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Make Or Break Year

Make Or Break Year: Kevin Youkilis

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The Red Sox are among baseball's most disappointing teams so far this season, due in part to injury. Closer Andrew Bailey, outfielders Carl Crawford and Jacoby Ellsbury, and starters John Lackey and Daisuke Matsuzaka are among the players the team has lost for a significant length of time already in 2012. Boston also lost Kevin Youkilis, an important right-handed bat in their lefty heavy lineup.

Uspw_6196732Youkilis, 33, is currently on the disabled list with a lower back strain. It's his fifth trip to the DL in the last four years, part of a laundry list of injuries that includes an oblique strain (2009), thumb surgery (2010), back tightness (2011), and a sports hernia (2011). Since the start of the 2010 season, Youkilis has played in just 240 of 352 possible games (68.2%).

Prior to being placed on the DL, Youkilis had a .219/.292/.344 batting line in 72 plate appearances. Dating back to last year's All-Star break, he's produced a .205/.307/.345 batting line in 231 plate appearances. His performance during his peak years – .308/.404/.560 from 2008-2010 – appears to be very much a thing of the past right now. A player with injury concerns and declining performance as he approaches his mid-30s usually isn't someone a team tries to keep around.

To make matters worse for Youkilis, the Red Sox have a ready-made third base replacement already in-house. Top prospect Will Middlebrooks has burst onto the scene with three homers and four doubles in his six games with Boston, continuing the hot streak that saw him hit nine homers in 24 games in Triple-A games before being recalled. Baseball America ranked Middlebrooks as the 51st best prospect in the game before the season, and the 23-year-old is doing his best to show the team he deserves to play the hot corner on the full-time basis.

The Red Sox owe Youkilis $12MM this season and hold a $13MM club option for his services next year ($1MM buyout). It's seems very unlikely that they'll exercise the option at this point, though the decision still isn't due for another seven months or so. A lot can change between now and then. Youkilis is in a difficult position as an injury-prone and declining player with a young hotshot rookie ready to take his job. If the Red Sox decline to bring him back in 2013, his stock as a free agent will be poor without a strong return from this latest back ailment.

Photo courtesy of US Presswire.

Make Or Break Year: Geovany Soto

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In the aftermath of Geovany Soto's big 2010 season, the catcher was being looked at as extension candidate, in line for a healthy multiyear contract.  The Cubs held off extending Soto and instead chose to go year-to-year in arbitration, which may have proven to be a wise decision.  Soto followed up his .280/.393/.497 performance in 2010 with a disappointing .228/.310/.411 slash line in 2011, and has thus far gotten off to a slow start this season, with just a .526 OPS entering tonight's play.  (Though, in fairness, Soto's .157 BABIP indicates he's been very unlucky.)

Uspw_6233158Soto earned $3MM in 2011 and $4.3MM this season during his first two arb-eligible years and is due for one more trip through the arb process before hitting free agency after the 2013 campaign.  We can tentatively predict Soto to earn around $5.5MM next year since even if he continues to hit poorly, I think the Cubs will still tender him a contract.  Soto's big 2010 season and his Rookie Of The Year campaign in 2008 are still too fresh in everyone's memory, and since solid-hitting catchers are such a commodity in the game, the Cubs will likely give Soto another chance to regain his past form.

"Likely," however, is not a certainty.  Soto is a middling-to-below average defender, so unless his bat heats up, he has little value.  Chicago has another catching prospect in 25-year-old Welington Castillo, who has posted an .852 OPS in 590 Triple-A plate appearances and is currently serving as the Cubs' backup with Steve Clevenger on the DL.  Jed Hoyer could go in a different direction next year, using Castillo and Clevenger (who also has some good minor league numbers) in a righty-lefty platoon, possibly with a veteran brought into the mix during Spring Training to add depth.

If the Cubs do give up on Soto, it's more likely that they would try to deal him at the trade deadline rather than non-tendering him for nothing in return.  The Rays are the most notable contender with a clear need at catcher, though a number of other teams could develop a hole behind the plate by the end of July.  If Soto can't get his bat going, expect him to be dealt for a low-level prospect to a team in need of a backup catcher.  If Soto does hit, however, he'll keep his job in Chicago for at least one more season, though the Cubs will still be right to hold off on an extension until they see what Soto does in 2013.

Photo courtesy of Howard Smith/US Presswire

Make Or Break Year: Jair Jurrjens

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The Braves boast an enviable collection of young pitchers, enough that they were able to trade Derek Lowe this offseason, lose Tim Hudson to injury, and still go 10-7 early on. Mike Minor, Brandon Beachy, and Tommy Hanson have carried the bulk of the workload while Randall Delgado cuts his teeth as the fifth starter and Julio Teheran bides his time in Triple-A. One guy who has not carried his weight so far is right-hander Jair Jurrjens.

Uspw_6190304Jurrjens, 26, made a fourth straight disaster start last night – five runs in three innings to the Dodgers – and was demoted to Triple-A after the game. He's allowed 17 runs and put 38 men on base in 16 1/3 innings across those four starts after posting a 2.96 ERA and being named to the NL All-Star Team last year. Jurrjens did finish last season on the disabled list though, missing a total of 44 games with right knee inflammation. He had surgery on the same knee after the 2010 season and has made a total of five trips to the disabled list since his debut in 2007.

The biggest physical concern with Jurrjens is not necessarily his knee, but his declining fastball velocity. PitchFX data says he averaged between 91.2 and 91.9 mph every year from 2007-2010 before dropping off to 89.1 mph last season and 88.4 mph in the early going this season. The start-by-start plot of his fastball velocity range is troubling, especially since he had shoulder problems in 2007 (inflammation) and 2010 (stiffness). Only once in his four years had Jurrjens topped 200 innings (2009) and only twice has he topped 160 innings (2008 and 2009).

Although his ERA has fluctuated through the years, Jurrjens has maintained a steady walk (3.2 BB/9) and strikeout (6.1 K/9) rate through his career. He started his time in the big leagues by getting a healthy amount of ground balls (49.6% from 2007-2008), though he's become more susceptible to fly balls in recent years (41.7% from 2009-2012). After producing 3.7 and 3.9 wins above replacement in 2008 and 2009 according to FanGraphs, respectively, he's produced just 2.2 WAR total in the two years and three weeks since.

Jurrjens will make $5.5MM this season, his second year of arbitration eligibility as a Super Two. The Braves made no secret of their willingness to trade him this past offseason, most notably offering him to the Orioles as part of a package for Adam Jones. They also had talks with the Rockies, Red Sox, Royals, Orioles, Blue Jays, Tigers, and Reds. Given his relatively high salary, two more years of arbitration eligibility, his injury problems, and all the young arms in the rotation around him, Jurrjens suddenly looks like a potential non-tender candidate if he can't right the ship in Triple-A and contribute to the big league club this season.

Photo courtesy of US Presswire.

Make Or Break Year: James Loney

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Matt Kemp and Clayton Kershaw are arguably the best player and the best pitcher in baseball, respectively, and both came up through the Dodgers' farm system. Los Angeles has also produced an All-Star closer (Jonathan Broxton), an All-Star catcher (Russell Martin), another All-Star starting pitcher (Chad Billingsley), and numerous other pieces in recent years. One player who has not developed as expected is first baseman James Loney.

Uspw_5478022One year ago, the 27-year-old Loney was a non-tender candidate after hitting .267/.329/.395 with ten homers in 648 plate appearances in 2010. He started slowly last season, hitting just .254/.305/.327 through his first 434 plate appearances before turning it on in the second half and hitting .388/.438/.679 in his final 148 trips to the plate. That late-season hot streak likely saved Loney's job, as the Dodgers tendered him a contract and will pay him $6.375MM in 2012.

The Dodgers have been using the left-handed hitting Loney as part of a first base platoon with the right-handed Juan Rivera so far this year, and he's hitting just .194/.306/.258 in the early going. He's a career .299/.359/.453 hitter against righties and .250/.307/.365 against lefties. Other than seven innings of right field experience much earlier in his career, he's limited to first base and doesn't offer any versatility.

Loney will be a free agent after the season and first basemen with minimal power usually aren't hot commodities on the open market. His career high is 15 homers back in 2007, which he did in just 96 games. Since then he's hit no more than 13 homers while playing no less than 158 games in a season. A player Loney's age is just entering his prime, but his performance has declined in recent years and now he might hit the open market with his value at its nadir.

Photo courtesy of US Presswire.

Make Or Break Year: Francisco Liriano

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In 2006, Baseball America's sixth-ranked prospect took the American League by storm after the Twins moved him from the bullpen into the rotation. Francisco Liriano was every bit as dominant as fellow ace Johan Santana, and Minnesota looked to have a pair of dynamic left-handers that would be as formidable as any one-two punch in baseball. Uspw_5484486

Tommy John surgery that summer derailed that tandem, and set Liriano on the shelf for the entirety of the 2007 season. After 118 innings of work at Triple-A in 2008, Liriano rejoined the Twins' rotation to mixed success, and his dreadful 2009 was forgettable, to put it lightly (5.80 ERA in 136 2/3 innings).

Liriano exploded in 2010 to show that he wasn't done yet, though, winning the American League Comeback Player of the Year Award with 191 2/3 innings of 3.62 ERA ball. As is often the case, the ERA didn't tell the whole tale. Fangraphs pegged Liriano's worth at a whopping six wins above replacement. He struck out 9.4 hitters per nine innings pitched, while walking just 2.7 per nine. His SIERA was 3.02, while FIP liked him for a full run lower than his ERA — 2.66.

Those days seem like a distant memory however, following yet another disappointing season in 2011. Liriano avoided arbitration this winter by settling on a one-year deal worth $5.5MM. After a fantastic Spring Training in which he posted a 33:5 K:BB ratio in 27 innings while featuring a fastball above 93mph, Liriano is looking like his 2011 self. His first two starts have left him with an ERA of 10.00, and he's walked five hitters in nine innings while striking out just six. There's certainly time to turn it around, but it's in his best financial interest to do so sooner rather than later.

Liriano is a free agent following this season, and while he has the talent to be one of the game's most dominant southpaws, his consistency will limit his free agent earnings. A return to his 2010 ways would be enough to entice suitors to pony up on a multiyear deal, perhaps similar to the three-year, $32MM deal signed by Jorge De La Rosa following the 2010 season. With enough interested parties, larger offers wouldn't be out of the question for a 29-year-old lefty with ace-caliber stuff.

A repeat of his 2011 numbers, however, would likely relegate Liriano to a one-year deal in which he'd be seeking to prove that he can still pitch at this level. The next six months could very well mean tens of millions of dollars to the enigmatic lefty.

Photo courtesy of Kyle Terada/US Presswire.

Make Or Break Year: Adam Lind

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Uspw_5516222There were more than a few Blue Jays fans disappointed that Adam Lind was still the club's first baseman on Opening Day, given the (mostly unfounded) belief in Toronto that the team would make a push to sign Prince Fielder last winter.  Playoff-starved Jays supporters were no doubt tired of having to wait at least one more year for the team to fully go "all-in" for a postseason run, but given the cost of acquiring a big first base bat, it's no surprise that the Jays are giving Lind another season to pull himself together.

Lind enjoyed a big breakout campaign in 2009, hitting .305/.370/.562 with 35 homers.  That performance earned him a multiyear contract extension worth a guaranteed $18MM from 2010-13, plus club options for each of the 2014 ($7MM), 2015 ($7.5MM) and 2016 ($8MM) seasons, which would have been Lind's first three free agent years. 

The extension was so team-friendly that it could still prove to be a bargain for Toronto, despite the fact that Lind has struggled mightily since signing the deal.  Lind posted a combined .243/.291/.432 line, 49 homers and 48 doubles in 2010 and 2011 — just 14 homers and two doubles more than he hit in 2009 alone.  This poor performance didn't occur in a vacuum, however, as Lind has battled wrist and back injuries, gone through a position shift to first base that he admitted he was physically unprepared to handle and also possibly distracted by off-the-field events like getting married and having his first child.

Now, Lind is healthy and entirely focused on baseball.  Even if he doesn't hit as he did in 2009, I think the Blue Jays would simply be satisfied with Lind proving he can be a productive Major League hitter rather than posting another sub-.300 OBP.  The Jays' plan is to have Lind play every day against right-handers and he'll be occasionally spelled at first by Edwin Encarnacion when Toronto faces a tough left-handed starter. 

The Jays have given themselves flexibility at the 1B/DH spots, between Lind, Encarnacion (the team holds a $3.5MM option on him for 2013), the loser of the long-term left field battle between Eric Thames and Travis Snider, or even Jose Bautista, who the Jays probably have slated to move out of right field within a couple of years' time.  Toronto's deep minor league system also provides depth; it's easy to see a scenario where Bautista moves to first to make room for Jake Marisnick or Anthony Gose in the outfield, with Gose could bumping current center fielder Colby Rasmus to right.

As noted, Lind's contract is not a great burden on the Jays' payroll.  Even if he does again underachieve, he'll be likely brought back in 2013 as a platoon candidate.  A third straight poor season, however, would be the third strike for Lind's place in Toronto's long-term plans.  Lind would be facing a $2MM buyout from the club rather than a pickup of his $7MM option for 2014.  As we saw last winter, 1B/DH types with much more proven track records than Lind had trouble finding Major League contracts, so it's not a stretch to say that Lind's career could be riding on how he hits in 2012. 

It's hard to avoid the parallels to the ignominious end of Aaron Hill's tenure as a Blue Jay.  Hill also enjoyed a big 2009 campaign and had a team-friendly contract extension that included a number of option years.  Hill's productivity after 2009, however, fell off so sharply that the Jays dealt him to Arizona last summer and moved on with Kelly Johnson at second base.  Hill's defensive skill and his premium position made him a more attractive trade candidate than Lind, but his departure confirms that the Jays will only give so much rope to an underperforming player, even one who has a good contract and was very recently thought of as a key part of the club's core.

There are a multitude of reasons why the Jays didn't feel the timing was right to make a play for a big-name first baseman last winter, be it signing Fielder or making a franchise-altering trade (i.e. selling the farm to the Reds for Joey Votto).  If all goes well for the Jays in 2012, however, the team will surely be looking to contend for the postseason in 2013, and they know they won't be able to achieve that goal without at least steady production from the first base spot.  Toronto has already prepared itself for the post-Lind era, so the pressure is on the 28-year-old to show that he deserves to not just keep his job now, but also that he deserves to play for the contender that the Jays fancy themselves to be in the near future.   

Photo courtesy of Michael L. Stein/US Presswire

Make Or Break Year: Delmon Young

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As last summer wore on, it became clear that Delmon Young didn’t figure in to the Twins’ long-term plans. He wasn’t hitting and he wasn’t getting any more affordable, so a non-tender seemed entirely possible. Instead, the Tigers acquired Young from their division rivals last August and he hit eight home runs in the season’s final six weeks before hitting five more homers in the postseason. The Tigers weren’t going to release Young after a performance like that, and he’s currently Detroit’s starting left fielder. Young will debut on the free agent market six months from now and in the meantime he faces a make-or-break year.

Delmon Young - Tigers (PW)

Let’s start with the positives. Young hits for a high average and offers some power. The right-handed hitter produces especially well against left-handers, as his career .305/.341/.475 split shows. He also has pedigree as the first overall selection of the 2003 draft. Plus, he won’t turn 27 until September, which makes him much younger than most free agents.

However, his defense in left field costs his team, according to The Fielding Bible Volume III and UZR. He strikes out often, rarely walks and offers ordinary offense against right-handed pitching.

It’s currently difficult to imagine the Tigers making Young a qualifying offer this coming offseason. Young doesn’t seem like a $12.5MM player and he’s never produced like one, according to FanGraphs’ version of the Wins Above Replacement metric. Young will hit the open market unfettered by draft pick compensation, barring the unexpected.

Young’s representatives at Wasserman Media Group will ask for a multiyear deal should he replicate his 2010 season or continue hitting the way he did upon arriving in Detroit. Josh Willingham, now 33, obtained a $21MM contract last offseason. Three days later, 29-year-old Jason Kubel signed a two-year deal worth $16MM. A similar market could emerge for Young’s services if he serves up an eye-catching combination of batting average, homers and RBI this year. Any team that signs Young to a multiyear deal will face its share of criticism from scouts and analysts alike, but back-of-the-baseball-card stats have some appeal to this day, so a multiyear deal with a generous annual salary remains possible.

If Young puts together a disappointing season and solidifies the impression that he’s simply a lefty masher who doesn’t play defense, he’ll be limited to modest one-year offers. He may still be 26, but his skillset sometimes resembles that of a much older player. And as Andruw Jones (one-year, $2MM) and Jonny Gomes (one-year, $1MM) can confirm, the market for part-time righty bats isn’t lucrative.

Photo courtesy of US Presswire.

Make Or Break Year: Mike Pelfrey

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The Mets slashed more than $25MM off their Opening Day payroll from last season, but one player they held onto was Mike Pelfrey. The club's Opening Day starter a year ago was a non-tender candidate this past offseason, and now he has to show that they make the right decision by keeping him around for another year.

Uspw_5202756Pelfrey, 28, has yet to live up to the expectations of being the ninth overall pick in the 2005 draft. He has made at least 31 starts and thrown at least 180 innings in each of the last four seasons, but he's pitched to a 4.27 ERA during that time. Pelfrey's career strikeout (5.1 K/9), walk (3.2 BB/9), and ground ball (48.5%) rates leave an awful lot to be desired, especially for a pitcher making $5.675MM in his second year of arbitration-eligibility.

The Mets were reportedly open to trading Pelfrey last month, and at one point they were even said to be considering releasing him. That didn't happen, and instead the 6-foot-7 right-hander will make his season debut tonight. If the club was thinking about trading him in Spring Training, there's a pretty good chance they're hoping he performs well early in the season so they could flip him for a decent return at midseason. Quality starting pitching is always in high demand at the trade deadline.

At the same time, there's also the chance that Pelfrey does not improve his performance and boost his trade value. Another season like last year (4.74 ERA in 193 2/3 innings) or 2009 (5.03 ERA in 184 1/3 innings) likely means that the Mets are stuck with him, at least until the non-tender deadline in December. At that point he would be a free agent coming off three disappointing seasons in the last four years. A good year could mean a trade to a contender and a hefty salary in 2013, but another typical Pelfrey season means something much less lucrative.

Photo courtesy of US Presswire.

Make Or Break Year: Phil Hughes

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Phil Hughes is still only 25 years old, but the Yankees' right-hander has ridden the career roller coaster since making his debut in 2007. He knows what it's like to be a highly touted prospect, to deal with injury, to be a dominant setup man, a quality starter, an All-Star, a World Champion, and a disappointment. The 2012 season figures to be the most important season of his career.

Uspw_5541668After helping the Yankees to the 2009 World Series as Mariano Rivera's setup man, Hughes moved into the team's rotation in 2010 and rewarded them with an 18-8 record. That record had more to do with all the terrific run support he received, though the advanced metrics indicate that his performance was almost exactly league average. His 4.19 ERA was backed up by a 4.25 FIP. League average isn't too shabby for a 23-year-old in the AL East.

Because he had worked primarily as a reliever in 2009, Hughes threw 80 1/3 more innings in 2010 than he had the year before. He also showed up to camp overweight in 2011. The combination of being out of shape and having a big workload increase led to shoulder issues. Hughes missed the majority of last season and wasn't particularly effective when he was on the mound, pitching to a 5.79 ERA (4.58 FIP) in 74 2/3 innings. His fastball velocity was gone and his breaking ball had no bite.

After making $2.7MM as a first-time arbitration-eligible player last year, Hughes got a very slight raise to $3.2MM this year. He rededicated himself to conditioning this offseason and came to camp in much better shape, showing renewed life on his fastball and break on his curveball. He came back like the 2010 version of himself, and the Yankees rewarded him with a rotation spot thanks in part to Michael Pineda's sore shoulder.

That said, no one will care how Hughes looked in Spring Training during his first start of the season this weekend. He has to show that he's back to being an effective starter, because another disaster season like 2011 could very end with him being non-tendered in December. Hughes is scheduled to become a free agent after next season, when he'll still be just 27. An effective season this year and next could lead to a significant payday, so Hughes stands to gain or lose quite a bit in 2012.

Photo courtesy of US Presswire.

Make Or Break Year: Scott Baker

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Icon_11802008The Twins are coming off the second-losingest season since moving to Minnesota in 1961, in part because they only got 21 starts out of Scott Baker. The right-hander has been a stabilizing force in their rotation over the last half-decade, though he's now entering what might be the most important season of his career.

Performance has never been an issue for the 30-year-old Baker. He's consistently pitched to a 3.98 ERA with 7.4 K/9, 2.1 BB/9, and a 34.1% ground ball rate since breaking into the big leagues full-time in 2007. Brandon Warne of FanGraphs argued last month that Baker is one of the most underrated pitchers in the game, noting that his fastball command allows his otherwise nondescript stuff to play up. Like I said, his problem hasn't been performance. It's been staying on the field.

Baker has visited the DL in three of the last four seasons, and in that fourth year he missed most of September with an injury but remained active due to expanded rosters. He's dealt with a groin strain (2008), shoulder stiffness (2009), elbow soreness (2010), and a flexor strain (twice in 2011). Sure enough, elbow tendinitis has limited Baker in Spring Training this year. In his first start back this week, he allowed seven runs in 2 2/3 innings.

The Twins hold a $9.25MM club option for Baker's services next year with no buyout. He's a prime midseason trade candidate if they fall out of the race again, but another injury-riddled campaign could ruin Baker's trade value and prompt the team to cut ties with him after the season. If the Twins' longest-tenured starting pitcher can avoid the DL and pitch like his usual self this summer, Minnesota will have no qualms with bringing him back at that price in 2013.

Photo courtesy of Icon SMI.

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