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Top Remaining MLB Free Agents

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The Astros’ agreement with Jake Odorizzi on a three-year contract yesterday removed the top remaining free agent from the market. Even into the second week of spring training games, though, there are a few potentially valuable players available to teams.

  • Rick Porcello: MLBTR’s #46 free agent entering the offseason, Porcello made 12 starts for the Mets in 2020. His 5.64 ERA isn’t eye-catching, but Porcello logged a more respectable 4.45 SIERA. The 32-year-old isn’t a particularly exciting option at this stage of his career, but he’s been an extremely durable innings-eater, and we’re entering a year where reliable innings might be more valuable than ever coming off the shortened season.
  • Cole Hamels: Hamels is the other of MLBTR’s top 50 free agents still unsigned, having placed 47th on the list. 2020 was a lost season for Hamels, who was limited to a single start by shoulder issues. He was still plenty productive as recently as 2019, though.
  • Shane Greene: The rumor mill has been surprisingly quiet for the reliable Greene. His peripherals don’t support the 2.60 ERA he put up for the Braves last season, and it’s alarming that his strikeout rate fell by six points last year. Greene has been something of a bullpen workhorse in recent years, though, and he generally does a decent job avoiding hard contact.
  • Maikel Franco: The 28-year-old didn’t live up to expectations as the regular third baseman in Philadelphia. But he had a decent 2020 season after signing with the Royals, hitting .278/.321/.457 with eight home runs in 243 plate appearances. The Orioles are among the teams interested in Franco, whose market is now “heating up” after a slow winter.
  • Jedd Gyorko: Gyorko’s name hasn’t appeared on MLBTR’s pages since the Brewers declined his club option last October. That’s a bit surprising given Gyorko’s performance in limited playing time last season. The 32-year-old hit a very productive .248/.333/.504 and looks like a decent right-handed platoon option at the corner infield spots.

There are a handful more who could plausibly claim to be the top free agent remaining. Roberto Osuna, Yasiel Puig, Edwin Encarnación and Homer Bailey are among the others unsigned. How does the MLBTR readership feel about the remaining crop of free agents?

(poll link for app users)

 

Offseason In Review: Pittsburgh Pirates

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The Pirates ramped up their rebuilding efforts by trading away several key players without adding much in the way of Major League reinforcements.

Major League Signings

Trades and Claims

Notable Minor League Signings

Extensions

  • None

Notable Losses

Ben Cherington’s first year at the helm of the Pirates didn’t result in the aggressive tear-down that many anticipated, although that was in part due to injuries. Chris Archer’s thoracic outlet surgery and a series of health setbacks for Keone Kela took away a pair of obvious chips prior to last summer’s trade deadline.

This offseason, Cherington and his staff got to work on what has long felt like an inevitable tear-down of the previous regime’s roster. Gone are Josh Bell, Joe Musgrove and Jameson Taillon, each traded away for a package of multiple young players — nearly all of whom are several years away from contributing at the Major League level.

Right-hander Wil Crowe is perhaps the lone exception, and he could join the Pirates’ big league roster early in the 2021 season. Crowe doesn’t have huge upside, but he could slot into the back of a Pirates rotation that is in a transitional state after losing Musgrove, Taillon and righty Trevor Williams, who was non-tendered back in December. (Williams went on to sign elsewhere in the division, landing a one-year deal with the Cubs.)

Broadly speaking, the trades of Bell, Musgrove and Taillon are hardly unexpected. The Pirates were baseball’s worst team in 2020 and will be among the worst in 2021 as well. All three members of that trio have just two years of club control remaining, meaning none of them were likely to contribute to the Pirates’ next competitive club.

Still, there’s an argument that the Bucs would’ve been better off holding off on making any deals until this summer. Bell is coming off a miserable .226/.305/.364 showing through 57 games last season. The switch-hitting slugger’s batted-ball profile was encouraging, but his strikeout rate spiked during last year’s abbreviated season. With a big first half, it’s feasible that Bell might’ve been more in demand than he was over the winter, when few clubs were looking for everyday options at first base and/or designated hitter.

Taillon, meanwhile, hasn’t pitched since the 2019 season due to Tommy John surgery. It was the second such procedure of his career, and he has a fairly lengthy track record of injuries, so perhaps the Pirates didn’t want to risk any further setbacks. One would imagine that had Taillon demonstrated his health and looked effective in Spring Training and early in the season, however, that the Pirates might have been able to fetch a larger return. Musgrove also dealt with injuries in 2020, although he came back and finished the year with his most impressive work of the season.

None of that is intended to pan the returns the Pirates received in those deals. Seven of Pittsburgh’s Top 30 prospects at Baseball America were acquired in those trades, with another two coming via last winter’s Starling Marte swap. Any rebuilding team is faced with trying to find the right balance between trading a player at peak value and hanging onto him too long; the Pirates were burned, to an extent, by hanging onto Kela and Archer, ultimately receiving nothing in return for either player. They took a more risk-averse approach by moving Bell, Taillon and Musgrove now rather than marketing them midseason, but they also ensured themselves a respectable return on each of the three.

That said, it’s also likely that the trades were financially motivated — particularly in the case of Bell, who avoided arbitration with the Nationals by signing a one-year, $6.35MM deal after the trade. Bell, Taillon ($2.55MM) and Musgrove ($4.45MM) will earn a combined $13.35MM in 2021. Williams, whom the club cut loose for nothing, was due a raise on his $2.825MM salary (and eventually signed at $2.5MM). The Bucs lopped more than $15MM off an already modest payroll and opted not to reinvest much into the 2021 roster. They’re currently set to open the year with a team payroll shy of $45MM, the lowest in baseball by a wide margin. (Cleveland is next lowest at about $53MM.)

Pittsburgh’s lone big league signing was a one-year, $2.5MM deal with lefty Tyler Anderson. The former Rockies first-rounder had an up-and-down tenure in Colorado and a decent showing with last year’s Giants, but was non-tendered by San Francisco in December. It’s a reasonable enough price point but a little puzzling as a rebuilding team’s standalone addition of the winter. Anderson has a fairly lengthy injury history, including a pair of knee surgeries. He hasn’t been a bankable source of innings and even at his best has been more of a fourth starter.

In a vacuum, the Anderson signing is perfectly reasonable, but it feels as though it’d be better for the Bucs if Anderson was one of several additions made with the intent of bolstering the rotation after losing three veterans this winter. That’s especially true given that the Pirates could trade either Steven Brault or Chad Kuhl at any point, further depleting their starting options.

As it stands, the Pirates will try to navigate the season with Brault, Kuhl, Anderson, Mitch Keller, JT Brubaker, Crowe, Miguel Yajure and Cody Ponce as their most immediate rotation options. Other internal options will surely arise, but particularly given the possibility of a Kuhl and/or Brault trade, the club could be thin on rotation depth. Non-roster invitees James Marvel, Clay Holmes and Chase De Jong could provide some cover, as could waiver claim Sean Poppen, but this looks like a club that could use another dependable arm or two just to help get through the year.

In the bullpen, the Bucs have some once-touted pitchers (Kyle Crick, Carson Fulmer, Michael Feliz, Chris Stratton) but there’s little in the way of certainty beyond de facto closer Richard Rodriguez. The 31-year-old is quietly among the game’s more effective relievers and should give them a solid option late in games — at least until this summer when Rodriguez is likely to be on the trade market alongside pretty much every other veteran on this roster.

On the position-player side of things, the Bucs picked up some catching depth by claiming Michael Perez from the Rays and inking longtime Rockies catcher Tony Wolters to a non-roster deal. Perez hasn’t hit much in limited big league time, but the 28-year-old has a solid Triple-A track record and gives them a lefty bat to pair with right-handed-hitting Jacob Stallings.

The trade of Bell opens up first base for Colin Moran, though he’ll likely be on the market this summer himself — particularly if he can sustain last year’s uptick in power. Second baseman Adam Frazier was discussed in trades this winter, even as recently as late January, so it’s possible he could still be moved prior to Opening Day. If not, he can expect to hear his name in trade rumors throughout the year.

On the other side of the diamond, former first-rounders Kevin Newman and Cole Tucker will vie for playing time at shortstop. Tucker’s outfield experiment appears to be over, so he’ll get another look at his original position. Both have options remaining. Uber-prospect Ke’Bryan Hayes, meanwhile, should have a clear path to at-bats at the hot corner after last year’s brilliant debut. At least on the surface, gregarious veteran Todd Frazier would seem to have a good chance to make the roster as a backup option at either corner.

Pittsburgh entered the winter without much clarity in the outfield, and several months later, not much has changed. They’ll still hope for a Gregory Polanco rebound that allows them to shed at least some of his contract, while 2019 Rookie of the Year candidate Bryan Reynolds will get a chance at his own rebound in left field.

On paper, the Pirates seemed like a decent landing spot for a non-tendered outfielder with some big league experience and upside — a Hunter Renfroe or David Dahl, for instance — but they opted instead to mine the DFA/waiver market. The Bucs have a pair of former top 100 prospects to compete for time in center field: August waiver claim Anthony Alford and recent trade acquisition Dustin Fowler. They’ll be joined by veteran minor league signee Brian Goodwin, who figures to have a good chance to make the club as well. If Goodwin indeed cracks the roster, he can be controlled through 2022 via arbitration.

No one expected the Pirates to be particularly aggressive spenders in free agency this winter, but it’s still something of a surprise, given the holes on the pitching staff, that the club didn’t bring in some more low-cost help. If nothing else, any such arms could’ve potentially become trade chips this summer, and they’d have helped to prevent the team from over-relying on a collection of pitchers that has been oft-injured and inconsistent. Perhaps ownership simply wanted to keep the payroll as low as possible, and if that’s the case, then mission accomplished; the entire Pirates roster will barely earn more than Trevor Bauer alone will be paid by the Dodgers in 2021.

Winning games in the short-term clearly isn’t a priority for the Pirates as they wade through the arduous tanking process in an effort to stack their draft and international classes over the next few years. We’ve seen many clubs go through this process since the Cubs and Astros won World Series on the backs of full-scale rebuilds, but the returns have diminished over the years as more teams employ the tactic. Perhaps the Pirates will eventually emerge as a division power in the wake of these lean years, but they’re asking fans for an awful lot of patience as they gear up for what looks like another non-competitive season and a top-five pick in 2022.

How would you grade the Pirates’ offseason? (Link to poll for Trade Rumors iOS/Android app users)

MLBTR Poll: Should The Twins Extend Byron Buxton?

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The Twins have high expectations for their offense in 2021. It’s a talented group with veterans Nelson Cruz and Josh Donaldson playing alongside young players on the rise like Alex Kirilloff, Ryan Jeffers, and Luis Arraez. In the middle both metaphorically and positionally, however, centerfielder Byron Buxton undergirds the Twins’ machine in both halves of the inning. He’s the player on the roster with the highest two-way ceiling, and at 27 years old, he’s in his prime. He’s also two years from free agency. Buxton’s agent has been in contact with the Twins about a potential extension, per Phil Miller of the Star Tribune (via Twitter), but there’s a lot for the Twins to consider.

Defense has long been Buxton’s calling card. He is routinely one of the more impressive performers in the grass, and the numbers back it up. He has averaged 18.3 defensive runs saved and 9.8 UZR per 1,200 innings, which roughly amounts to one season. Both are excellent marks. Statcast is similarly complimentary of Buxton’s glovework, crediting him with five outs above average in 2020. That tied with four others for sixth among outfielders, despite only appearing in 39 games. In 2017, when Buxton was healthy enough to play more than 100 games, he racked up 30 OAA, not only topping the field in that season, but setting the bar. It remains the highest single-season mark from any outfielder in the Statcast era by a fair margin.

Buxton entered the league less polished on the other end, but he has nonetheless come into his own over the past two seasons. Early in his career, he was plagued by strikeout rates over 30 percent, only average power, and well-below-average walk rates. The latter still holds true, but the Twins want him swinging the bat because good things happen when he does. His exit velocity has surged from 88.3 mph in 2015-18 to 90.4 mph the past two seasons. His power has climbed into an elite range as well, rising from .157 ISO his first four seasons to .292 ISO in 430 plate appearances across 2019-20. A bat that was 23 percent below average through 2018 has been 13 percent above average since.

Put together, Buxton’s potential is that of a two-way centerpiece at one of the most important positions on the diamond. The Twins have to be tempted to find a way to keep the former number two overall pick in a Twins uniform long-term. Buxton would like to stay in Minnesota, but the Twins are focused on keeping him healthy in 2021, per the Athletic’s Dan Hayes.

Though the idea of Buxton wearing a Twins uniform long-term is tantalizing, the injury concerns are real. The Twins have placed Buxton on the injured list no less than 13 times since he’s been in their organization, with the ailments ranging from concussions to wrist sprains to shoulder issues. The Georgia native hasn’t seen his skills affected, however. He remains one of the fastest players in the game, finishing in the 99th percentile for sprint speed in every season of his career. He turned in a strong batted ball profile in 2020 as well, landing in the 85th percentile for exit velocity, 89th percentile for hard hit percentage, and 88th percentile for barrel percentage.

Finding the right price point for such a high-risk, high-ceiling player will be a challenge for the Twins and Buxton’s representatives at Jet Sports Management. The muddled centerfield market certainly doesn’t help matters. Despite it being one of the weaker positions around the game, Jackie Bradley Jr. struggled to find the kind of deal he was looking for and ultimately settled on a two-year, $24MM offer with an opt-out. Meanwhile, George Springer had no trouble securing a deal, signing in Toronto for six years and $150MM. There were no free agent centerfielders to sign a multi-year deal last winter. The year before it was AJ Pollock joining the Dodgers for five years, $60MM and Andrew McCutchen signing a three-year, $50MM deal with the Phillies. Neither player primarily plays center anymore, however. Lorenzo Cain signed a five-year, $80MM deal with the Brewers the year before that.

Pollock is a natural comp as an oft-injured potential star in center, but he was entering his age-31 season as a free agent, two years younger than Buxton would be after 2022. Cain was also 31, so was Dexter Fowler when he signed with the Cardinals, so will be Springer and Bradley in the first seasons of their new deals. Suffice is to say that it’s hardly a simple task to project what Buxton might find in free agency – especially two years from now under the conditions of a new CBA. The Twins have maintained flexibility in long-term payroll, with their luxury tax payroll falling from ~$147MM this year to ~$66MM in commitments for 2022 and ~$57MM the year after.

But let’s put the financial parameters of a deal to the side for now, and consider the question simply. Should the Twins try to sign Buxton to a long-term deal?

(poll link for app users)

Out Of Options 2021

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The following 40-man roster players have less than five years service time and are out of minor league options. That means they must clear waivers before being sent to the minors. I’ve included players on multiyear deals. This list was compiled through MLBTR’s helpful and much-appreciated sources.

This year, option status for several players remains unresolved at present due to the nature of the 2020 season, as reported by Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.  We’ll keep this list updated as new information comes in.

Angels

Astros

Athletics

Blue Jays

Braves

Brewers

Cardinals

Cubs

Diamondbacks

Dodgers

Giants

Indians

Mariners

Marlins

Mets

Nationals

Orioles

Padres

Phillies

Pirates

Rangers

Rays

Red Sox

Reds

Rockies

Royals

Tigers

Twins

White Sox

Yankees

Checking In On Last Season’s Worst Bullpens

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A bad bullpen can play a major role in destroying a team’s playoff hopes, as we saw with last year’s Phillies. They finished a game behind the National League’s lowest-seeded playoff team, in part because their relief pitchers could not perform. Here’s how the Phillies and the game’s other four worst bullpens from 2020 (based on ERA) have tried to improve themselves since last season ended….

Phillies (7.06 ERA, 13.1 K-BB percentage):

  • The Phillies might have broken their playoff drought last year if not for a bullpen that didn’t get much high-end production out of any of its regulars. New Phillies president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski and general manager Sam Fuld have gone to work to better the unit, having added several veterans – Archie Bradley, Jose Alvarado, Brandon Kintzler, Tony Watson, Chase Anderson, Hector Rondon, Neftali Feliz and Sam Coonrod, to name some – early in their regime. Some of those players aren’t on guaranteed contracts and will have to fight for spots this spring, but there’s no shortage of experience or success among most of the group.

Rockies (6.77 ERA, 8.8 K-BB percentage):

  • Daniel Bard earned NL Comeback Player of the Year honors as a member of the Rockies, and Yency Almonte also put together a very good 2020. They’ll stick around this season, though no other returning Rockies relievers recorded good numbers over a solid amount of innings last year. There is some potential for the team’s bullpen production to get better in 2021, though. Mychal Givens, who has typically been a quality reliever, struggled in a mere 9 1/3 innings last season; Carlos Estevez, one of the Rockies’ most reliable relievers in 2019, put up an ERA north of 7.00 in 24 frames; and newcomer Robert Stephenson, whom the Rox acquired from the Reds earlier this offseason, was effective two years ago before falling off a cliff in 2020.

Mariners (5.92 ERA, 7.8 K-BB percentage):

  • In light of last year’s issues, general manager Jerry Dipoto came into the offseason saying he wanted three to four new relievers. True to his word, Dipoto added to the Mariners’ relief corps with the likes of Rafael Montero, Keynan Middleton and Will Vest (Rule 5 pick), though the team can’t necessarily count on anyone from that group to fix its issues in 2021.

Red Sox (5.79 ERA, 13.2 K-BB percentage):

  • The Red Sox made an unexpected trade with the enemy Yankees when they acquired righty Adam Ottavino from New York in a January salary dump. Ottavino, who will count $9MM against Boston’s luxury-tax bill in 2021, had a rough time last season, but the 35-year-old has typically been a solid option. Along with Ottavino, Hirokazu Sawamura (a former Nippon Professional Baseball hurler whom the Red Sox signed for a two-year, $3MM deal), Matt Andriese and Rule 5 selection Garrett Whitlock are newcomers to the group.

Marlins (5.50 ERA, 6.7 K-BB percentage):

MLBTR Poll: Forecasting The Yankees Rotation

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Jameson Taillon is aiming for 120 to 150 innings in his comeback from Tommy John surgery, writes Ken Davidoff of the New York Post. Taillon has just 37 1/3 innings to his name over the past two seasons, and since this will be his second time coming back from TJ, there’s reason to temper expectations regarding his workload. Davidoff looks at PECOTA, Steamer, and ZiPS to get an idea for what the projection systems think Taillon can handle in 2021 – though the creators of the systems admit this is an area that requires guesswork. Still, it’s instructive to know that the three systems project 103 innings, 133 innings, and 106 1/3 innings – in line with Taillon’s thinking.

How those innings manifest might be the question for the Yankees. The mean of the three projections is 114-ish innings, which would be just under four innings per start over a full 30-game workload. That’s not likely to be the shape of Taillon’s 2021 production. We know that depth will be key in 2021 across the league, but thinking in this way about Taillon all but erases the possibility of a five-man rotation surviving the season.

While that’s an absolute best-case, rarely-achieved feat in the first place, it’s worth keeping in mind before getting frustrated when Deivi García, for example, doesn’t make an opening day roster, speculatively speaking. And while Clarke Schmidt’s injury doesn’t appear to be serious, it serves as a generous reminder that the injury bug can bite at any time.

As if Taillon didn’t cloud the Yankees’ projections enough on his own, the rest of the group doesn’t bring much certainty either – beyond Gerrit Cole, of course. The projection systems collectively tag presumptive No. 2 starter Corey Kluber with an expectation for about 137 innings in 2021, a forecast largely born from the fact that the soon-to-be 35-year-old managed just one inning in 2020 and 35 2/3 innings the year before. Still, Kluber was a workhorse before 2019, with five straight 200+ inning seasons with the Indians.

Jordan Montgomery slots into the No. 4 spot, and he logged just 51 2/3 innings over the past two seasons after undergoing Tommy John surgery himself. Somewhat remarkably, the starter with the most innings after Cole the past two seasons is the guy who missed all of 2020 under the league’s domestic violence policy: Domingo Germán. Germán made 24 starts and amassed 143 innings with a 4.03 ERA/4.72 FIP, 38.1 percent groundball rate, 25.8 percent strikeout rate, and 6.6 percent walk rate in 2019. Those are above-average walk and strikeout numbers. Germán faces his own uphill climb, of course. Given comments made by his Yankee teammates this offseason, there’s more than a little doubt about how well he’ll be able to re-acclimate to the spotlight that comes with donning Yankee pinstripes.

García will obviously be a candidate to join the rotation, as could other 40-man roster arms like Schmidt, Michael King, Nick Nelson, Alexander Vizcaino, Luis Medina, and Luis Gil. Veterans Jhoulys Chacin and Asher Wojciechowski are also in camp as non-roster invitees. Jonathan Loaisiga, Albert Abreu and Luis Cessa are expected to pitch out the bullpen, but they’ve spent time starting games in the past. The Yankees also hope to receive a mid-season boost when Luis Severino returns from Tommy John. Severino threw just 12 innings the past two seasons, but he was an ace in the two years before that, averaging a 3.18 ERA/3.01 FIP, 5.5 fWAR in 192 innings per season in 2017 and 2018.

Of course, no matter the starting five, most teams are going to call upon more than just their opening day rotation to toe the rubber. The Yankees themselves used nine different starting pitchers in 2020 over just 60 games. They used 12 in 2019, 12 in 2018, and 11 in 2017. Those units finished eighth, fifth and fourth in the American League by measure of FIP, ninth, third and third by fWAR. Yankee starters ranked third in the AL by both FIP (4.19 FIP) and fWAR (5.3 fWAR) last season.

Volume isn’t everything, but for pitchers, inning totals do often point to success, or at the very least, health. Given the uncertainty of the Yankees new rotation, what are your expectations? Who of the starters after Cole stands the best chance of surviving the season?

(Poll link for app users)

(Poll link for app users)

MLBTR Poll: Top-5 Free Agent Contracts

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With there’s always quite a lot of room to quibble over free agent rankings, there was really no debate regarding the top handful of talent in this year’s class. (At least, that is, once Marcus Stroman elected to accept the qualifying offer.) After Trevor Bauer, J.T. Realmuto, George Springer, Marcell Ozuna, and DJ LeMahieu — in whatever order; that’s how we had it — the drop-off to the rest of the board was rather pronounced.

As it turned out, those players signed contracts that hewed fairly closely to MLBTR’s predicted ranges. But the market, as always, had a few surprises for our in-house brain trust. In particular, Springer and LeMahieu came away with a fair bit more money than we had anticipated.

Trevor Bauer to Dodgers for three years, $102MM (with two opt-outs): If you’re of the opinion that Bauer is an ace-level hurler, then this deal represents a steal. The Dodgers are paying a premium rate, sure, but without any of the long-term entanglements. Then again, it’s only fair to note that Bauer has completed just one full season with a sub-4.00 ERA.

J.T. Realmuto to Phillies for five years, $115.5MM: This is a lot of coin for a free-agent catcher, but Realmuto is arguably the game’s best all-around backstop and the Phils got an up-close look at him before committing. If you value the hard-to-quantify contributions of a top-shelf catcher, this could be viewed as a bargain. On the other hand, Realmuto will turn thirty before the deal begins and the rigors of the position represent an ever-present concern.

George Springer to Blue Jays for six years, $150MM: Speaking of age, that’s the one real demerit in the situation of Springer, who’ll turn 32 at the tail end of the 2021 campaign. He’s a well-rounded masher who adds value with a versatile glove. If he can turn in a few more premium seasons and then settle in as a high-quality regular at the tail end of his career, Springer could easily reward the Jays for this contract.

Marcell Ozuna to Braves for four years, $65MM: Ozuna is significantly younger than Springer and easily bettered him at the plate in the pandemic-shortened 2020 season. But Ozuna’s stretches of bliss have surrounded other spans of merely above-average play, and his glove is not as renowned as his bat. While there’s obviously some cause to temper expectations, there’s a realistic scenario where the Atlanta organization achieves huge value in this deal.

DJ LeMahieu to Yankees for six years, $90MM: The idea of a 32-year-old LeMahieu signing a contract like this … well, it still feels a bit preposterous to hot stove watchers of a certain age. But you can threw out what you thought you knew about the guy with the Rockies. He has been on a tear ever since he donned pinstripes. Throw in a quality glove and gravitas, and you’ve got a great finishing piece for any team with championship ambitions. The sixth year feels like a stretch, but it’s important to remember that it was designed to tamp down the annual luxury tax hit for the Bronx Bombers.

So, which of these contracts do you believe was the shrewdest investment from the team perspective? (Response order randomized; poll link for app users.)

Trading A Cy Young-Caliber Starting Pitcher

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Less than three months after their first-round playoff defeat to the Marlins, the Cubs traded second place NL Cy Young finisher Yu Darvish to the Padres.  This occurred after the Cubs won their division with a .567 winning percentage, which would have extrapolated to about 92 wins in a full season.  I looked back through the last 20 years, and this has never been done: winning teams simply do not trade top-2 Cy Young finishers.

As you might expect, teams prefer not to trade top-2 Cy Young finishers at all.  In the past 20 years, it’s only been done twice in the offseason: the Mets traded 38-year-old R.A. Dickey to the Blue Jays after the 2012 season, and the Diamondbacks dealt 41-year-old Randy Johnson to the Yankees after Arizona’s abysmal 2004 campaign.  Let’s see if the more recent Dickey trade bears any similarities to what the Cubs did.

December 17, 2012: Mets trade Cy Young winner R.A. Dickey with Mike Nickeas and Josh Thole to the Blue Jays for Noah Syndergaard, Travis d’Arnaud, John Buck, and Wuilmer Becerra.

The 2012 Mets finished with a 74-88 record, good for fourth place in the NL East.  Dickey, a knuckleballer, had quietly signed a minor league deal with the Mets after an uninspiring 2009 season out of the Twins’ bullpen.  He flourished in the Mets’ rotation, finding another gear in 2012 en route to a 2.73 ERA over 233 2/3 innings.  That effort resulted in 20 wins and the Cy Young award for the 38-year-old.  At that point, the Mets had one year of control left on Dickey at an affordable $5MM.

Dickey hoped to stay longer.  In May of his Cy Young-winning season, he told Mike Puma of the New York Post, “I like it here and I want to be here. I feel like the team is moving in the right direction, and I want to be a part of the solution. Now it’s up to them. If I’m in those plans, [addressing the contract] is one way to make it known.”  As late as September of 2012, GM Sandy Alderson spoke of his intent to retain Dickey as well as David Wright long-term.  They were the clear bright spots on the 2012 team.  By November, however, a significant gap had emerged in contract talks between the Mets and Dickey, with the righty reportedly seeking a two-year extension worth $26MM.

Once the Mets succeeded in locking up Wright, the PR hit of potentially trading Dickey diminished, and the trade rumors began in earnest.  In 2021, the Cubs’ nod to the negative PR of the departures of Darvish and Theo Epstein, among others, seems to be the nostalgia signing of Jake Arrieta.  Not quite on par with the Wright extension, though the Cubs do have Anthony Rizzo, Javy Baez, and Kris Bryant as extension candidates given their impending free agency.

The Mets reportedly discussed Dickey with eight different teams at the Nashville Winter Meetings in 2012, ultimately reaching an agreement with the Blue Jays pending a contract extension for the pitcher.  The Jays hammered out a two-year, $25MM deal – only $5MM more than the Mets had offered – and the deal was done.  Alderson explained the Mets’ approach:

“One of the reasons the negotiations were prolonged is we began to see forces of supply and demand at work, frankly.  On the one hand, we saw the value of starting pitching go up in terms of compensation. At the same time, we saw the supply start to go down in terms of availability. And so because we were proceeding on two tracks, at some point we had to wait and see what the value might be.”

Much like the 2021 Cubs after trading Darvish, Alderson talked about how the Mets weren’t giving up on the 2013 season, saying, “No. 1, we have made this trade, and we feel a number of the players that we’ve acquired — John Buck, certainly — and probably Travis d’Arnaud will make contributions in 2013.  We can’t quantify those at the moment. But we do have expectations about that. In addition, there’s a lot of time between now and when we report to spring training. So we do expect to do some other things. We do expect to acquire some other players. We recognize we have holes to fill — that we may have created a hole in our rotation, but we will address those. We certainly are not punting on 2013.”

What were those “other things?”  The rest of the Mets’ offseason consisted of signing Shaun Marcum for $4MM and adding some veterans on minor league deals.  I didn’t expect much from the 2013 Mets, writing, “The Mets have been a sleeping giant under the Alderson regime, parting ways with their best veterans other than Wright, avoiding free agency, and allowing their attendance to slip to 17th in MLB. A decent rotation won’t be enough to overcome the team’s gaping holes in 2013, but perhaps the season will provide a sneak preview for the Mets’ return to relevance in the coming years.”  The Mets wound up treading water in 2013, putting up the same 74 wins they had in 2012.

Then-Blue Jays GM Alex Anthopolous talked about the Mets’ leverage in the negotiations:

“Sandy clearly had the option to sign the player back. Everyone knew that. That was made aware. And the player wanted to stay.  I think Sandy, when d’Arnaud was on the table, he was probably on the table for 10 days. And it really didn’t move anywhere. There was no traction. There was no dialogue. It just was not enough from his standpoint, as much as we valued Travis.”  Anthopoulos would go on to tell reporters that Syndergaard was the last player the Mets insisted on acquiring.

Having recently added Jose Reyes, Josh Johnson, and Mark Buehrle in a blockbuster deal with the Marlins, Anthopoulos pulled the trigger on Dickey and gave up two major prospects in d’Arnaud and Syndergaard.  How were the prospects perceived at the time?

In d’Arnaud, the Mets landed an MLB-ready prospect ranked 23rd in baseball in early 2013, according to Baseball America.  It would be similar to acquiring Luis Patiño in the present day, who happens to be the main piece the Padres sent to the Rays for Blake Snell last December.  Baseball America slapped a 60 grade on d’Arnaud at the time, generally assigned to “first-division regulars.”  D’Arnaud was said to have the ability to become an All-Star catcher, “if he can stay healthy.”

Though d’Arnaud played well in 2014-15, accumulating 6.2 WAR over 175 games, his Mets career was mostly marked by a litany of injuries, and he was released in May 2019.  D’Arnaud has had a resurgence since then, with a 120 wRC+ over 550 plate appearances.  He took home his first Silver Slugger award with the 2020 Braves and is entering the last year of a two-year, $16MM free agent contract.

Syndergaard, meanwhile, landed 54th on BA’s top 100 back in 2013.  He, too, was assigned a 60 grade, with “the ceiling of a frontline starter.”  Syndergaard, who had been drafted out of high school, was a 20-year-old who had yet to pitch above low-A, but he was considered a polished pitcher at the time.  He ascended quickly to top-15 prospect status, reaching the Majors in 2015 and finishing fourth in the Rookie of the Year voting.  He pitched well for the Mets in their 2015 run to the World Series and finished eighth in the 2016 NL Cy Young voting.

Though Syndergaard missed most of the 2017 season with a lat injury and all of 2020 due to Tommy John surgery, he’s tallied 18.8 WAR for the Mets and should be a factor in 2021 before becoming eligible for free agency.

While Buck and Becerra didn’t pan out for the Mets and d’Arnaud fell short of expectations, the acquisition of Syndergaard alone made the Dickey trade a resounding success for the Mets and Alderson.  The chances of the Cubs having landed a player of Syndergaard’s caliber in the Darvish deal are remote, but we’ll have to check back in five years or so.

With Dickey seeking a reasonable two-year extension, a suitor could have expected to control him for three years in total, which is what the Blue Jays wound up getting.  Dickey would only need to be paid $30MM over the three-year term, in an offseason where Zack Greinke landed a six-year, $147MM contract and Anibal Sanchez signed for five years and $80MM.  Dickey would be paid just 40% of the AAV the market’s top pitcher received in free agency, on a much shorter term.  In 2021, Trevor Bauer signed for three years and $102MM, an average annual value of $34MM.  With the Cubs picking up $3MM of Darvish’s tab, the Padres got him for $59MM over three years – a $19.67MM AAV that is about 58% of Bauer’s.  Bauer’s contract could easily become $85MM over two years assuming he opts out of the final year, however, and then Darvish’s AAV would be about 46% of Bauer’s.

It’s not a perfect parallel, and both Dickey and Darvish came with some risks, but it’s fair to say the Cubs weren’t offering quite the same payroll-friendly ace the Mets were – especially with teams reeling from the pandemic.  The Cubs surely would have upped their return had they been willing to include more cash or take on a bad contract.  Talent-wise, Dickey was a 38-year-old knuckleballer who had never shown strikeout potential prior to 2012.  Darvish, on the other hand, made four All-Star teams prior to 2020 and consistently rates among the top strikeout pitchers in the game.  Darvish seems more likely to deliver ace-caliber seasons for his new team than Dickey was, though he poses a greater health risk.  As it turned out, Dickey never reached 2 WAR in any of his four seasons with the Blue Jays.

Like the Mets in 2012, the Cubs didn’t have any real urgency to make a deal this offseason, and should have held out unless they were bowled over.  The Padres had already traded the aforementioned Patiño, the game’s #23 prospect, but still had prospects ranked #10, #11, #36, #76, and #85.  The Cubs received none of them.  Though the Cubs threw in a credible backup catcher in Victor Caratini, their return was one year of righty Zach Davies, plus prospects Reginald Preciado, Owen Caissie, Ismael Mena,  and Yeison Santana.  None of the four prospects are near the Majors, and all of them received 45 grades from MLB.com.  Santana, who recently turned 20, is the oldest of the bunch.  We’ll let future Hall of Famer Clayton Kershaw take it from here, in his interview with Jorge Castillo of the L.A. Times:

“There’s a lot of smart guys in front offices. Figure something out that’s easier to do than trading away a [star]. Just, for example, a potential Cy Young [Award winner] in [Yu] Darvish, who has been one of the top five pitchers in baseball for a year and a half, for prospects that could potentially be good but they’re 17, 18 years old. And [Zach] Davies is a great pitcher, but to me, that’s just not . . . For the Chicago Cubs to do that, it’s not good. It’s just not good.”

Kershaw would know.  He’s finished in the top two for Cy Young voting five times, and his big-market employer never entertained trading him immediately thereafter.

So then, why do the deal if you’re the Cubs?  A mandate from ownership to reduce payroll is the likely answer, as the Cubs removed $59MM of Darvish’s $62MM commitment from the books.  Darvish carries a $21MM CBT payroll hit for 2021, yet the Cubs added $31.33MM back to the payroll in Davies, Joc Pederson, Jake Arrieta, Andrew Chafin, Trevor Williams, Jake Marisnick, Austin Romine, Jonathan Holder, and Kohl Stewart.  The new acquisitions project to 6.1 WAR, while Darvish projects for 3.8 by himself.  This sequence of moves represents a clear step back, as the Cubs could have easily kept Darvish’s 3.8 WAR out of one roster spot, while adding all the same supplementary help aside from Davies.

The 2021 Cubs currently carry a CBT payroll of about $170MM, more than $45MM shy of where they sat last year.  They project as roughly a .500 team, and fit in well in a division where most of the teams aren’t really pushing for the title.

The Luxury Tax Boogeyman

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The competitive balance tax has been an insidious force against the players.  Back in 1996, in the wake of the ’94 strike, a new collective bargaining agreement was reached and healing between the teams and players could begin.  As Jon Pessah wrote in his book The Game, “[Union head Donald] Fehr finally said yes to a luxury tax — the first time the union agreed to any form of payroll restraint since free agency changed everything in 1976.”  I don’t think anyone anticipated what the luxury tax would become.

In that CBA, which covered 1997-2001, the luxury tax was to cover only the 1997-1999 seasons, sort of an experiment.  Opening the door to the luxury tax in that 1996 deal wasn’t perceived as a major hit to the players.  Pessah wrote, “This labor war was a huge victory for Fehr and the union…The owners never got their salary cap or any changes to free agency or salary arbitration.”

Fast forward to 2021, and it’s clear that most major market teams use the base tax threshold of $210MM as something of a soft salary cap.  It’s a limitation MLB likes having in place, as it helps keep free agent salaries down.  If MLB wanted the luxury tax removed, they could do so easily, as they did when it was decided the tax would not be collected in 2020.

Here’s the chart for tax rates (link for app users):

The tax brackets for 2021 are $210-$230MM, $230-250MM, and $250MM and beyond.

In their extrapolated 2020 payrolls, the Yankees, Astros, and Cubs exceeded that year’s $208MM base tax threshold.  It’s notable that while MLB did not make these three teams actually pay tax in 2020, they still didn’t give them a free reset.  That’s why the Yankees sit around $200MM right now – they’re in that third column of the chart, and they want to move back into the first for 2022.  It’s all about the reset, not the actual tax amount if they slightly exceed $210MM in 2021.

The Cubs are trying to avoid the third-time CBT payor column as well, and they’ve accomplished that goal and then some in getting Yu Darvish, Jon Lester, Tyler Chatwood, Jose Quintana, and Kyle Schwarber off the books.  They’re only around $170MM for 2021, a full $40MM shy of the threshold.  The Astros are sitting around $196MM, so they have wiggle room as well.  The machinations of these three teams, particularly the Yankees, assume that the luxury tax system will remain similar in a new CBA, and there actually is a reason to reset in 2021.  If the union succeeds in drastically increasing the thresholds, which should be a major priority for them, all three clubs could have easily reset in 2022 anyway.

The one club that didn’t get the memo about treating $210MM as a soft cap is the Dodgers.  The Dodgers pulled off their reset in 2018 and have stayed below the base tax threshold since, putting them in the first-time payor column for 2021 after the signings of Trevor Bauer, Justin Turner, and Blake Treinen.  With a projected CBT payroll of $254.4MM currently, they’re looking at a tax penalty of about $13MM for 2021.  If a third-time payor spent $254.4MM, their tax penalty would be over $26MM.  In any case, exceeding $250MM places another tax: the club’s highest available pick moves back 10 spots in the next draft.  That’s why the Dodgers will likely find a way to get below $250MM this year.

It’s worth asking: if you’re not the Yankees, Astros, or Cubs, why are you so scared of the $210MM boogeyman?  None of the other 27 teams need to reset – they’re already in the first-time CBT payor column.  That includes the Red Sox, sitting around $204MM and letting the Blue Jays pass them up.  The Angels are around $191MM.  The Mets are around $187MM.  The Phillies are around $196MM.  The Nationals are around $194MM.  That makes five teams this winter that seem to have some deference to the $210MM base tax threshold.  What would be so bad about spending, say, $220MM?  The tax penalty would be $2MM, exactly the price of one year of Hansel Robles.

So the Reset Club includes the Yankees, Astros, and Cubs.  And then five additional teams – the Red Sox, Angels, Mets, Phillies, and Nationals – belong to the Soft Cap Club.  For the other 22 teams, the luxury tax simply has no bearing, which will only be underlined if the thresholds go up significantly in the next CBA.  It’s possible the eight luxury tax avoiders have grand plans for the 2021-22 free agent class – check it out – and want to be first-time payors after they go big next winter.  Otherwise, it’s hard to understand why a Soft Cap Club forms every offseason.

MLBTR Poll: Jackie Bradley’s Future

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After last night’s agreement between Justin Turner and the Dodgers, Jackie Bradley Jr. stands out as the top remaining free agent position player. The longtime Red Sox center fielder has earned a reputation as one of the game’s top defensive outfielders and is coming off a strong 2020 season at the plate.

It was reported earlier this month Bradley was seeking a long-term deal, potentially even targeting a five-year pact. That’s a rather lofty goal; entering the offseason, the MLBTR staff projected a two-year, $16MM contract for Bradley.

While a five-year deal would register as a major surprise, Bradley has drawn a decent share of reported interest this winter. The Mets, Giants, Red Sox, Astros, Cubs, Phillies and Blue Jays have all been tied to Bradley at various stages of the offseason. Toronto can safely be ruled out, having signed George Springer since engaging with Bradley very early on. The Phillies still have room for a center field upgrade, but it seems unlikely Philadelphia would be willing to make a run at Bradley after spending to re-sign J.T. Realmuto and Didi Gregorius. The Cubs, meanwhile, have since signed Joc Pederson and Jake Marisnick to join Ian Happ and Jason Heyward in the outfield.

That leaves the Mets, Giants, Astros and Red Sox as the likeliest landing spots on paper. We’ll turn things over to the MLBTR readership to predict Bradley’s destination and contract length.

(poll links for app users)

 

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