First off, his wRC+ for the season is 120. His career average is 118. Dave wasn't picking on a cold month, he took data and split it into two groups, with the second group containing 290 pa's. So this isn't knee jerk analysis. His BABIP on the season is 12 points higher than his career average, and his ISO is down year over year for 3 consecutive years. He gets a break in the wRC+ for his home park, but even then it is almost exactly at his career average. And you've also decided to focus solely on his hitting and completely ignore his base-running and defensive value. It's been pretty convincingly stated that he is AT BEST a bottom 5 base-runner in all of baseball since he came up, and quite possible the #1 worst. Those runs he is giving up on the base-paths are real runs. You can't just say "his ops+ is 126 and there's a chance that he could turn into an MVP caliber hitter after turning 30" while ignoring that his position and base-running eat away a lot of the offensive contribution he makes. He just isn't as valuable as you think he is. There's more to the story.
I understand that the Mariners have run out horrible offenses for the last few years, and even though they are still a below average team, it makes it more enjoyable to watch them score more runs. So yeah, giving one of the team's best hitters 14 million for 1 year doesn't seem like a horrible idea. But the issue raised by this analysis is this: instead of paying 14 mil for 1 year of a 30 year old DH with no other baseball skills, why not try to find better all around baseball players. I think his statement that Morales isn't worth $14 million is correct. However, given the Mariners payroll situation, if giving him $10 million doesn't preclude you from signing better players, there isn't a lot of harm there. So we are in unison on that point.
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