The Bryce is Right, Bitch

[BigSlick]

We’ve lost Duke, all is lost.

 

I don’t understand how tight things are. Like, are we not gonna resign Kris Bryant? What are we looking at here

[Aaron_Kennelly]

We’ve lost Duke, all is lost.

 

I don’t understand how tight things are. Like, are we not gonna resign Kris Bryant? What are we looking at here

 

They'll have to the money to resign KB. But he is going to sign in Philly to play with Bryce, and we'll sign Kyle Seager instead.

[Ding Dong Johnson]

Having pessimist Duke is the best timeline.

[Thusly Boned]

I am not particularly bothered the Cubs didn't sign Harper. I didn't feel like he was a necessity, and I actually have quite a bit of confidence that our existing players will rebound/develop nicely.

 

Are you high?

 

DISCLAIMER: I am not defending the Rickettses and their "we are out of money" BS.

 

Nope, just don't see Harper as the transformative player some others do. This is a player who averaged less than 4 fWAR over the past 3 seasons. He's young and good for sure, and he'll get a bump not playing in DC, but he's not Mike Trout.

 

If we were going to have made big moves this offseason, I would have prioritized pitching over Harper, without question.

 

Now that we know that the FO is operating under bizarre BS artificial budgetary constraint, and may be operating in a scenario where signing him may have prevented us from retaining Bryant/Baez/etc. down the road...well, I am not sure what to think. But I do feel like we needed other things more than Harper.

 

Of course, we got essentially nothing for BS reasons, so w/e.

 

All I was trying to say was that I the reason for not signing Harper was that resources were being allocated to more pressing needs, I would have been fine with that.

[Thusly Boned]

We’ve lost Duke, all is lost.

 

I don’t understand how tight things are. Like, are we not gonna resign Kris Bryant? What are we looking at here

 

They'll have to the money to resign KB. But he is going to sign in Philly to play with Bryce, and we'll sign Kyle Seager instead.

 

My optimistic take from all of this is that part of the BS "no money" line is that future extensions are being allocated for in some way.

[Deeg]

LAD supposedly offered something like 4/160. If I'm Harper I would have found that very tempting indeed.

[Andy]

LAD supposedly offered something like 4/160. If I'm Harper I would have found that very tempting indeed.

Supposedly 4/180, and while tempting I don't blame him for not taking it. The way things are going I doubt he'd have made 150M after those 4 years.

[David]

LAD supposedly offered something like 4/160. If I'm Harper I would have found that very tempting indeed.

Supposedly 4/180, and while tempting I don't blame him for not taking it. The way things are going I doubt he'd have made 150M after those 4 years.

I think he could've managed to make that in nine years.

[Bluescale]

All I was trying to say was that I the reason for not signing Harper was that resources were being allocated to more pressing needs, I would have been fine with that.

 

Gotta keep the Trump re-election fund topped up...

[Deeg]

LAD supposedly offered something like 4/160. If I'm Harper I would have found that very tempting indeed.

Supposedly 4/180, and while tempting I don't blame him for not taking it. The way things are going I doubt he'd have made 150M after those 4 years.

I think he could've managed to make that in nine years.

 

Me too, especially as that will be post-strike and with a new CBA. But it's undeniably a gamble - both on his own performance in the interim and the players' resolve holding.

 

Harper would have been a FA at 30 - seems very probable to me he'd be able to get at least a $150 million deal then, and for less than 9 years too. I'm sure he hated this whole disgusting free agency process, with the sham the owners have turned it into, and you can't knock a guy for taking 330 million dollars. But this ended up being a very team-friendly deal.

[Derwood]

I don't blame him for taking the sure money. He could blow his knee out on Opening Day this year and never come back to form and still be guaranteed his money. The short term deal isn't worth the risk

[mul21]

Supposedly 4/180, and while tempting I don't blame him for not taking it. The way things are going I doubt he'd have made 150M after those 4 years.

I think he could've managed to make that in nine years.

 

Me too, especially as that will be post-strike and with a new CBA. But it's undeniably a gamble - both on his own performance in the interim and the players' resolve holding.

 

Harper would have been a FA at 30 - seems very probable to me he'd be able to get at least a $150 million deal then, and for less than 9 years too. I'm sure he hated this whole disgusting free agency process, with the sham the owners have turned it into, and you can't knock a guy for taking 330 million dollars. But this ended up being a very team-friendly deal.

 

This is the thing that people who are bitching about this deal don’t seem to understand. The total dollars is a big number no doubt, but the guy literally has to average 3.2 WAR over the life of the deal to make it worth it. I’m baffled by fans freaking out over it.

[Tim]

Here's one more kick in the balls...

 

We could have traded for Stanton last year if we weren't going to try to sign Bryce. Yankees got him basically for nothing.

[CubColtPacer]

I think he could've managed to make that in nine years.

 

Me too, especially as that will be post-strike and with a new CBA. But it's undeniably a gamble - both on his own performance in the interim and the players' resolve holding.

 

Harper would have been a FA at 30 - seems very probable to me he'd be able to get at least a $150 million deal then, and for less than 9 years too. I'm sure he hated this whole disgusting free agency process, with the sham the owners have turned it into, and you can't knock a guy for taking 330 million dollars. But this ended up being a very team-friendly deal.

 

This is the thing that people who are bitching about this deal don’t seem to understand. The total dollars is a big number no doubt, but the guy literally has to average 3.2 WAR over the life of the deal to make it worth it. I’m baffled by fans freaking out over it.

 

I wouldn't be upset by the deal, but anytime you stretch out a deal that long even hitting that low WAR number is a risk. Pujols for example over his last 13 years has averaged 3.88 WAR per year. And those 13 years include 2 MVP years out of him, 2 2nd place finishes, and 2 other top 10 MVP years.

 

Bryce isn't guaranteed to fall off like Pujols did, but he hasn't shown himself to be anywhere close to the player Pujols was either. There are certainly a decent range of outcomes where we look in 13 years and find out he didn't reach that number. And there are scenarios where he doesn't come particularly close. It's still a pretty solid deal, but it isn't a slam dunk or an amazing one.

[Sammy Sofa]

Here's one more kick in the balls...

 

We could have traded for Stanton last year if we weren't going to try to sign Bryce. Yankees got him basically for nothing.

 

Even better is how the Cubs completely whiffed or didn't even bother trying to trade for ANY of the baller players the Marlins were dumping.

[Bertz]

I think he could've managed to make that in nine years.

 

Me too, especially as that will be post-strike and with a new CBA. But it's undeniably a gamble - both on his own performance in the interim and the players' resolve holding.

 

Harper would have been a FA at 30 - seems very probable to me he'd be able to get at least a $150 million deal then, and for less than 9 years too. I'm sure he hated this whole disgusting free agency process, with the sham the owners have turned it into, and you can't knock a guy for taking 330 million dollars. But this ended up being a very team-friendly deal.

 

This is the thing that people who are bitching about this deal don’t seem to understand. The total dollars is a big number no doubt, but the guy literally has to average 3.2 WAR over the life of the deal to make it worth it. I’m baffled by fans freaking out over it.

 

ZiPS actually has the deal as an overpay by about $40m, and they had Machado's deal as dead even (worth $302 over 10 years IIRC).

 

That being said, the death of baseball's middle class was supposed to be in service of getting these types of guys outrageous money. If Bryce and Manny had combined for $850m, then it'd be hard to get too worked up about like Brian Dozier having to settle for a one year deal. But if these guys are getting market rates, the middle class is getting squeezed, and kids have to settle for arb, we obviously have a problem.

[SouthSideRyan]

 

I wouldn't be upset by the deal, but anytime you stretch out a deal that long even hitting that low WAR number is a risk. Pujols for example over his last 13 years has averaged 3.88 WAR per year. And those 13 years include 2 MVP years out of him, 2 2nd place finishes, and 2 other top 10 MVP years.

 

Bryce isn't guaranteed to fall off like Pujols did, but he hasn't shown himself to be anywhere close to the player Pujols was either. There are certainly a decent range of outcomes where we look in 13 years and find out he didn't reach that number. And there are scenarios where he doesn't come particularly close. It's still a pretty solid deal, but it isn't a slam dunk or an amazing one.

 

I've seen this comparison a lot, and feel the need to point out that Harper is 6 years younger than Pujols was at the time of their contracts.

[CubColtPacer]

 

I wouldn't be upset by the deal, but anytime you stretch out a deal that long even hitting that low WAR number is a risk. Pujols for example over his last 13 years has averaged 3.88 WAR per year. And those 13 years include 2 MVP years out of him, 2 2nd place finishes, and 2 other top 10 MVP years.

 

Bryce isn't guaranteed to fall off like Pujols did, but he hasn't shown himself to be anywhere close to the player Pujols was either. There are certainly a decent range of outcomes where we look in 13 years and find out he didn't reach that number. And there are scenarios where he doesn't come particularly close. It's still a pretty solid deal, but it isn't a slam dunk or an amazing one.

 

I've seen this comparison a lot, and feel the need to point out that Harper is 6 years younger than Pujols was at the time of their contracts.

 

That's not the comparison I was using. I used Pujols's numbers from age 26 to last year his age 38 season, essentially the 13 years that Bryce just signed for. So the last 6 years with the Cardinals (mostly amazing) and the 7 years with the Angels (mostly disappointing).

[David]

 

ZiPS actually has the deal as an overpay by about $40m, and they had Machado's deal as dead even (worth $302 over 10 years IIRC).

 

Out of curiosity, are they accounting for potential inflation on the $/WAR calculation in any way?

[Bryants Disco Ball]

 

I wouldn't be upset by the deal, but anytime you stretch out a deal that long even hitting that low WAR number is a risk. Pujols for example over his last 13 years has averaged 3.88 WAR per year. And those 13 years include 2 MVP years out of him, 2 2nd place finishes, and 2 other top 10 MVP years.

 

Bryce isn't guaranteed to fall off like Pujols did, but he hasn't shown himself to be anywhere close to the player Pujols was either. There are certainly a decent range of outcomes where we look in 13 years and find out he didn't reach that number. And there are scenarios where he doesn't come particularly close. It's still a pretty solid deal, but it isn't a slam dunk or an amazing one.

 

I've seen this comparison a lot, and feel the need to point out that Harper is 6 years younger than Pujols was at the time of their contracts.

 

Plus, I think it's a great bet that Pujols is a few years older than he says he is.

[JennieGarthAlgar]

Here's one more kick in the balls...

 

We could have traded for Stanton last year if we weren't going to try to sign Bryce. Yankees got him basically for nothing.

 

Even better is how the Cubs completely whiffed or didn't even bother trying to trade for ANY of the baller players the Marlins were dumping.

 

It all makes sense if you buy the collusion theory. MLB owners spreading the superstars around, making sure no NBA-like superteams happen.

[Bertz]

 

ZiPS actually has the deal as an overpay by about $40m, and they had Machado's deal as dead even (worth $302 over 10 years IIRC).

 

Out of curiosity, are they accounting for potential inflation on the $/WAR calculation in any way?

 

I know he does, but the methodology wasn't discussed. The long and short of it was "the computer spits out $289 for Bryce, but the Phillies are in that meaty part of the win curve where it's totally worth it."

[Brian]

I thought things would even out a bit on this one over time but with 6 hours to go it's now at 73% no.

 

[tweet]

[/tweet]

 

at this moment it's 70% No

[Flames24Rulz]

Here's one more kick in the balls...

 

We could have traded for Stanton last year if we weren't going to try to sign Bryce. Yankees got him basically for nothing.

 

Even better is how the Cubs completely whiffed or didn't even bother trying to trade for ANY of the baller players the Marlins were dumping.

 

yep, any of the Marlins OF'ers made sense to trade for and instead, they let their two biggest threats acquire them. :good:

[Brian]

weird, the Cubs are not even mentioned in this Verducci article that details the entire process of signing Harper

 

https://www.si.com/mlb/2019/03/01/bryce-harper-philadelphia-phillies-contract-scott-boras

 

Harper, 26, had given Boras strict instructions at the start of his free agency: prioritize length of contract, and don’t bother even asking for opt outs.

 

“It was not only important not to have an opt out, he refused to allow me to do it,” Boras said. “He said, ‘I want to be with one team.’ I tried to talk him out of it. He gave me my marching orders.”