Giants All-Star hurler Carlos Rodón tossed five frames tonight against the Dodgers, reaching the 110-inning threshold for the season. That’s a notable marker for the southpaw. Rodón’s two-year, $44MM contract with San Francisco affords him the right to opt out after this year upon reaching 110 innings.
Rodón has clearly been trending towards the mark for a while, as he’s stayed healthy and taken the ball 19 times. While not unexpected, his getting to that point nevertheless has key ramifications for next winter’s free agent class. Rodón is dominating opponents for a second straight season, and he and his representatives at the Boras Corporation seem all but certain to test the market over the offseason. Barring injury or an out-of-nowhere performance downturn in the second half, Rodón is a lock to handily surpass the one year and $22.5MM that’ll remain on his deal with San Francisco.
Indeed, the former third overall pick is trending towards reaching the market as one of the best, if not the best, arms in the class. He won’t turn 30 years old until December, and he owns a sub-3.00 ERA for a second straight season. Rodón provided the White Sox with 132 2/3 innings of 2.37 ERA ball last season, striking out an incredible 34.6% of batters faced against a career-low 6.7% walk rate. He looked on his way to Cy Young consideration before spending a couple weeks on the injured list in mid-August with shoulder fatigue. He remained effective upon his return but did so with diminished velocity, sitting in the 91-94 MPH range with his heater after working in the 95-98 MPH territory for the bulk of the year. His slider saw a similar dip in speed from 85-87 MPH to 82-84.
Rodón’s breakout came on the heels of two injury-ruined seasons. He made just 11 combined appearances between 2019-20, losing significant chunks of those respective campaigns with elbow and shoulder problems. Paired with his late-2021 yellow flags, the market devalued Rodón enough he didn’t find a long-term pact to his liking. The White Sox elected not to make him an $18.4MM qualifying offer, and he lingered on the open market until after the lockout. Rodón and agent Scott Boras expressed an early desire for a multi-year guarantee. The Giants put one on the table, but the two-year term with the vesting player option served as more of a modified pillow contract than a lengthy commitment. Rodón is making $21.5MM this year and has now earned the right to explore the market next offseason.
That late-offseason move has paid off brilliantly for San Francisco. Not only has he stayed healthy, Rodón has more or less doubled down on last year’s breakout. He carries a 2.86 ERA while fanning 30.8% of opponents with an 8.3% walk rate. That’s slightly worse rate production than he managed on Chicago’s south side, but it’s still top-of-the-rotation caliber and far better than any year he’d had before 2021. He’s also regained last year’s peak velocity, averaging 96 MPH on his four-seam while throwing his slider at 85.4 MPH.
Rodón’s work has been instrumental for a San Francisco club hanging right around the edges of the Wild Card race. The Giants entered play tonight half a game back of the National League’s final playoff spot. Rodón and Logan Webb have dazzled, helping to compensate for the loss of Anthony DeSclafani to a season-ending ankle issue. While various clubs would surely have interest in snagging Rodón for the stretch run, San Francisco seems likelier to add to the roster in hopes of snagging a playoff berth.
That’s all the more true because the Giants would likely be in line for draft compensation were Rodón to depart in free agency. Because Chicago elected not to tag him with a qualifying offer last year, he’d be eligible for a QO this winter — assuming the system remains in place. MLB and the Players Association are negotiating an international draft that, if implemented, would result in the removal of the QO system. How they’d compensate teams for free agent departures under a new arrangement is unclear. If no draft is agreed upon and the existing setup remains, Rodón would be a lock for a QO if he opts out. He’s not going to forfeit a $22.5MM salary to accept a subsequent one-year offer that’s likely to check in somewhere in the $18MM-20MM range.
Rodón’s place in next winter’s market will be influenced by how he performs over the second half, of course. He seemed trending towards a long-term deal at this point on the calendar last year, but the August shoulder concerns sidetracked that. That Rodón has continued to excel lends more faith to the idea he’s truly broken out as one of the game’s best arms. Should he surpass 150 innings and finish this season healthy, he’ll be one of the game’s marquee free agents.
Joe Musgrove looks as if he’ll be Rodón’s biggest competition for the title of top pitcher on the market, unless extension talks with the Padres culminate in a deal. Jacob deGrom has continued to maintain he plans to opt out of his deal, but he’s gone more than a year between MLB appearances and will hit free agency in advance of his age-35 season. deGrom, the sport’s best pitcher when healthy, looks likely to receive the loftiest average annual salary if he holds up down the stretch, but Rodón’s and Musgrove’s comparative youth could land them a larger guarantee over a longer term. Mike Clevinger, Zach Eflin, Jameson Taillon, Chris Bassitt, Noah Syndergaard, Clayton Kershaw and Nathan Eovaldi are among the other starters who are slated to hit the open market as part of a deep class.
There are a whole lot of durability issues in that group. The starting pitching aisle is going to be slim pickings this winter
Rsox – With the way pitchers are handled these days, pretty much every pitcher could experience injuries.
So let’s see ….
$44M for two years of Rodon (if he doesn’t opt out)
OR
$32M for three years of Paxton (if the Sox pick up his options despite not having much, if any, opportunity to see him pitch this year). Which basically means $32M for hopefully two years of pitching.
Bloom tried to play the “I’m smarter than everyone else” card, and right now it’s looking like a massive fail. It will be VERY interesting to see if he picks up the options.
I don’t see Bloom picking up his options because of the setbacks. Paxton was expected to already be on a rehab assignment getting ready to join the team and now may be nothing more than a bullpen arm/extra starter in September. Bloom may play like he’s “the smartest guy in the room” but he isn’t, we know that, he knows that, but at least he gave himself an out in this case.
I’m not knocking Rodon or the Giants, i merely observed that for what starting pitching costs and what is available the choices are either not very good/come with huge injury concerns.
I guess the only question is if he doesn’t pitch this season, does Paxton take the $4M player option.?
I would imagine end of season medicals will make that decision for him.
Either way it’s looking like at least $6M wasted on him. Not a bad risk for a team willing to spend, but money that could have been far better spent for a team that’s been going cheap.
Still have no idea why the White Sox didn’t QO him
History of not staying healthy.
Only would have mattered if he accepted
It was basically a one year deal and if he signed elsewhere they get a decent draft pick. Yet another blunder for the Southsiders.
There’s really not much risk in a one year contract, especially for a team that was hoping to be a WS contender. It was dumb for the White Sox not to extend a QO.
Buyer beware
Payroll! They couldn’t fill their 2b or RF with their remaining payroll w/o his QO being added. They had to do a contract swap to get Pollack. Remove 18.5MM from last off seasons acquisitions if you want to see where they would have been. Keep in mind, no one knew how many innings he would be able to throw this year. SF was not maxing their payroll, and could gamble. Rodon was a win. DeScalini was a fail.
@stymeedone Again, it would only have added $18.5m to their payroll if he accepted it.
Doesn’t matter, what he signed for wouldn’t have netted the White Sox a draft pick since his deal was under $50 million…
Yes he would have netted them a draft pick. Just would have been after the 2nd round not the 1st round.
They wanted to pick up Kimbrel’s option instead of ending up with nothing in order to trade for an outfielder.
It doesn’t look like they had the payroll space to do both. I think they feared calling Boras’s statement about rejecting the QO in case he was bluffing.
What part of “QOing Rodon only means they can’t afford to make other moves if Rodon accepts the QO which he was never going to” do you not understand? If a team that is above the luxury tax is trying to drop below it and they have a player who they already know is going to reject the QO they’re not going to just decline to extend it just because they don’t have room for him in their budget.
Extend him.
It almost felt like the Sox were doing him (and Boras) a huge favor by not slapping a QO on him. Pitch for us, on the cheap, in 21 and we won’t QO you after the season. Idk, it seems baffling they didn’t offer it because he was of course going to reject it, thus getting an extra pick.
I think we’re all forgetting he played 2021 on a 1 year low money deal. He wasn’t eligible for the QO after 2021. He didn’t get extended the QO because that was after his 2020 season which in 4 games he had a 8+ ERA… No one in their right mind would offer that a QO. Especially after being hurt in 2019 and a 5+ ERA…
He was absolutely eligible to be extended a QO last year…
https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2021/11/notable-players-not-to-receive-qualifying-offers.html
Interesting that’s on me I didn’t realize you could have the opportunity to offer the QO more than once to a player. Seems shady by ownership, but hey the players signed off in the CBA.
You can only offer the QO once but Rodon didn’t get one after 2020 so they could have extended him one after 2021. SF can and will extend him one this coming offseason.
Wrong.
Did Rodon have blister issues or thumbnail issues with the white Sox? I remember reading something about that but nothing was mentioned is this post.
Yeah because Scott Boras has a long documented history of doing favors for teams… lol
I like the sound of New York Met Carlos Rondon
I wonder if Rondon is as good as Rodon
Farhan, extend Rodon please.
Rodon will exercise his opt out option and Zaidi will be rebuilding the Giants pitching staff again.
Kyle Harrison will replace Rodon in the rotation next year.
I expect he will be up next year but he isn’t going to replace him – I think there will need to either need to be an addition or an extension of rodon either way. the rotation is still fragile – who knows what is up with desclafani, wood and cobb are all injury prone.
after the way the defense played tonight, and for the most of the season behind him frankly, he’s opting out and finding a team that can field the ball properly
Yeah. Giants played like the Cubs, dropping cans of corn. Exciting game though. Dodger stadium looked demoralized before the 8th inning rally. Giants defense really let him down
I think someone must have dropped something heavier on your head.
@rememberthecoop
No need for insults just because the giants play like a AA team
Well, that rules out a return to the White Sox.
Rodon is an exceptional pitcher when healthy but I’m not a big fan of his.
When his fielders make an error behind him he lowers and shakes his head in disgust, which only makes the position players feel worse and play worse. Alex Cobb does the same thing and now even Alex Wood is doing it. That pisses me off. Do the position players shake their heads when their pitcher gives up a bomb? No.
Logan Webb is a bright example. When his fielders make an error behind him, he makes it his mission to pick his teammates up, which he almost always does.
That said. Luis Gonzales is the worst fielding outfielder the Giants have had since Glenallen Hill. Gonzales made a couple of nice plays his first couple of games giving the Giants a false sense of security with him in the field.
Tonight he charged in on a fly ball only to have it sail 50 feet over his head. It wasn’t even counted as an error. That’s at least the 4th egregious misplay I’ve seen him make in the outfield.
Trade him and Rodon (before his arm wears out) for a solid starting pitcher with 2-3 years of control.
Kevin Johnson;
Excellent post.
1. Be skeptical of defensive statistics. In fact be skeptical of any public statistics. They show you what happened. They do not show you the variables as to why that happened. I’d guess that individual MLB teams have internal statistics that break down plays in their games better. Then again, what’s truly needed is to do what the NFL does – have multiple people break down film of every game. Of course MLB plays 10 times the amount of regular season games as the NFL over the course of a season, and individuals interpret actions and view variables differently.
2. Scott Boras’ opt-out clause is beyond favorable to the player. It’s sleazy. A FO has to be pretty desperate to go along with that. Farhan Zaidi is extremely bright. He and his staff knew all the possible oncomes. It’s going to be interesting to see how he/they react to the Rodon situation as well as to opt-outs in the future.
3. The Washington Nationals under the older Lerner had a great working relationship with Mr. Boras (who I admire….partially because I can’t believe what he routinely gets away with). The agent made sure the team put the players interests over that of the team. And the Nationals did compete, even won a WS. But they often ran excessive payrolls and came up short in what they accomplished as opposed to what they paid for…nothing new in Washington, DC. The next generation of Lerner’s recognized the situation for what it is. The franchise is currently having a liquidation sale and is looking for a new owner…..of which there are always a pool of candidates.
@Samuel – Zaidi knew exactly what that option was. He really only wanted to sign Rodon to a one year deal anyways and he got him at a very good salary given his performance. The second year option was the only way Rodon was going to sign; it offered him protection should he have a bad season or an injury-riddled season that only allowed him to make 18-20 starts. Keep in mind that Boras & Rodon were looking for a 9 figure deal this past offseason, but this 1 year deal with SF may just get him that; albeit one year later. I can see Rodon getting 5/$110M+ on his next deal from a desperate team. Given his history of short term deals, I’m not sure Zaidi will be in on that bidding. If SF were to offer 4/$100M then Rodon might re-sign with the Giants but I’m not sure Zaidi and ownership wants to pay that much for a pitcher who at any time could hit the 60-day IL. At the end of the day, this contract (so far) has worked out very well for both sides. I’m sure both sides are very happy with it and if it nets SF an extra draft pick via the QO, even better for the Giants!
Keep in mind that if Rodón sucked this year, Mr. Zaidi and the Giants organization would be on the hook for $44m.
^^This. Opt-outs have cash value and function as a discount for the team over what they would have paid without the opt-out. The Giants went into this signing with their eyes open, and not only that, it worked out very well for them, and for the player. Nobody should have any complaints. This is the guy Friedman should have signed instead of Heaney.
it’s just money. the giants aren’t as concerned about that as other orgs, the goal for the FO is to put together talent and build the system. Rodon is a transitional figure since the real window that the giants are looking at is more like 23-24 when some of the prospects start coming up and you can dip further in the FA market. we are in a window right now where guys are moving in and moving out and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t but it looks like the plan is to build the base that you can build around and supplement with transitional guys until that base comes together rather than finding big contracts and clearing house
“…….[Rodón] striking out an incredible 34.6% of batters faced against a career-low 6.7% walk rate. He looked on his way to Cy Young consideration before spending a couple weeks on the injured list in mid-August with shoulder fatigue.”
Am I the only person following MLB that finds this both a logical outcome for Mr. Rodón as well as the primary reason for the epidemic of pitching injuries as well as the excessive amount of TJ surgeries. Does one have to go through four years to attain a bachelor’s degree, four years in medical school and at least three years completing a residency and possibly six years of a residency if specializing to figure this out?
LOL
Should baseball, and for that matter the world, survive 50-100 years from now, history will show that the opt-out clause was one of the worst things to happen in sports. Players cry about lack of loyalty in owners but they, the players, will sign a 6-year or 8-year “deal” but only if they can pull out after two or three seasons. Let’s see owners try that. “Okay, Mr. Soto. We’ll sign you for 15 years at $500 million, but we want opt-outs after seasons 3, 5, 6 and 9” Just smell the collusion cries.
Owners do that. They’re called team options.
Poor billionaires getting treated unfairly?
I don’t feel sorry for either side.
I’d give him 2 years/$53.5M making it a 3 year/$75M deal, effectively.
You could offer him that, and then watch him sign with someone else.
Rodon stunk last night and Giants bullpen was even worse. Too emotional to be elite.
This guy is talented but stress him on the mound & he blows up like a balloon.
Stretches of nastiness but at best he’s a consistent number 3. Nowhere near a #1 or #2.
Watch agents, especially Boras, to discourage their clients to not consider Giants. The agents’ talking point will be signing with Giants means you become a platoon player.
Random comment–if the Union gives MLB an international draft in return for just getting rid of or modifying the QO system, they are even bigger idiots than I thought.
Rodon was better in 2021 up until fatigue understandably set in. A second consecutive strong and healthy season, while also building up his innings, will set him up for a huge payday.
The Sox should have QO’d him. A major market team with a wealthy owner cheaped out.
He couldn’t receive the QO. He was playing under a 1 year deal. His QO would’ve been after 2020 in which he pitched 4 games with a 8+ ERA and his 2019 wasn’t any better… It wasn’t possible, The QO wasn’t an option
Jason – Nothing personal, but you are totally misinformed. The White Sox absolutely were allowed to offer him a QO after last season. They chose not to only due to health concerns.
https://chicago.suntimes.com/white-sox/2022/3/24/22995323/carlos-rodon-white-sox-giants
Yeah I was completely wrong on that one. Sox should’ve offered lol.
“Joe Musgrove looks as if he’ll be Rodón’s biggest competition for the title of top pitcher on the market.”
Did ANY of the other players rumored to be going to the Pirates in the Gerritt Cole trade end up being better than Joe Musgrove?
None of the Yankees (Frazier, etc.) did.
Did any of the other rumored packages end up being better or did the Pirates, in fact, take the best offer?
No but Musgrove got the Pirates David Bednar arguably the top closer in the NL and Hudson Head the Pirates #19 and Endy Rodriguez (from Mets) their #6 prospect per mlb
I really like Endy. He looks like he could be a Luis Arraez 2.0, but from behind the plate. He had a rough April, but since the start of May, he’s batting for a .908 OPS, .403 wOBA, and 144 wRC+. He’s also greatly improved his K-rate, going from 31.6% in April, 24.1% in May, 19.4% in June, and finally 15.4% so far in July. I’d love to see him keep on that pace for the rest of the season. If he can end the year with a sub-20% K-rate and walk rate above 10%, it will be the fourth year in a row he’s done that. He might not have very much home run power, but Rodriguez can drive the gaps extremely effectively. 66 doubles in 1011 minor league plate appearances, which averages out to 32 in 500 trips to the plate.
CONGRATS Carlos.
Were at the half way point of the season, there is a very good chance that he doesn’t make thorough the second half. The CWS didn’t QO him for a couple of reasons. They thought Crochet was going to take the next step before having to have TJ surgery and they wanted to appease Boras because doing a QO would have limited the teams willing to sign Rodon. Sometimes feeding Boras a bone for his client allows you to be in the room for some of his future clients who normally wouldn’t consider the CWS as an option. or good market.
boxer – That’s an EXCELLENT point about Boras, kudos.
Giants have to trade him. They got lucky to enjoy the healthiest stretch of success of his career. Yes, he’s a rental, and one could argue they won’t get much in return, but they can sign him again this winter after he opts out. This team is not gonna sniff the post season this year, so SF needs to get something for him while they can.
The Mariners could use him.
Good call, a team 4 games over .500 definitely won’t sniff the playoffs
Bueno 1 hombre
“He carries a 2.86 ERA while fanning 30.8% of opponents with an 8.3% walk rate.”
These are mostly-irrelevant stats.
ERA is unadjusted and non-standardized, and therefore usually misleading. Strikeout and walk rates are variables that do TEND to predict success, but they too are unadjusted, and they’re presented devoid of pertinent context, so all you can do is assume or infer that they actually affect success.
Context example: Were *constantly* walking Bonds 20 years ago, Trout for the past decade, and Soto now counterproductive strategies? Obviously not.
Walks are bad only in certain contexts, yet people who don’t really understand statistics, and do not comprehend the crucial distinction between Predictive and Evaluative measures, miss this point (any many other points).
You’re wrong about the SO% being irrelevant. SOs are one of the most relevant stats concerning pitchers. They’re what FIP is based on. SOs happen without any other factors involved, other than the pitcher. The context; the park, and the defense playing behind the pitcher, are all non-factors.
Not sure what your point is about Bonds. If it’s that BBs aren’t bad, I disagree. Yes, walking a hitter intentionally can be a strategy, but those IBBs are a fraction of the overall. For example, Rodon has 5 IBBs for his entire career spanning 140 games (135 GS).
Bonds was an outlier anyway. He holds the MLB records for IBBs. His 688 IBBs are 372 more than #2 Albert Pujols, and 390 more than #3 Stan Musial. And in a career 10 years longer Bonds has 573 more IBBs than Mike Trout.
@tad: I clearly wrote MOSTLY irrelevant. K% is just yet another beta weight in a forced-fit regression model that’s completely devoid of pertinent context.
They’re all lazy, simpleton stats that, ridiculously, are only slightly useful.
And if you think officially-labeled IBB’s are the only IBB’s, then you’re only off by, oh, maybe two thousand percent.
Soto or Judge would be big time additions for the Giants. Without quality players (not platoon players) in front and after teams would pitch around them.
judge yes, soto no. I think if soto were on the free market it would be a no brainer to go and try to add him but right now it would be gift of the magi do dump all of your farm to get soto since by the time you manage to put a team around him that can win he is going to walk out as a FA anyways
Right now this what the starting pitching market may look like:
Possible opt-outs:
Carlos Rodon
Jacob deGrom
Chris Sale
Rodon may opt-out.
deGrom has said he would, but hasn’t thrown a pitch this year so maybe he won’t.
Given his recent spate of injuries Sale would be foolish to forego any guaranteed money to try his luck in free agency
Vesting options:
Chris Flexen
Carlos Carrasco
Flexen needs 20.2 innings for his $8 million opton to kick in so depending on what the Mariners plans are he should get it
Carrasco needs 71 innings for his option to kick in and would have to average at least 5 innings over 14 start to get there so his is much less certain
Team/player/mutual options
Justin Verlander
Aaron Nola
Charlie Morton
Chris Bassit
Sonny Gray
Zach Eflin
Mike Minor
Dylan Bundy
Zack Davies
Taijuan Walker
Drew Smyly
Jake Odorizzi
James Paxton
Luis Severino
Chris Archer
Jordan Lyles
Nick Martinez
Danny Duffy
Garrett Richards
Many of these could go either way so it’s tough to gauge
Free agents:
Noah Syndergaard
Jameson Taillon
Nate Eovaldi
Clayton Kershaw
Joe Musgrove
Sean Manaea
Zack Grienke
Kyle Gibson
Wade Miley
Tyler Anderson
Andrew Heaney
Dallas Keuchel
Johnny Cueto
Michael Pineda
Rich Hill
Michael Wacha
Corey Kluber
Matthew Boyd
Joe Ross
Martin Perez
Mike Cleavinger
Jose Quintana
Trevor Williams
Aaron Sanchez
Anibal Sanchez
Carlos Martinez
Michael Lorenzon
Vince Velasquez
Ross Stripling
Jose Urena
Julio Teheran
Chad Kuhl
Chase Anderson
Michael Foltynewicz
Trevor Cahill
Koji Arihara
Josh Lindblom
Matt Harvey
Shelby Miller
Dan Straily
David Price
And a plethora of non-tenders likely to add to this group
I change my mind on extending Rodon, trade him along with everyone else that has value.
It’s tempting, but I don’t think they will, as long as they’re within a shot of a WC spot. I don’t think they’ll extend him either though. He’ll get a QO, if that’s still a possibility.
The problem the Giants have is that no FA pitcher will come there with that Zaidi plug-and-play defense. Unless Zaidi actually inserts players who can field their (sole) position and stops the dumpster diving, which he won’t do, they’ll only be able to count on those they draft and the pillow contract cases for their rotation, and even those will back away after seeing the Zaidi defense.