Email a copy of 'NL West Notes: Greinke, Senzatela, Rockies/Dodgers Renewals' to a friend
Loading ...
By Jeff Todd | at
Email a copy of 'NL West Notes: Greinke, Senzatela, Rockies/Dodgers Renewals' to a friend
MLB Trade Rumors is not affiliated with Major League Baseball, MLB or MLB.com
hide arrows scroll to top
AZcubluv
Greinke will wind up being one of the worst free agent signings in history.
Mattimeo09
No offense buddy, but Jason Heyward might pass him for the worst.
Bat speed for a hitter is much more important than Pitch velocity for a pitcher.
Either way it’s still only been 1 year for both of them. Maybe they’ll turn it around
coachbrad
He looks absolutely helpless in the box, like Bernie Mac in Mr. 3000.
mannyl101
Haha
AZcubluv
Yeah good point! If Heyward doesn’t turn it around then he’ll be number two or three of the worst contracts in history. I imagine it’ll be easier for the Cubs to absorb that kind of money loss then it will be for the Diamondbacks if they both turned out to be flops
realgone2
Totally forgot about Heyward.
chetmanley
Because of the length, money, and expectations relative to the market, he certainly could be. But Greinke is still incredibly talented (if not a bit of a space cadet).
Let’s not write off major signings like Carl Pavano, Kei Igawa, Jacoby Ellsbury, Mo Vaughn, Mike Hampton, and Josh Hamilton. Those guys provided nearly nothing (or less) and were signed for comparatively similar amounts, relative to the markets of the time.
davidcoonce74
“space cadet?” Greinke is possibly the most thoughtful, intense and intelligent people playing the game right now. He’s the exact opposite of a “space cadet,” frankly.
johnsilver
Interesting how the players fans don’t agree with get those labels who speak isn’t it? Bill lee was another, who was probably more of a space cadet, tho was and still is capable of some type of thoughtful dialect on certain topics if anyone has ever listened to him lately.
cxcx
Ellsbury has produced 8 rWar since signing with the Yankees, over which time they have paid him $64m. Going by the $8m/WAR metric I always see people through out there, he has been paid exactly what he has been worth. He has been fine.
Now granted, he is aging and can be expected to be worse over the next four years than he has been over the past three, but it is severely premature to lump him in with the worst of all time. He will have to tank severely for him to enter that conversation.
chesteraarthur
8/war is relative to current prices. It would be lower when he signed.
cxcx
Well what was the thing back then, 7? Anyway, the later seasons should match up with the later pricing. Like say if revenue and team salary suddenly jumped up tenfold this year and they Yankees started carrying a $2B payroll and the “market value” or whatever became $80/WAR, then Ellsbury giving you 2 WAR at $21m over the next 4 years would be a huge steal. So if the price keeps for a WAR keeps inflating, which it will I assume with revenue and payroll increasing, long term deals that seemed very inflated will seem less so. See NBA contracts from a couple of years ago for an exaggerated version of this.
davidcoonce74
We are all aging. I just aged while typing this. I think we should just say “old”
Senioreditor
Carl Crawford
B-Strong
Barry Zito
James7430
More recently, Matt Cain.
mannyl101
Awful part of the trade to Dodgers! What a waste! Was so talented!
layventsky
Nick Swisher.
realgone2
Mike Hampton is one of the worst pitching contracts ever.
Colemania87
Don’t forget about Pelfrey
davidcoonce74
Pelfrey was just two seasons.
Colemania87
Two seasons of overpaid trainwreckage
davidcoonce74
Two years at what, 16 million? It wasn’t a good contract because Pelfrey has never been good but contracts like the Pujols or Hampton ones are far more egregious. The Cuban guys – Castillo, arrebuerenna (I know I spelled that wrong), Kennedy, oliveras, Tomas have all ended up as pretty bad contracts too.
Colemania87
I get your point, I was being sarcastic to a certain extent. There are obviously different levels of bad deals. Pelfrey is just comical because like you said he was never good. At least Pujols, Grienke, and some others were good/deserving at one point.
SupremeZeus
Looks like it might be the same unresolved shoulder issue/injury that shut Greinke down last September. I don’t have high expectations for the Dbacks, but if Greinke has a shoulder problem and is ineffective or is lost…the Dbacks will be competing for a top draft pick again. A shoulder issue w/ $157M left could devastate that franchise for years to come. And ->Mike Butcher…how does he still have a coaching job?
BlueSkyLA
Hardly think so. Even with the commitment to Grienke, the D’Backs still have one of lowest payrolls in MLB.
coachbrad
Maybe not “devastated”, but almost certainly a major hindrance to putting a competitive product on the field. The money committed to Greinke can’t now be used to attract cornerstone pieces to the roster or give enough roster flexibility to add depth or take on a questionable contract to secure younger talent or lock up increasingly expensive arb players.
Instead of being a solid team in the NL West capable of competing for the WC spot, they now are perpetually on the fringe between “do we add 60m in payroll and go for it” and thorough rebuild, which means losing Goldschmidt and Pollock.
Worst situation to be in.
BlueSkyLA
That conclusion relies on an assumption that the D’Backs revenue can sustain nothing more than one of the smallest payrolls in MLB (#27 last I checked). Now they might not want to spend more than that if they can avoid it (the rest being gravy for ownership), but if they want to compete they almost certainly can afford to raise their payroll to somewhere closer to the middle of the pack. That’s about $50M annually north of where they are now. Enough to do a lot.
coachbrad
That would be true if they were already a solid team and thought a key piece or two would make a difference. But they have significant holes to fill and paying $34 million a year for $12 million worth of Greinke will affect how competitive they can be. If nothing else it greatly shortens the competitive window because to be competitive they will have to push payroll beyond their comfort level. They’ll try that for a year or two but will eventually have a fire sale and a rebuild..
And that kind of money will probably be the difference between keeping a player like Goldschmidt and making him the franchise player and trading him in his walk year.
That contract will shape how they compete until it runs out.
BlueSkyLA
Their comfort level is to pay as little as possible. That is how profits are maximized. So the comfort level of any given team doesn’t really interest me.
What Grienke is “worth” doesn’t matter much in the end. The worst case scenario for the D’backs is he can pitch, but not well enough to earn a spot in the rotation. If he’s hurt, they stick him on the DL and collect on the insurance policy they no doubt have on his contract. The driving force is the competitive window begins to close for them in a few years anyway, as it does for most teams that lose their core players to free agency, or have them age out, and don’t have much of a farm.
The bottom line is the D’backs are not a poor team. They can afford to spend at least half again more than what they are now over the next few years at least. I won’t be weeping any tears in my $12 beers if they have to spend more than they would have liked to fit more pieces together.
Then again, Grienke could well regain his form and make this debate academic.
Wolf Hoffmann
Thoughts and prayers.