Hoops Rumors
    • Pro Football Rumors
    • Pro Hockey Rumors
  • App
  • Chats
Go To Pro Hockey Rumors
Go To Hoops Rumors

Introducing The 2013 Arbitration Projections

By Matt Swartz | October 4, 2012 at 9:00am CDT

Twenty teams have officially finished their seasons and are already considering available free agents, which means they also have to consider whom they can afford. This involves predicting the salaries they will have to pay to arbitration-eligible players. Rather than having their salaries determined by the highest bid, their salaries are set to be determined by an arbitration panel. Of course, very few players actually ever make it in front of that panel, since teams and agents spend considerable resources trying to resolve their salaries in advance.

Last year, MLBTR owner Tim Dierkes asked me if I thought I could put together a model that predicted arbitration salaries. I had studied free agent salaries, but I decided that I could probably do almost as well with arbitration salaries. It went better than expected: the model was within 10% of the actual salary for 55% of players who signed one-year deals, and was within $1MM for all but 4 of the 156 arbitration-eligible players.

Unlike free agents, whose salaries are determined by the highest bid among 30 teams with 30 different ways of predicting and valuing future performance, arbitration eligible players receive salaries based on the similarity between their past performance and the performances of other comparable players. A well-designed model can do a good job of sifting out which statistics are most important and predict salaries accordingly.

Last year’s model was strong, but there were still a number of players who were poorly projected. One category with which I struggled was breakout stars entering arbitration for the first time. Jordan Zimmermann received a salary of $2.3 million, above my projection of $1.8 million. Even though he only had 23 career starts in an injury-checkered past before going into 2011, his solid 3.18 ERA in 161 1/3 innings in 2011 seemed to matter more than his previous injuries. Another thing I learned in my projections for 2012 was that previous salary did not matter much for first-time eligible players. My biggest overestimates included projecting David Price at $7.8MM instead of his actual $4.35 million salary and Rick Porcello for $4.2MM instead of his actual $3.1MM, since I thought hefty Major League deals given to draft picks would give these players a leg up going into arbitration. This is not true, as I have since learned. I also missed big on some players who had strong rebound performances after being non-tendered the season before. The biggest miss was projecting Melky Cabrera’s 2012 salary; I only predicted a $4.4MM salary, instead of his $6MM earnings. It turns out that bouncing back after being non-tendered gives players like Cabrera a little extra room for raises, and such players are now projected for higher salaries in 2013.

I did a lot of work on improving pitcher projections for this year’s model. I originally included all pitchers into the same model, which gave them credit for wins, saves, and holds as they received them in each role. This was supposed to better incorporate swingmen and other pitchers with evolving roles, but now I have separate models for starters and relievers, which allows for more accuracy for everyone. In last year’s model, I ignored the importance of strikeouts for starters and had to introduce other measures to juice the salaries of elite starters. This year’s model incorporates elite starters much more smoothly. The starter/reliever distinction also gave me an opportunity to notice an important feature about arbitration — declining marginal returns to individual statistics. It turns out that the gap in earnings is much larger between pitchers with 170 innings and 200 innings than between pitchers with 200 innings and 230 innings, and that a guy with 30 saves out-earns a guy with 20 saves far more than a guy with 40 saves out-earns a guy with 30 saves.

In the coming weeks, we will present the projections for all 30 Major League teams’ arbitration-eligible players. Last year’s projections had a good foundation, but we believe this year’s will be even better. These can help teams and fans alike as they try to anticipate trades, extensions and non-tenders and determine how much money is available for free agents.

Share 0 Retweet 0 Send via email0

Arbitration Projection Model

Marlins Seeking Replacement For Guillen
Main
Figgins Wants Out Of Seattle
View Comments (0)
Post a Comment

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Please login to leave a reply.

Log in Register

    Top Stories

    Astros To Promote Brice Matthews

    Phillies Reportedly Targeting Controllable Relievers

    Yankees Prioritizing Pitching, Also Searching For Infield Help

    Orioles Trade Bryan Baker To Rays

    Yankees Release DJ LeMahieu

    Trevor Williams To Undergo UCL Surgery

    Nationals Fire PBO Mike Rizzo, Manager Dave Martinez

    Brewers Activate Brandon Woodruff

    Clarke Schmidt Expected To Undergo Tommy John Surgery

    Bobby Jenks Passes Away

    Braves Release Alex Verdugo

    Top 40 Trade Candidates For The 2025 Deadline

    Rays Reinstate Ha-Seong Kim

    Yankees Have Shown Interest In Ryan McMahon

    Royals Interested In Bryan Reynolds

    Rangers Option Josh Jung

    Kevin Pillar Announces Retirement

    Braves Place Spencer Schwellenbach On IL With Elbow Fracture

    Giants Exercise 2026 Option On Manager Bob Melvin

    Yordan Alvarez Shut Down Due To Setback With Hand Injury

    Recent

    MLB Finalizes Home Run Derby Field

    Astros To Promote Brice Matthews

    Giants Outright Sergio Alcántara

    Joe Coleman Passes Away

    Dodgers Outright CJ Alexander

    Trade Deadline Outlook: New York Yankees

    Clarke Schmidt To Undergo Tommy John Surgery

    Trade Deadline Outlook: Atlanta Braves

    Phillies Reportedly Targeting Controllable Relievers

    Nationals Sign Francisco Mejia To Minor League Deal

    MLBTR Newsletter - Hot stove highlights in your inbox, five days a week

    Latest Rumors & News

    Latest Rumors & News

    • Sandy Alcantara Rumors
    • Luis Robert Rumors
    • Alex Bregman Rumors

     

    Trade Rumors App for iOS and Android App Store Google Play

    MLBTR Features

    MLBTR Features

    • Remove Ads, Support Our Writers
    • Front Office Originals
    • Front Office Fantasy Baseball
    • MLBTR Podcast
    • Trade Deadline Outlook Series
    • 2025-26 MLB Free Agent List
    • Contract Tracker
    • Transaction Tracker
    • Extension Tracker
    • Agency Database
    • MLBTR On Twitter
    • MLBTR On Facebook
    • Team Facebook Pages
    • How To Set Up Notifications For Breaking News
    • Hoops Rumors
    • Pro Football Rumors
    • Pro Hockey Rumors

    Rumors By Team

    • Angels Rumors
    • Astros Rumors
    • Athletics Rumors
    • Blue Jays Rumors
    • Braves Rumors
    • Brewers Rumors
    • Cardinals Rumors
    • Cubs Rumors
    • Diamondbacks Rumors
    • Dodgers Rumors
    • Giants Rumors
    • Guardians Rumors
    • Mariners Rumors
    • Marlins Rumors
    • Mets Rumors
    • Nationals Rumors
    • Orioles Rumors
    • Padres Rumors
    • Phillies Rumors
    • Pirates Rumors
    • Rangers Rumors
    • Rays Rumors
    • Red Sox Rumors
    • Reds Rumors
    • Rockies Rumors
    • Royals Rumors
    • Tigers Rumors
    • Twins Rumors
    • White Sox Rumors
    • Yankees Rumors

    Navigation

    • Sitemap
    • Archives
    • RSS/Twitter Feeds By Team

    MLBTR INFO

    • Advertise
    • About
    • Commenting Policy
    • Privacy Policy

    Connect

    • Contact Us
    • Twitter
    • Facebook
    • RSS Feed

    MLB Trade Rumors is not affiliated with Major League Baseball, MLB or MLB.com

    Do not Sell or Share My Personal Information

    hide arrows scroll to top

    Register

    Desktop Version | Switch To Mobile Version