Thank you G this is just so obvious. Unless the M's have a guaranteed better option in their back pocket, resign Kendrys. Sorry but, only stat geeks who have never run anything in the real world worry about "overpaying" by a measly $4M (when the M's just signed a bajzillion $$$ TV deal). Any business person recognizes that there are always going to be MANY problems to be solved, and it is worth "overpaying" a little bit to eliminate a big problem w/ an easy solution, and move on to the hard stuff. Which the M's have plenty of to deal with.
I think certain areas of the M's blogosphere were just irreparably scarred into a scarcity mentality by the mistakes of the Bavasi years (and the Figgins fiasco early in Z tenure). The analysis at USSM always seems to be premised on a very limited payroll. Or maybe the pure sabr types just all want to play Billy Beane :) The fact is the M's have plenty of $$ if they choose to spend it, and we fans do not need to bean count on their behalf.
Dave Cameron put up a nice post on the Big Blog about how Morales is not a big bat. He is a good hitter, not a great one, and not one of the best 60 hitters in the league by wRC+, and thus paying him the $14 million qualifying offer is silly; he simply won't earn that on the market so even offering it is guaranteeing we'll have to overpay him because he'll snap that cash right up.
For fun, go through everybody on the wRC+ list who's better than him and cross off all the unavailable guys. Here's a snapshot of who's available:
#10 - Choo: Yay! Think we can sign him to that 9 figure contract he wants? Werth (#5 on this list this year) got 7/126. How close is Choo gonna get to that?
#18 - Cano: take whatever it will cost to sign Choo, then double it.
#19 - Byrd: 35 year old Marlon Byrd, having the greatest season of his career by far. No way would he be juicing for his last contract or having a freak year.
#21 - Beltran: Legit age 36 season for a future HOFer, also a switch hitter. I'd be willing to throw him another 2 year contract. Here's option #1.
#34 - J. Upton: ...kinda not available.
#36 - Seager: Yay! Oh wait, already have him.
#41 - Peralta: FA in 2014, also an infielder. Miller is playing his spot right now.
#42 - Pence: FA, right-handed, plays the OF... there's your option #2. Just gotta pay (see: Choo).
#46 - Cruz: Steroid suspension. Morales is a better career hitter and doesn't play in a bandbox.
#55 - Loney: 2014 FA who is a LH 1B with a career .136 ISO.
#62 - Napoli: RH DH type, did okay in a hitter's park this year, can probably be had as a '14 FA. Decent alternate option.
#64 - Kendrys
Maybe you can trade for someone like #44 Ethier, except he's a lefty (we have too many of those already). Might get #59 Lowrie out of Oakland for something, but he's an infielder who just played his first full season ever and will be 30 next year. Is the difference between Ethier's .279/.367/.429 and Morales's .280/.336/.443 enough to pay prospects for? Especially since Ethier has 4 more decline years under contract at ~17 million per, plus a buyout year? It's not like Morales is getting that contract. And if the 20 spot difference between Ethier and Morales isn't worth haggling over, then why bother making the statement that Morales isn't a top-60 hitter to begin with?
DH is a position. It needs to be filled by someone or someones for every AL contest, and half the AL-vs-NL ones. That means I don't care how Kendrys plays defense because for those games NO ONE is playing D out of the DH position. Yes, he's a terrible baserunner who also hits into a lot of DPs, and no, I don't want him as my best hitter. But do I want him back? Yes.
The only difference between Kendrys of 2009 and our Kendrys is in his ISO, because he's not hitting HRs like he did that year. His K rate, BB% etc are the same. His LD% is a bit better this year, but that year the flyballs left the yard. So you can look at that one of two ways. 1) Kendrys is a lucky HR streak from being a 130 wRC+ player for us, or 2) that will never happen again and he should not be a MOTO hitter for us. I'm with dan and terry in the shouts - keep the good hitter you have, and feel free to add another in a spot in which you DON'T have one. I don't want Morales being the best hitter on this team either, but that doesn't mean he should leave while we risk another Cust in his place.
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If Kendrys is worth 9 or 10 million dollars, and you want to keep him without locking up the DH position for multiple years, why isn't that worth a premium for next season's payroll? You're paying for the privilege of making a 1-year contract with a hitter who would get multiple years otherwise. Do I expect him to come in around 2/20? Yeah. Maybe 2/18 if we're lucky, and any lower than that is just great. I would love 2/14, but with Boras as his guy I think someone will take 2/20. They might not do 2/20 with a lost 1st round pick, though, which means we could keep him instead.
Which is the leverage to be gained from the QO in the first place. If the Mariners can't attract free-agent bats yet (and there's zero evidence that we will be able to) then we need to keep the decent hitters already on this team.
Especially since our FA options that are better than Kendrys look like Choo (9 figures), Pence (same), Cano (hahahahaha...) and Beltran - and the only one in the limited years/dollars pool is Beltran. Napoli is a RH Morales if we wanna go there instead, but we had that chance last year and passed. Has anything changed?
The idea that "Real" teams wouldn't have Morales as their #1 or #2 option has no bearing on what is actually available to the Mariners in 2014. With lots of teams needing upgrades and few good hitters, let alone great ones available in the market, "overpayments" may well happen. A team's need doesn't go away just because the price goes up. Kendrys doesn't have to re-sign here, and when we've been involved in bidding wars before we've lost.
The QO removes the need for the bidding war and exchanges dollars for certainty. That's a valid business principle. I don't think it'll come to that, but if we make that determination then so be it. In a perfect world, Smoak finds his HR stroke, Saunders turns on the lightbulb, Franklin pulls a Jeter and with Seager already locked in that makes Morales the 4th best hitter on this team. I'm fine with that perfect world.
In a less than perfect one, having a top-70 hitter who is a few HRs from being a top-50 hitter seems like a fine plan. We're only gonna trade for one big bat this offseason, if we can even pull that off. Asking for the miracle trade PLUS the better-and-more-expensive FA seems unlikely. Keep Morales, even if it costs you a couple extra bucks thanks to the qualifying offer, and focus the rest of your attention on the other moves.
Don't make this offseason harder than it has to be.
~G
Comments
Go read up on it, you're over valuing something because you already have it which is a common flaw in human nature when evaluting options. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loss_aversion
Everyone is falling for okay player on a bad team syndrome in a big way here. Kendry Morales is an okay baseball player. He's okay at hitting for a DH or first basman, but in no way is he elite. He is made less valuable by the fact that he is a terrible base runner and can't play in the field every day without getting hurt. The previous comment is correct that this team really need to bring in two starting outfielders in the off season and probably a starting pitcher. I'm not against bringing Morales back at the right price, but he's not worth $14 million. Look at this way, a DH platoon of Ibanez and Montero would probably produce similar value for almost not money.
I realize that the Mariner offense has been so bad for so long that anyone who looks like a hitter seems the new Edgar Martinez, but in this case, that's not what Morales is. He's the guy who scores 20 points a night for a bad NBA team because someone has to take the shots.
But I posted the link to this post over on USSM in the comments thread for Dave's post :P
I think it is a thoughtful and reasoned response. Would love to get more calm-headed dialogue going between the sites. Even if I am biased towards the content that comes from SSI.
I can see reasons to swap Kendrys for him, and if we were talking robots, I would prefer Napoli. More thump from the right side, mostly. But if Kendrys offers more leadership to this team, and has a greater desire to be here, I would defer to that and take Kendrys.
The fatal flaw in the USSM "group think" logic is that the market for baseball players is perfect, and that there are numerous opportunities available to each team, each of which is accurately priced based on the value that said player produces. Gordon has blown that argument up -- there are actually very opportunities for the M's to add comparable hitting talent to Morales this off-season in the FA market. And those opportunities that are available will require expensive, long-term contracts that present substantially more risk than Morales at 1/$14M or 2/$20M. I'm no fan of GMZ, but ANY GM in the M's current position is going to offer Morales a QO - DC and the "Group Thinkers" (is that a boy band?) are just whipping up an illogical argument that is only valid in a non-existent perfect world.
Call it the Carlos Guillen/David Bell theorem: which is to throw the theory of Loss Aversion out when the Mariners are involved. Every organization and fan base thinks their prospects and major league talent is better than it is, EXCEPT for the Mariner fanbase. The Mariner talent base consistently proves itself better than even Mariner fans and organization correctly understand it is. Thus, Mariner trades backfire at an alarming rate. Mariner fans knew the following players were good: Adam Jones, Shin-Soo Choo, Asdrubal Cabrera, Doug Fister, Raphael Soriano, Jose Cruz Jr., Jason Varitek, Derrick Low, George Sherrill, Michael Pineda, Carlos Guillen, even Freddy Garcia when he was traded. All turned out to be even better than thought. Mariner players are not over-valued. By some strange freak of nature, Seattlites undervalue their talent. But they don't realize they do, so they consistently make bad trades.
How do we test this? Here's how: if the Mariners allow Morales to walk, and go outside the organization to fill the primary DH role, then whoever takes the primary role of DH in his place will be less valuable in 2014 than Kendry Morales will be in 2014 for whomever he plays.
Could really do without the superior tone, here. Just because someone holds a contrary opinion to yours, doesn't mean they aren't as "smart" as you are (or think you are).
But to address your point, the concept of loss aversion really is not applicable here. By offering the QO, the Mariners quite literally tip the scales in their favor. I would argue Morales as a legitimate FA target regardless of the fact that he was a Mariner this year. The current situation simply makes it even *more* of a no-brainer.
He stated that Kendrys was not a great hitter, so I don't think he's overvaluing anything :) He very clearly articulated that there are no realistic upgrades on the market (contrary to popular assumptions) so it makes sense to overpay when the supply is low. Specifically, it makes sense to overpay when the supply is low when you are dangerously low on said supply. When the water starts dwindling in the hot summer desert and all that's left for those who have yet to find a drink is a shallow steamy mud puddle, you''ll be sure to find an overpay to attain the sip that ensures survival. It has nothing to do with loss aversion, it has to do with understanding scarcity particularly when survivability is on the line.
Offering Kendrys the QO gives the M's a good chance to avoid going below the line of "death" and gives them flexibility early in their offseason plan to explore riskier options elsewhere (like a RH outfielder) while Kendrys plays the borderline QO Free Agent waiting game we saw with LaRoche last year.
Can Beltran play the field at all anymore? He seems like the only option for a DH upgrade.
I'm thinking we need to add TWO OFers this offseason.
Morales is our 2013 RBI leader, and Ibanez, another of our RBI leaders, is 41. Do you feel more confident extending Morales by somewhat overpaying, or do you want to bet on Montero going from 'roid suspension to MOTO DH in 2014? Aside from any 2014 contributions by Morales/Ibanez/Montero we still need to acquire a BIG bat. Extend a QO to Kendrys and move on to acquiring the other bat. Overpaying? I don't care about the salary budget of a profitable, but decade-losing team. Don't tell me it costs too much to win.
Well put, G. My thoughts exactly.
MLB is not Roto and the M's do not have to concern themselves with the luxury penalties (ha!) that the other rich organizations do.
Is Kendrys a player with whom you can win your next pennant? If not, who are these better players who are willing to play for the M's?
Z was spurned by free agents and trade targets last offseason. Acquiring a guy like Morales is a pragmatic solution to a serious problem for the M's.
Corey Hart is coming off of knee surgery. He has put up some solid numbers for the Brewers. Perhaps he can be our next shot at the QO leveraging game Z seems to like playing.
...that could post the same composite line and production numbers. If Jesus Montero could post his 2012 numbers against lefties and Raul could post his 2013 numbers against righties, we should be golden - and like you said, have spent far less than the 14 million dollars that we'd be out if we make the QO and Morales accepts. They'd even be the same composite-terrible on the basepaths. It'd be awkward-conjoined-twin-Morales out there.
But how certain are you that they'll give you the production you need? What if Montero hits like he did in the first half of 2013, and Ibanez hits like he has in the second half? We could try Corey Hart, see if his knee will hold up, but again how certain are you of his production? Let's say you were gonna get fired if your DH position posted a wRC+ under 112. Do you want to bargain shop for guys who have the potential to give you what you want, or pay for someone who is almost certain to, given average health?
*shrugs* I agree, Morales is not a world-changing batter - unless you don't have any other ones. If the executed plan this offseason is to sign the Cuban Abreu, then trade for Stanton and LoMo then sure, let Morales go. But we have to actually get those guys or performers like them, we can't just wish for em... and unfortunately we can't make other teams trade with us or make FAs sign with us either. If the dream is just to find competent hitters somewhere, like I dunno, Mike Morse, who are under-utilized in short exposure and would no doubt flourish with extended playing time, well then I'd say you're playing with fire. Kendrys can do what he does in extended exposure, which is an important quality to have.
The QO is leverage to get a good hitter to sign with us. Dave agrees that Morales hits what he hits, and he'll probably hit it next year. We COULD get that production elsewhere. For all we know we could call up Choi and he could do it for the price of a sandwich and a very expensive bottle of wine. But I wouldn't bet the 2014 season on it.
There are obviously plans in which we don't need to keep Morales. In the plans that require his presence on the team for a successful year (ie, likely the ones that involve keeping most of the baby hitters), I don't much care what I pay him over one season in order to get him to stay. Getting the wRC+ at market rate is less important in that case than simply getting the wRC+. I don't care if I'm paying 10 dollars a gallon for gasoline if I have the money and it's the only gas for miles that will get my car started. Seager throwing 130 wRC+ on the fire basically for free helps me afford that slightly overpriced year from Morales, if it comes to that.
There are worse things. Like, say, turning in our playoff competitor cards in May again.
~G
No one is falling for "okay player on a bad team" syndrome. The OP and everyone on this site views Kendrys as a good not great hitter, a bad baserunner, and a DH / occasional spot 1B at best. He is consistent and does not have major holes. That is a valuable player in MLB. Not a star, but valuable. Well - stars make a lot more than $14M on their contracts last I checked. $14M total dollars is bupkus in today's MLB (total dollars are more important than the 1 year average).
Calling him a "1 win" player is theoretical thinking, not how businesses are run. For the real live 2014 Seattle Mariners, he is worth more because we can't seem to find this mystical replacement DH that supposedly gets us within 1 win of Kendrys. Just like Felix was worth like 13 wins above an average pitcher a few years ago if you compare his actual starts to what an average pitcher would have done, with the 513 run M's backing them up. No he was not a "13 WAR" pitcher but WAR doesn't win real world games, it is a STARTING POINT for player comparison.
Also, knowing Kendrys can perform for the M's in our park, is a good personality fit, likes it here, etc...absolutely DOES weigh on the scale vs bringing in a player of equal stats on paper, who has not proven any of that.
Also, a platoon is 2 players. So even assuming we could create a cheaper Morales equivalent platoon (something we have not pulled off in reality for years), who is the other player we can't keep on the team in that case? Part of the equation you're leaving out.
PS, Kendrys is nothing like a 20PPG scorer on a bad NBA team. That analogy doesn't make sense. The good stats bad team effect in NBA is because someone has to shoot the ball (their stats would go down on a good team due to fewer touches...same for rebounds and many other NBA stats), and because scoring 20PPG isn't that hard to do or valuable (a Kobe Bryant or Lebron could easily score 35PPG under same circumstances). Hitters are individual performers whose results are much more statistically independent than NBA players' are. Kendrys would be taking the same ABs and producing same results on a good or bad team. (If anything his superficial stats would improve due to more opportunities.)
Very well put. Not only do the M's not operate in this perfect world of statistical analysts' imagination...in fact they operate in a world in which they are a semi-joke of a franchise, with no clear direction or strategy, no obvious present competitive advantages, absentee ownership, limited MLB talent, no tradition or history of success, no attendance, a low payroll...in the corner of the country so players get to sit on planes more.
Sorry, it's a downer but those are facts. We may like to think money is money...but baseball players are human beings and right now, we are very low on the totem pole. (Not that we ever offer as much money as other teams do either :)
From reading the post and comments...to me it seems to boil down to a belief that we could get more than Kendrys for $14M. One way or another it was stated that Kendrys is a 1 WAR player and we could reasonably get 2-3 WAR for that money. You don't really have to argue over any other points than this, they are more or less window dressing.
Well, I haven't done a study on this and I'm sure some of these examples are bad ones, but just glancing at some 2012 full season 3 WAR players who are in the established stage of their careers, you have hitters Kinsler ($85M), Ethier ($85M), Kendrick ($34M), Victorino ($39M), Butler ($30M), Starlin Castro ($60M)...pitchers Dempster ($27M), Bumgarner ($35M), Cahill ($31M), Lohse ($33M), Ian Kennedy ($4M), Jordan Zimmermann ($5M)...Jered Weaver lol ($85M).
Call me simple but most of those numbers seem to be more than $14M. (And yes, total dollars matter...especially if the M's have a wave of young talent supposedly almost ready to storm the beach while costing nothing...last thing you want is to tie up big money long term.)
When you figure the M's have about $35 million in commitments for next year now. They could conceivably add $50-$60 million in payroll next year and aren't likely to be able to draw enough free agents in to spend it all anyway. USSM has argued multiple times that overpaying 1 year deals are the way to go anyway because it offers flexibility next year that longer contacts don't. Swisher vs. Morales, lol whatever USSM. Swisher isn't top 100 and would have cost more and longer...
Feb 12 2013 "So for fun, let’s just say that the Mariners had signed Bourn for 4/52 and Swisher for 4/60" not sounding like fun to me, but ok. So Morales isn't worth $14Mx1 but Swisher is worth $15Mx4? The logic there is so slimming...
If they're after Abreu, couldn't having Kendrys not only make it easier to draw him in but also help him transition to the states and MLB? I'm not saying that's a reason to bring him back or give a QO, just a consideration since I think that decision is easy already.
It all comes down to what the future has in store. I think it's a little near sighted to call Kendrys Morales a washed up Jose Vidro. Morales has age on his side, when comparing the two in age arc. Vidro was a decent player until age 32, while Kendrys starts his age 31 season next year. Don't forget vidro was a 2.0 O-WAR TO 5.0 o-WAR player for 8 years. I'm only asking for a year or two from Kendrys. He'll not play the field unless Smoak gets injured. Cut some slack on this one. Who else is your DH?
I think it is imperative to understand you cannot compare WAR for *ANY* other position player to WAR for a DH.
It's not enough to just say "ignore the defense". The oWAR calcuation for 2B is very different from that of DH - regardless of whether the player is good or bad defensively. And *MANY* position players implode offensively when asked to DH. It's a unique position, and not everyone can handle the transition. The notion that you can simply cycle through every OF/1B/3B you've got and have a DH-by-committee and they will *ALL* hit just as well as DH as they do when playing the field is just demonstrably false.
And I'm staring at Morales' total WAR figures for 2012 (2.2) and 2013 (2.8) ... and trying to figure how one pegs him as a 1.0 WAR player?
Even in his 51 games in 2010, he managed to produce 1.7 WAR.
As a DH, he *IS* (and has been), **AT LEAST** a 2.5 WAR DH.
I get concern that heading forward, age is going to catch up to him. Which is precisely why you wouldn't want to go more than 3 years. But, Morales to me is precisely the kind of vet you might want to sign to a "decent" contract - and then *IF* you get a log-jam with your prospect pipeline, he'll be relatively easy to swap out.
I also don't follow the Montero/Ibanez platoon argument. So, we're going to dismiss the 2.5+ WAR that Morales bring, because we think WAR is over-valuing him because he's slow on the base paths and gives no flexibility for play in the field - and "solve" that problem by putting TWO guys on the roster who are every bit as bad defensively (if not worse), and already as bad or worse (Montero) on the base paths - or likely to be, due to age (Ibanez)?
How does doubling down on lack of defensive flexibility, slowness, and eating up an extra roster spot actually help win games? At best, it might keep an extra dollar or two in the coffers - but you've eaten up an extra roster spot to spend that money on to save that money, (when money is CLEARLY not your immediate issue).
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My position is pretty simple:
The 42 year old guy is VASTLY more likely to implode next year than the 31 year old guy.
The failed catching prospect who only hit .637 in his 93 games as a DH is VASTLY more likely to face plant as a full-time DH than the 31 year old DH with the .815 career OPS.
While age concerns are valid - they are LESS valid for a "proven" full-time DH. "Becoming" a productive DH and handling the not playing the field prevents most guys from doing very well at the position. But, age related decline is generally accellerated due to not being able to handle the day to day pounding of playing in the field every day.
As a full-time DH, Morales should be less susceptible to aging effects. He's still currently in the "sweet spot" for production (27-32).
While Ibanez as DH opens the possibility of staving off age arc impact ... at age 42, the cliff he eventually falls off is likely to be drastically steep. When he goes, (at this age), it is far more likely he crashes to Ronnie Cedeno levels than something more modest.
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Maybe he just "looks" wrong.
To date, I still don't get the long love affair with Morse and the general feeling of ... dismissal that Morales has seemed to always engender. (shrug)
Yeah, if you are looking for a three year DH then Morales makes more sense. But what if you can only get him for the one year $14 million qualifying offer? That probably what - more than twice what it would cost to get Ibanez to DH for a year? Is there risk that he falls off the cliff in 2014? Yep. Is that risk = $7 or $8 million for a team that doesn't spend big on payroll? It's a tough call.
I do agree on the Montero thing - why he's even in the conversation is kind of strange. I don't see any reason to platoon Ibanez - he's hitting lefties OK right now. Just keep him out of the field if you have him on the roster.