Doc-
Good to have you back. Now let me disagree with you on the Dunn and Texiera fronts.
I believe the Mariners are in year one of a 3 year rebuilding (or at least should be). This offseason should be approached with 2010 and 2011 in mind first and foremost. Anything this club can get out of 2009 is a bonus. This is very different terrain than Bavasi was lookin at heading into the 2005 offseason.
Bavasi had:
1) Ichiro at his peak
2) A teenage phenom who was ready to start at the big leagues
3) Two young pitchers who were prime candidates for a nice rebound (Meche and Pineiro)
4) An utter bulldog (Madritsch)
5) Lots more interesting arms in AAA
6) One of the games top prospects in CF (Reed)
7) Interesting young catcher
8 ) Jose Lopez looking legit and ready to be a star
9) An army of other young SS candidates
Adding two MOTO bats to positions of weakness looked to be a move that could make the Mariners contenders in 2005. Unfortunately that fell apart. Richie gave the club two good years where he earned his money. But when Bavasi got most of the other pieces in place (2007) Richie was an anchor to the team that may or may have not cost the team a spot in the playoffs.
Fast Forward to 2009. I think this club is not positioned nearly as well as the 2005 squad. Bavasi left AAA bare. It takes time to fix a pipeline and the M's are full of holes. The Mariners need to find a large quantity of players. Think scrubs and then stars.
DH and 1B are the two easiest positions to find someone to play. Lots of players in the pipeline that could land at one of those two spots. Lots of players that can be had through waivers that could land in one of those two spots. Lots of players that will be free agents next year that could fit one of those two spots. I don't see the pressing need to get one of those two players to fill one of those two spots this year.
Rocco looks interesting to me because if that guy can stay healthy (might be a big if, lets see what a physical turns up) you could have your centerfielder locked up for the next few years. I think he's the better play.
Caveat emptor: We ain't gonna prove 'em, link 'em, or Google 'em for ya. :- ) Take it or leave it. Youse guys have known me since (as far back as) 1995 and you have a feel for how careful I am, or amn't, with info processing.
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COEFFICIENT OF CONFIDENCE = 0.85: Bidding on Teixeira is already up to $22.5M x 8 years and will go considerably higher. AL teams who are north of $20M already (!) include LA, Boston AND New York.
D-O-V and all iterations thereof are scoff-free zones. If you're one of those who thinks that LA, Boston and New York are idiots and you're the guy who's smart, please head three websites up I-5 and stay there. ;- )
I'm going to assume at this point -- the jelling of the expectations in the $24-27M range -- that it's a moot point for the Mariners.
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COEFFICIENT OF CONFIDENCE = 0.65: Inquiry on Adam Dunn is coming from the Angels, Dodgers, Nationals, and ... Mariners! (Obviously the Angels are pushing hard for Tex and setting up Dunn as the safety net.)
I realize, just from my re-baptism here this week, that there is a blog or two that (predictably) loathes the idea of Dunn. Well, good to know that little has changed. :- ) :winning smile: The object of the game is still to keep the powder dry.
If you agree with the anti-Dunn argument, you don't need me to repeat it for you at length. (Psst: it's "Sexson redux.")
We'll deal with that if the rumors get hot. For now, notice that Dunn is:
(a) turning 29 next season,
(b) the owner of five consecutive 40-homer seasons,
(c) a 130-140 OPS+ hitter, and
(d) lefthanded in Safeco.
This presumably makes him a legit Zduriencik target. Youse guys told me that Zduriencik is focused, right?!
::crickets::
I don't know if we're going to have to spend the next five years playing badminton against the idea that every FA is Richie Sexson, but simply note that (a) if Dunn has precisely Sexson's weird decline, he'll have three great years from here, and (b) Safeco doesn't demoralize LH hitters.
If Jeff Clement ever produced exactly Adam Dunn's lines from the last five years, we'd all be thrilled.
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COEFFICIENT OF CONFIDENCE = 0.40: Rocco Baldelli has supposedly received word that his possibly terminal disease (a mitochondrial disorder) was misdiagnosed; now the diagnosis is channelopathy, a very treatable disease.
At 24, Baldelli hit .300/.340/.530 in CF and looked headed for a possible Dale Murphy career. Baldelli was actually, what Adam Jones and Greg Halman dream of becoming.
If all of a sudden he's healthier than Brandon Morrow, it's worth keeping an eye out. Imagine having a CF playing LF next to F-Gut and Ichiro.
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COEFFICIENT OF CONFIDENCE = 0.70: That M's fans will spend the winter hoping for that one MOTO bat that will make the 2009 M's truly interesting ... and then find out, after the M's sniff around for hometown discounts and don't get them, that the M's are "way over budget already" and are going with Bryan Lahair.
COEFFICIENT OF CONFIDENCE = 0.20: That M's fans will watch Dr. D disappear like Bobby Fischer, reappear just as suddenly to post 10 times a day, and nothing weird will come of it.
Cheers,
Dr D
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image: http://cdn.faniq.com/images/blog/p1_dunn-SI-mangin.jpg
Comments
COEFFICIENT OF CONFIDENCE = 0.95: That Dr. D fans will watch expectantly for Dr. D articles and posts.
Doc...just as long as you promise not to suddenly spout antisemitic slurs on public radio or grow a 3 foot beard, I think we'll put aside the Bobby Fischer comps. :)
Baldelli would be a guy I wouldn't mind signing for a relatively low-cost multi-year deal and making our "project"...you'd need to deploy him intelligently (read: he needs a lot of off-days) so he'd probably wind up platooning with Wlad Balentien or Endy Chavez might steal a lot of late innings from him for defensive purposes when he gets tired. Even if it's not a mitochondrial defect, there's still the real truth that he was dead tired by the 6th inning in all of his starts in 2008.
I'm in favor of signing Dunn, but I don't see the Richie Sexson parallel. You could get Dunn for 4 years, 12 mil per (the Sexson contract) and he's not going to implode in year three...he's WAAYY more selective at the plate than Richie was and he's two years younger than Sexson was. Though I do disagree with your characterization of Sexson's flameout as "weird"...Sandy has called my attention to the fact that it's actually normal (without steroids) to decline around age 32-33.
Where did my previous post go?
Nevermind
Coug, howzit goin' man.
++ This offseason should be approached with 2010 and 2011 in mind first and foremost. Anything this club can get out of 2009 is a bonus. ++
What, does the 29-year-old Dunn have only one year left?
Somebody explain this to me nice and slow. If you're going to try to win in 2010, why is it incorrect to sign a young, core player, ONE year early?
Thanks Michael :- )
++ Sandy has called my attention to the fact that it’s actually normal (without steroids) to decline around age 32-33. ++
It's actually normal to decline around age 30. If you're a mediocre ballplayer. :- ) (Not that you don't know this.)
The better a player is, the later he tends to decline, as you know. It's normal to decline around age 32-33 if you are at Talent Level X. It's certainly not normal for a HOF-class player (Griffey, ARod, Pujols, etc) to decline at age 32.
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I expected Sexson to age well and the opposite occurred. That's my bad. As you know, it doesn't prove that you project every non-HOF hitter to fall off the table at 31 from now on.
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As you know, Sexson hit in terrible bad luck, also. The jury is out as to whether Sexson's age-arc wasn't warped by Safeco and by bad luck.
Cirillo and many others have left Safeco and recovered. Let's see what happens with Sexson from here out.
The point remains...even all-star caliber players like Fred McGriff became average-at-best after age 32. That was the norm until our expectations got warped by players taking steroids and lasting longer.
Mark Teixeira is not a hall of famer. He's Fred McGriff. And he's not likely to still be a star after age 31/32
:- )
1. BEGINNING at age 33 -- which would be the BACK half of Teixeira's deal -- McGriff averaged a 121 OPS+ for the next five years.
2. Could you explain, nice and slow, why a 121 OPS+ is "average at BEST"?
3. Could Teixeira age like Fred McGriff -- as opposed to aging like Edgar Martinez or Carlos Delgado or Jim Thome? Sure. But you're ASSUMING the (semi-)worst case.
4. Is there a chance that Teixeira's contract will be an overpay at the end? Sure. You want a franchise player with a guarantee that he won't be overpaid at the end of his contract? Show me the guy you're talking about.
The average first baseman has an OPS+ of 119 Doc.
And that 121 OPS+ is biased by one fluky big year back to star performance...it's really 4 110-119 OPS+ seasona and one more glory year.
And I don't think it's a worst-case projection to pick the most similar players and discover that they all fell to average production rates for first basemen by age 32.
There's nothing wrong with having a 119 OPS+ 1B.
There IS something wrong about paying said 119 OPS+ guy 22-25 million per year to be a "typical" meh 1B compared to league.
Right...I wasn't arguing that it was bad to have a 119 OPS+ first baseman...I was saying it's suicidally STUPID to sign a 28 year old expecting that in years 5-8 he's going to still be what he is now.
Here's where we need that understanding of median, mean, and mode, right? :- )
The Mariners had one (1) hitter last year with an OPS+ of more than 109, and their 1B was at 87. Let's not go thinking that a 120-OPS+ first baseman is the generic box of cheerios off the bottom shelf at Safeway.
Still, it's possible that Teixeira's OPS+ will be 120 in the second half of his contract. You could say the same about any hitter on the planet.
++ I was saying it’s suicidally STUPID to sign a 28 year old expecting that in years 5-8 he’s going to still be what he is now. ++
Would you please be less inflammatory in your phrasing?
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Nobody expects Teixeira to run eight (more) consecutive 150 OPS+ seasons. He doesn't have to.
To justify 24+ mil for 8 years, yes he does. He'd better make the hall of fame for that money.
Yeah. At $24mil and 8 years plus, I say you can have him.
Dunn as a 1b in Safeco, on the other hand, is interesting. Buyer's market...can you get him on a Richie Sexson deal? If you can I say go for it.
I think you can get Dunn for 4X13...THAT'S the straw I want stirring my drink. Someone who we can sign for his middle 4 seasons without wasting money on his back 4 who will give you 80-90% of Tex's production for 50% of the cost.
Doc-good to see you back in the swing, so to speak.
On to the the point at hand, my thoughts are that Dunn could be a good, value grab at the numbers bandied about in the thread. If you can get him at Furcal numbers or better, I say take a shot. Three true outcome guy, little upside but highly probable output over the next two of three years, MOTO hitter from the proper side for Safeco, and a laid back personality by most accounts fits very nicely in this patchwork JZ is quilting.
No FA compensation is just the icing on the cake....I say take a run at the big fellar'.
How you doin' Tee-man.
Little upside, highly probable -- exactly. Adam Dunn is one player, you know what you're going to get. 40 dings, 100 walks, 160 K's ... 7.5 runs created per 27 outs.
I read an argument somewhere that said Dunn will age very early. Don't remember the logic ... old player's skills or somesuch. Babe Ruth had old player's skills. You have to take into account the level of play.
The M's need the OBP almost more than they need the lefty flyballs...
Gettin' hooked up on some cowhide, thanks to Doc, Matt, Taro, and Sandy-of course. Can't believe I'm about to say this, but, I think AD might be the MOST underrated baller on the FA market this winter. OBP out the stratosphere, dingers and RBI's comin out his head, but very little buzz on the guy. How come? Does he rub most everyone the wrong way?
The stats tell a different story.....and I don't buy the whole old man skills. Plenty of guys played the same skill set into productive years well into their mid-30's. Expectations, contract duration, and dollars per have alot to do with the relative success or failure measurements.
How bizarre would if be if the big Texan signed for something in the Raul range......I'd be estatic if that would be with us.
So far...teams appear to be going hard after free agents that can do more than one thing (Tex bats and fields...for now) or that can pitch...and leaving the slw, slugger outfielders who are terrible fielders alone. Abreu, Dunn, Burrell etc...all good players...none attracting interest. Perhaps because they're all too similar to each other so no team feels the need to be aggressive going after them.
Fellas,
Adam Dunn seems to be a pipe dream signing, especially for a team that maybe could finish .500... With Guiterrez in CF, split LF between Chavez/Wlad, 1B platoon of Branyan/Shelton, and split DH between Wlad, the other 1B, and one of the catchers. This assumes we keep Johjima, Clement, and Rob Johnson - I'd like us to give Joh a chance to get his value back up so we can get rid of him. I think Clement should play every day - so have him catch half the games and DH the other half seems like a good idea and might save his knees after his late season injury last year. As much as he's maligned by a lot of the board types, I'd give Mike Morse a look somewhere too (if you don't want Shelton on the 40 man, maybe platoon Morse with Branyan).
Your 13 M you give Adam Dunn, use it to get rid of Wash or Batista by paying their whole contract. I wouldn't mind signing a low cost closer type (maybe Takashi Saito, Hoffman, isn't Brandon Lyon a FA?) so that any ideas of yanking Morrow back to the closers role would be get quickly quashed. I don't think the team needs a closer, but it does need Morrow starting and after some Mark Lowe or Heilman blown saves, I think that's where Brandon would be headed.
Gus
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Comment in regards to "Hall of Famers" not declining after age 30.
Ken Griffey - last 150+ season? 1998 - age 28. The fact that he managed a 144 at age 35 does NOT negate the reality that he declined *AND* lost lots of time to injury. BOTH are true -- and any attempt to sidestep this reality by blaming lowered production on injury misses the point. Injury is PART of the reason that age causes decline.
Seatle dumped Griffey at the PERFECT time -- immediately AFTER they had gotten his best seasons, and exactly when it could be PREDICTED that he would likely begin declining, and begin to be injured.
AROD just completed his age 32 season. His best two years were age 29 and age 31 (173 and 177 OPS+). At this moment, we do NOT know what the next 6-8 years will bring. But we DO know that the odds are AGAINST him maintaining his previous level - AND it is also brutally likely that his age 31 season (177 OPS+) will, in fact, be the best season of his entire career. But AROD's career track is VASTLY superior to that of Tex.
Of course, we just went thru the steroid era, where we can only guess how many players avoided their "true" declines thru better chemistry.
It *IS* true that some of the pre-steroid GIANTS of the game avoided the typical fate of "mere" humans. Willie Mays, Henry Aaron come to mind. But I don't find it logical to try and equate a player like Tex to someone like Aaron.
Tex has had exactly TWO 150+ seasons. Aaron, by age 28, had managed 7. Heck, Vlad managed 5 150+ seasons by age 28. His next 4 seasons have been 154, 138, 147, 130. That's still great. But it is *NOT* the 160s that he was posting in his 20s. DECLINE does not mean scrap heap.
The 160 player may decline to 130
The 150 player may decline to 120
The problem arises in the "perception" that the 120 is actually still as valuable as the 150.
Tex is "perceived" as a 150 OPS+ player because that is what he has done the past two seasons. In truth, Tex is a 134 OPS+ player, (his career average).
Is it "possible" that he could post a 170 next season, or pull a Chipper Jones, and reverse a downward trend? Sure, it's possible. But, based on the history of the game, it is HIGHLY unlikely. First off, viewing Tex as a 150 OPS+ guy is dangerous, because it ignores the 126 he posted at age 26. It puts 100% of the assessment of his value on his two most recent years, (not completely unreasonable). But it also puts 100% of the assessment of his value on his two BEST years, (a lot riskier).
++
Gettin’ hooked up on some cowhide, thanks to Doc, Matt, Taro, and Sandy-of course. Can’t believe I’m about to say this, but, I think AD might be the MOST underrated baller on the FA market this winter. OBP out the stratosphere, dingers and RBI’s comin out his head, but very little buzz on the guy. How come? Does he rub most everyone the wrong way?++
One thing is that Three True Outcomes players always "feel" scary. Dunn is unquestionably underrated.
Teams do have to take his defense into consideration, and when you go 280 lbs. you'd better have a very Sta-Puft personality or people are going to be uncomfortable around you. Dunn doesn't particularly have that kind of personality, from what we understand.
But he's going to get his jack, it says here.
++ Fellas,
Adam Dunn seems to be a pipe dream signing, especially for a team that maybe could finish .500 ++
Well, but do you notice in general that baseball FA's only take their huge dough from teams that won last year?
++ Comment in regards to “Hall of Famers” not declining after age 30.
Ken Griffey - last 150+ season? 1998 - age 28. ++
Sigh.
Well, of course, Sandy, if you measure HOF'ers as a group and compare their age-34 seasons to their age-28 seasons, you're going to find that their age-28 seasons are better.
C'mon, though. You're trying to throw out Teixeira's first 4 seasons as irrelevant, limit the discussion to his second 4, and then cast that second 4 in its worst possible light.
The average of the 8 seasons -- not merely the last 4 -- is going to be what GM's are looking at. That's why he's getting 8/$190M.
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Again, nobody expects the Mariners to be players in that price range. The question is moot.
The average of the 8 seasons Tex gets on his contract is going to be less than his current OPS+.
In eight years I'll remind you about this discussion.
I've long imagined Dunn as a perfect fit in Safeco. And from a stats perspective, it's a no brainer.
But I once heard that clubhouse character matters. Tex is a good actor. Dunn is, reportedly, not. Does that matter?
AD to the M's might be pure speculation-isn't that part of why we gather over the "hot stove". We have a need that he fits, dollars to appropriate to that position, a market and stadium that works, and new blood in the org. that is pretty familiar with the guy based on games in the NL. Add to that the value of slotting him at DH that the AL brings and I see us as a player on this guy.
Doesn't mean that we should be penciling him into the line-up quite yet. I do believe that we should be and probably are kicking the tires, so to speak.
Hazard to guess what its going to take to sign, seal, and deliver this big ol' hoss?
Wonder what JZ is up to?
For me, the key to an 8 year Texeira deal is the financial situation of the team - if you are the Yankees or Red Sox and you can have a guy making 20-25 M a year at the end of the contract who isn't that great (Giambi last year) and not submarine your salary situation, then go for it. For a team like Baltimore or Washington where Tex is at least 1/4-1/3 of your payroll if not more, that'd be a tough pill to swallow for the last couple years.
The same goes for Adam Dunn in that if you give him a 4 year deal, can you handle having him around at year 4? I feel like his batting eye will age a little better then some people give him credit for and he won't be as horrendous as Sexson by the end. For Dunn alternatives, does anyone here like Pat Burrell or Bobby Abreu as DH alternatives? I'd like to see Abreu with his batting eye hitting 2nd in the lineup. The current problem is he's asking for 15-16 M a year which seems fairly steep to me.
Gus
Doc,
I'm not trying to "throw out" the first 4 years of the assumed 8-year Tex contract as irrelevent. In point of fact, I stated that he would likely be worth his contract for those 4 years.
But I AM saying it is the 4 years of horrid expense for (likely) declining production that makes the move bad for the team. Sexson was signed for 4 years. He was worth the money for two. He was undebatably NOT worth the money for 2. If we simply ignore the last two years of non-production from Sexson, then the Sexson signing was a GREAT move by Bavasi.
My opinion is that signing Tex for 8 years is the exact same STYLE of decision that the Sexson signing was. Except, the down side projection is twice as long.
If it were possible to get Tex for 4 years -- while not my preference for rebuilding strategy -- I would not be nearly as vocal in my opposition. It's not. My original salvo in the Tex discussion was that he WOULD be getting about 8 years.
This is why I've been a lot quieter in regards to Dunn. While I maintain my generic objections to beginning rebuilding plans by signing FAs -- the reality that Seattle doesn't have any juicy near-ready 1B specs -- and the possibility of getting Dunn for ONLY 3 or 4 years -- makes me a LOT more willing to consider the viability of the move.
So, I hear the JZ is clipping coupons, saving up for the big slugger super sale that will be commencing after the holidays. Per the rumor mill and Ken Rosenthal:
"Zduriencik says he has made “some contact” with the agents for free-agent sluggers. But the Mariners, like many teams, are waiting for bargains to develop.
The M’s preference, Zduriencik says, is for a left-handed hitter. Adam Dunn, Bobby Abreu, Garret Anderson, Jason Giambi and — of course — Ken Griffey Jr. all fit that description.
“Our eyes and ears are open, that’s for sure,” Zduriencik says.
I'm starting to get a mancrush on this guy-his results may not prove out but I can't complain about how he goes about his business. I can just see him working down this huge ol' offseason checklist:
(Cue up Uncle Kracker)
+ Offer Raul Arb and get the picks-Check
+ Get some platoon options-Check
+ Get some help defensively-Check
+ Trade JJ while see still has some value-Check
+ Get some MOTO help from the value bins-TBD
What next?