The position player market isn't that hot this year.
There is aged Pujols who is probably a Cardinal for life,
There is Prince Fielder who ominously cannot control his weight,
There is old Carlos Beltran and younger Grady Sizemore, who are great talents with bum knees,
There is Jose Reyes, who is perfect, except he is not the big RBI man the M's need
Then, there are a 100 30+ year old baseball journeymen who are only so-so. Why should the M's sink money into any of these guys unless it is shown that they will probably help the ball club?
This article is right on the money. The M's should sign a hot pitcher or trade for someone really good, rather than sign some bad or injured or old free agents. There is no sense spending money for the sake of having a full payroll. This Yu Darvish character seems to fit the bill.
Also, Z's pitcher judgment seems to be above reproach, while his position player free agent signing record is dismal.
But, this Nippon Pro Ball posting bid system seems like a good way to get burned. It would be an unmitigated catastrophe to pay millions to negotiate for a player, and then not get a deal done.
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Q. How about intangibles? What is SSI's intuition on him?
A. Bill James, as a Royals fan, once complained about Earl Weaver's pitching staffs "being filled with guys who had 95 mph fastballs and absolutely refused to throw them to you."
Darvish seems to like to pitch backwards -- in Mike Mussina style, starting batters with breaking pitches and only then coming back with fastballs. But Darvish has the hot fastball that makes this effective at the Cy level. His 95 mph heater "establishes" the #1 in the batter's mind, no matter how many offspeed pitches they see.
Dr. D is partial to David Cone, Mike Mussina types. Assuming that the pitcher is brainy and has his act together, those guys "happen" in the playoffs. The tougher the opposition, the more valuable they are.
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Another reason I'm biased towards Darvish: you remember how badly we wanted Brandon Morrow to get on top of the baseball at release? Darvish gets WAYYYYYYY on top of the baseball when he throws. This video gives you a great feel for the way he throws downhill in MLB style.
Darvish shares this attribute with fellow template-pitcher Mike Mussina. In the picture above, you can see Moose hooking over the ball, creating downward bite. Felix does this also.
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DiceK might have slowed some MLB teams -- and Dr. D -- down. A little. :- )
But Yu Darvish would enter next year's 2012 AL-only roto draft as one of the top 10-15 starters in the league. And there's a very real chance that he'd join the league at the Verlander-, Felix-, Weaver-class level of elite Cy contender.
For $10-12M per? I'll take five.
BABVA,
Dr D
Comments
In a few places, you read around the 'net that the MLB team with the highest post MUST sign Darvish to a contract. Not sure what that meant.
He hits for average, and he hits lots of doubles, and triples, and he steals a ton of bases and he is a good shortstop.
Plus, he is probably within the Mariner's price range, as he isn't a "big bopper". His last contract was rather modest.
Plus, he appears healthy as a horse
How about a POTD for the batting champ?
Remind me amigo ...
Reyes piled up an enormous 7.8 runs per 27 this past year, and coming from SS, you're talking about a Longoria-, AGone-level contributor. The type of hitter matters not a whit to me, once you're talking about that kind of production.
If 5 wins is 5 wins (Darvish), what are 6-7 wins? :- )
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Volatile player, though, with injury risk creating a disaster scenario ... will be on a lot of 1st-place or last-place roto teams in 2012...
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You think Capt Jack is married to the classic NL gold glove shortstop?
2003 Ankle Sprain
2009 Calf injury
2010 Thyroid gland
so says Wikipedia
None of these injuries appear to be a real big deal, or likely to reoccur. Maybe they are though.
As for him not being a good SS as our current one, He could probably play 3B too.
The posting fee is only paid if the player and new team agree on a contract. When a NPB team posts a player, MLB teams have four days to submit sealed bids to win exclusive negotiating rights for the player. The NPB team can accept or reject the highest bid. The MLB team that wins the bid has 30 days to come to an agreement with the player or he reverts to his old NPB team. The posting fee is only paid when an agreement is made with the player. Last year, Oakland won the bid for Hisashi Iwakuma, but was unable to reach an agreement with him, so did not have to fork over the $19M posting fee.
This is the same Jose Reyes that has not played more than 133 games in the last 3 years. He missed 29 games last year with a left hamstring injury last year, 24 games with a right oblique strain in 2010 and missed most of 2009 with a torn RIGHT hamstring. This is a guy who relies a lot on his legs that missed 155 games in the last 3 years with leg injuries, and has a long history (222 games) specifically with hamstring issues. Yes, he had a great batting line last year, probably the best of his career, but it included a .351 BABiP; easily the best of his career (previously .335 in his rookie year, his full season best was .320) and notice that his stolen bases, over 55 per year for 4 years until his hamstring tear, were a comparatively meager 39. Now there's nothing wrong with 39 stolen bases, but notice a trend here.
Stolen Base Attempts per Stolen Base Opportunities
2005 31%
2006 33.8%
2007 40.5%
2008 29.1%
2009 20.3% (Hamstring Tear Year)
2010 18.5%
2011 18.3%
Yes, he still has good stolen base numbers, but after what mostly looks to have been a career year, people are talking about 4 or 5 years between 75 and 100 million dollars. It's not hard to envision his career tapering off like say, Rafael Furcal, another all star shortstop who was fantastic until about age 30 when back and leg injuries started to significantly hamper his career. He went from being a 3.2-5 win (via fangraphs) player over the previous 4 years to being worth 2 in each of the next 2 years and having a little career resurgence and getting close to those career years before collapsing again last year. Now Jose Reyes is better than Rafael Furcal, but he's already missed a huge amount of time due to leg injuries and as mentioned before, he probably will cost 17-19 million a year and at least 4 years to sign and shortstop is an extremely physically demanding position .
I like Yu Darvish better, if for no other reason than he makes it possible (in that we could trade Pineda or Vargas without having to replace them with Danny Hultzen or James Paxton who would likely not have the ability to pitch more than maybe 150 innings) to make that big (low cost) bat trade for Joey Votto as Dave Cameron has been pushing for.
Okay, I get the concept of Reyes, (and appreciate the risk). But, doesn't that slam Nick Franklin into the boards?
Doesn't this set up another position swap at the ML level between a kid and a long timer? Or is the assumption that Nick Franklin is expendable?
Me? I'm not high on Fielder (or Votto), because the club seems to be in good shape regarding 1B. I'm thinking the position the club is most questionable on going forward remains CF. I'd prefer to hold onto my cash this year with a plan to make a run at someone like Kemp in the next 18 months.
Of course, the Darvish issue brings up an important issue. Since Seattle DOES have a major Japanese footprint, what NPB bat(s) might be on the cusp of defection to MLB ... potentially sliding into the Ichiro marketing slot?
So if you're the Mariners, and your budget only allows for one of either Darvish or Fielder, which do you take? Assuming of course that you are the high bidder on Darvish and are able to sign him.
I'd go for Darvish. Younger than Fielder; probably cheaper, allowing for more roster flexibility. As Sandy says, 1B seems to be not a position of need with Scrub Carp manning the position. And, Jemanji makes a great point that the M's would get big dollar value from having the Next Big Thing from Japan on the roster. Darvish wouldn't have the draw that Ichiro does, playing every day, but it would go a step towards retaining the interest of the Japanese fan base.
I just thought that a guy who regularly hits the double digits in triples per year and who has lots of stolen bases seems to be healthy. Maybe he stretches and sprains stuff playing so hard.
The only reason I brought him up is that he is within the Ms price range, he seems to be the best bat available that the Ms can afford, and he can turn one of the black hole positions into a nice .800 Ackleyesque OPS.
But, if he is worn down and washed up, maybe the Ms should sign a pitcher, or just skip this lot of players alltogether, which seems to be the general consensus. The recent stolen base trend is disturbing.
One of the mysteries of life solved. The American news made it sound as if the A's had to pay the bid, but didn't get their player. Or, at least that was my impression of the system.
Darvish, of course!
No brainer.
On the Reyes issue, Sandy's right! Franklin is on the way, and we have two guys who can play the position right now. SS is not a weakness and if you get Reyes you're paying for his best year ever, which you won't see again......and you're getting a thoroughbred with tender legs......and you pay for a full season but get 30 games less than that from him. Over the course of 4 seasons you get almost one less "Reyes season" (130 games) than you pay for. Paying fullbore for a hotrod is fine, but if it is in the shop every 4th day that you want to cruise up the coast with the top down then you may have overpaid.
glmuskie is right and wrong. We're fine, right now, in the 1B/DH area. He got that right. But Carp is hardly a scrub. I'll trust he said that tongue in cheek.
I continue to be amazed at Dave Cameron's OCD with a Pineda + for Votto swap. Man, Pineda had a 1.1 WHIP last year, as a rookie! Felix didn't hit that until his 4th year. Pineda had a 9.1 K's/9, something Felix has never touched and he had a 3.15 K/BB ration. Felix came very close twice, but only matched that the last couple of year. Pineda may not be Felix, but he's a 22 yr old with a gun with no health issues. He's WAY cheap for the next 5 seasons, too. Why would you ship that off? 5 years from now, let's look at your retrun on investment, total WAR/$ spent. Wanna bet on who has the better return?
Votto is quite nice, thank you. Better than that, even, but no thank you. Not for that price.
I'll take ten Darvishes, thank you, and trade half of them. This club doesn't need pitchers or hitters - it need better players, period. Personally, I don't think Robinson OR Wells is ever going to be an impact hitter and I'd be sniffing around the Dodgers who are going to be tidying up their balance sheet in order to boost the bidding in their auction sale. Andre Ethier, until this year, was a better hitter than Kemp. They just re-signed Juan Rivera on a gross overpay which makes me think they're going to dump other salary. Ethier had a run-in with Mattingly last year and is ready to move. For next year, anyhow, he'd be a cheaper upgrade than Fielder at a better position andif you decide to keep him a replacement for Ichiro down the line.
Ethier is nice but not cheap. $9M+ next year then a costly arb year in '13 then a FA.
He's not playing center, but if you put him in left then you use Wells in CF, trade Guti and have Trayvon or Halman or ? as your 4th OF.
Such a move means Carp/Smoak are 1B/DH which I'm good with.
However, I'm not sure I trade away whatever it would take to get Ethier for just two years of his service. If Guti and a bullpen arm was involved I'ld jump, but LA isn't making that move.
To get 2 yrs of Ethier, you'll pay a premium. Therein lies the problem.
Moe
. . . is what I meant. Sorry for being unclear. And you're right, Guti and a bullpen arm wouldn't do it. They're motivated sellers, but not that motivated. It would take an outfielder and one of the pitching prospects, I'd guess. And I thought 2012 was his walk year? I see him as a rental unless you really like what you see and you try to extend him.
Just double-checked. '12 is his arb and then walk year.
My bad.
Makes him even less worth a couple of nice pieces. If you could get a guaranteed extension, say 3 years at a reasonable price, then it would be very worth considering.
Reasonable price being the critical phrase, of course.