Click here to read a transcript of today’s chat with host Jeff Todd.
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- Cubs Acquire Jesse Chavez
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hahaha
hobie
2:35 How does Hamilton and Iglesias for Buehler, Verdugo, Hernandez and Peterson sound?
Jeffrey Todd
2:35 Sounds like a phenomenal opportunity for the Reds that will not remotely be entertained by the Dodgers.
No way
interested in Jeff’s comment about Scherzer: “Consider, for example, the Scherzer contract. He has been worth far more than his salary. ”
I would disagree. Washington paid market rate for an ace and Scherezer has delivered, winning the Cy Young the last two years. If Max had been ,500 pitcher the Nats signed for say, three years, $30 million and delivered the type of numbers he had then sure, he would have been worth far more than his salary. But Max was spectacular his last few years in Detroit and the Nats made Max one of the highest paid pitchers in baseball to continue that excellence and after a mediocre first season, he’s been wonderful the last two seasons. Whether he’ll turn out to be worth that contract remains to be seen but IMO, Washington and Max should be happy with the deal. He’s delivering what he was paid for.
You are stripping away all the context from what I wrote. I was discussing how major contracts can “look” at their midway point.
Scherzer would have been worth his salary if he had put up three-straight 4-WAR seasons. Instead he’s been a 6-WAR pitcher. That sort of early outperformance is generally necessary for any FA deal to work out, since typically the salaries are relatively consistent across the contract but the team expects to make out like a bandit in the beginning and get less than it’s paying for at the end.
In Scherzer’s case, I think he has been good and consistent enough that the remainder of the deal now looks like a good commitment for the team. In that regard, I think it is an example of a top-of-market contract that has worked out better than hoped at its mid-way point. That’s all I was suggesting in response to a question about how the Upton deal might look in a few years’ time.
So then I see we agree. :) Max has been everything the Nats could have realistically expected halfway through this deal.
As for Upton, we’ll see. But he’s been very consistent and unlike Josh Hamilton, he’s been healthy and unlike Albert Pujols, his contract is a lot shorter and Upton is younger so it appears the Angels have a made a better FA investment here than they have in the past.
“Worth” is a relative term. Is any player “worth” hundreds of millions of dollars? That’s strictly opinion. The free market decides how much someone is paid. All a team can hope for is someone who will produce the type of numbers he produced before the contract. ARod did that for Texas….Chan Ho Park did not. A team’s attendance, ratings and record are things beyond the scope of one player in most cases in baseball. To expect Yu Darvish to become a 20 game winner or Eric Hosmer to win the triple crown is absurd. To expect Yu to win between 12-14 games a year and Hosmer to hit 25HR with 90 rbi is all a team can realistically expect. How much you pay to get them is another issue.