Arbitration decisions on several first-year arb-eligible starting pitchers have been released. According to prior reports, the outcomes of the pending cases were being held until all had been heard and decided, to avoid earlier results impacting later decisions.
Three starters won their cases:
- Collin McHugh, Astros: With his victory, McHugh will earn $3.85MM rather than the $3.35MM that the team had argued for, as Brian McTaggart of MLB.com first reported on Twitter.
- Jake Odorizzi, Rays: In another relatively high-dollar case, the right-hander will get his requested $4.1MM payday over the club’s $3.825MM submission, according to Jon Heyman of Fan Rag (via Twitter).
- Marcus Stroman, Blue Jays: Stroman takes home $3.4MM in his Super Two year instead of the team’s $3.1MM proposal, also via Heyman.
Teams prevailed against three others:
- Taijuan Walker, Diamondbacks: The new Arizona rotation member, who’s also a Super Two qualifier, will earn $2.25MM instead of his filing figure of $2.6MM, per Jack Magruder of Fan Rag (via Twitter).
- Chase Anderson, Brewers: Anderson, the final Super Two member of this bunch, will settle for the team’s $2.45MM proffer rather than the $2.85MM he sought, according to Heyman.
- Michael Wacha, Cardinals: In his first year of eligibility, Wacha will take home $2.775MM, falling shy of his $3.2MM request, per Heyman.
Ah, Baseball. Sport of the People, where millionaires argue that they deserve more money not on the basis of having been excellent and deserving of more money, but simply because other people are getting paid more and they should as well. Even when they have mediocre or below average performances, they still get paid more than their contract specified when they started.
It’s the most bizarre thing that needs to probably get eliminated in the future and pre-FA contract adjustments put on a performance scale instead of a mandatory bump or release.
Surely someone can come up with a formula that references WAR, Service Time, and the average value of a contract signed for post-Arbitration years by a player adjusted for these values. Or just something to not make this process so stupid.
Do you recognize that a compensation matrix based on WAR–Wins Against Replacement [Player]–would still be a system based on paying players relative to another’s salary/value?
Seems to be the opposite of what you are going for.
I agree that the process is stupid and doesn’t make sense. In the case of Trevor Plouffe, for example, he made $7.25MM last season, played 84 games, and I believe he was expected to receive over $8MM in his final year of arbitration – that part doesn’t make sense.
However, these guys are paid essentially league minimum for three years, regardless of whether or not they compare to Babe Ruth in his prime or amount to a quad-A, replacement level player.
That fact makes the significant raise after a mediocre performance make sense – it’s almost compensation for three years of relatively low pay.
Dave, it’s called the Union. The Union is a joke.
Those civic-minded, selfless, heroic owners agreed to this with the Union.
I feel for the owners, and their yachts. Players getting paid, it’s outrageous, don’t these people realise that I pay my MLB tv subscription to see the likes of Loria etc?
Be nice to see a better formula and system for dealing with arbitration, but not sure I’ve seen any suggestion that isn’t as fraught with issues as the current one. Might be better to let the arbiters (is that the word) settle in between the two figures but if they think either is unreasonable, they go the other way. Probably be just as bad though.
Kane the MLBPA is by far the strongest union in sports and one of the strongest period. Calling the union a joke must mean you don’t know jack **** about What you’re talking about. You must have never been part of a Union before to say something that stupid.
He’s not saying it’s not strong. He’s saying he doesn’t like it. I would assume he thinks it’s probably TOO strong
Of course, the reason why we have the MLBPA is because of the owners and their odious reserve clause that they were able to hold onto for decades because of baseball’s absurd anti-trust exemption. No owner is putting his body on the line on a nightly basis. Most of them are billionaires. I’m not really convinced we need a GoFundMe so that they can afford Collin McHugh’s raise.
Exactly. Let’s not fault players for making what the established market pays them.
That’s plenty for Wacha right now. Until he can show his command and velocity are back, he doesn’t deserve to get the big bucks.