What is the Cubs' Dansby Swanson Contingency Plan?

[Brian Kelder]

Dansby Swanson's signing certainly has not had the impact Jed Hoyer expected when he inked the shortstop to a seven-year deal prior to the 2023 season. Looking under the hood, there is reason to be concerned that the mistake will hamper the Cubs on the field and in the marketplace for years to come.

Image courtesy of © Isaiah J. Downing-Imagn Images

When Dansby Swanson and the Cubs agreed to a $177-million deal, everyone understood that he would have his peaks and valleys at the plate. The selling point was that he would be an elite defender at a premium position. Gold Glove awards would abound, and people who are smart about baseball would lovingly cite his sparkling defensive metrics. The value would all math out nicely.

Alas: not so fast. Swanson's Defensive Runs Saved rating has cratered, dropping from 17 in 2023 to 5 this year. He led MLB in DRS at shortstop last year. This season, he's 11th, and there are several players who would also pass him up if you prorated their lower innings total out to a full season like Swanson's. What's going on here? Why isn't the elite shortstop at the top of the ranks?

It's the range. Outs Above Average on Baseball Savant gives Swanson a ton of credit for rarely making errors. He's got a great set of hands. He's making all the plays that he can get to. He just doesn't get to as many balls as you would hope, especially while going to the right. He's gotten a step slower.

In 144 games played, Swanson has 495 total chances. This ranks him seventh in the league, but if you go by per-game number of chances, he drops considerably. He's just not getting to balls with the range of Ezequiel Tovar, Masyn Winn, Elly De La Cruz, or Taylor Walls. By this statistic, even Trea Turner has demonstrated more range on ground balls. Swanson does not field as many ground balls as many other players, which is what we should expect. Forty-nine players have played at least 220 innings at short this year. Including Swanson, only 12 are 30 or older. Turner, who is only eight months Swanson's senior, is the oldest regular shortstop in baseball.

We've already demonstrated a huge deduction in DRS. His 5 DRS places him essentially level with Corey Seager, and far below young whizzes like Winn, Tovar, and Zach Neto. Being an above-average shortstop is a good thing, but the sharp downward slope of the trend line here is worrisome.

Given Swanson's age, it's fair to question if this is a long-term issue. He has never been an electric athlete, and any decline in range should be met with alarm. His arm is already below-average. It's been ranked in the 18th percentile of shortstops. He's not making up for a lack of range with a cannon. His lower half has betrayed him several times (multiple heel, knee issues), and injury problems don't ease up after three decades on the planet. They might continue to take him out of the lineup, and they're almost certain to continue eroding his defensive value even when he's out there.

Actuarially speaking, we're also past the prime years for Swanson's bat. He'll turn 31 just as he reports to spring training next February. He's being paid for average performance offensively, to go along with elite defense. With the glovework dropping off, his wRC+ is also at 97, which means he's technically become a below-average hitter. His isolated power has really plummeted, from last year's .172 to this season's .145. They need him to be capable of producing something close to 25 homers per year; he's only managed 16 this season. The best years of almost any long-term deal come at the front end, and the front end of Swanson's deal has been underwhelming.

Swanson has played a lot of games and takes pride in his position. The Cubs also have paid a hefty premium for him to be their long-term shortstop. Given the lack of options coming from the farm or available via free agency, he'll remain at short heading into next season. Hopefully, he'll show up in Arizona looking refreshed and healthy, and it will be a moot point, but should the Cubs have some sort of contingency plan in place in case this decline accelerates?

Looking to the minors, there's no help to be had. Jefferson Rojas has been playing short in High A, but he's a 19-year-old who may need to repeat the level after managing only a .646 OPS. Christian Hernandez is at the same level, and could develop into an option in a few years, but no sooner. The Cubs somehow have a farm system chock-full of second basemen and outfielders. Nico Hoerner's arm also isn't suited to moving back to the left side of the infield.  

Brandon Crawford is often cited as a comparison for Swanson, in that he started at short well into his 30s. Offensively, the comparison is apt. Neither made their money as sluggers. However, Crawford's range and arm were both better at their respective peaks, and even so, the Giants stalwart was a below-average defender in four of his final six years at the position.

Jed Hoyer took the risk with Swanson and went against his stated philosophy of not spending big on contracts for many years; he really needs this contract to maintain value going forward. In his quote, Hoyer says a contract like this is only for the "truly elite." Swanson, with his current plate production and range and arm, has not met that lofty standard. The Cubs need to account for this and take action with some sort of plan. Hoyer had better hope Swanson's defensive dip is just that, as opposed to the beginning of an accelerating downward slide. If this continues to be a missed signing and the team doesn't succeed, the Cubs will look to someone else to take the next big contractual risk.

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[Bertz]

1 hour ago, Brian Kelder said:

Dansby Swanson's signing certainly has not had the impact Jed Hoyer expected when he inked the shortstop to a seven-year deal prior to the 2023 season

Dansby Swanson is 22nd in baseball in WAR since he signed.  The two guys directly in front of him are Matt Olson and Kyle Tucker, the two guys directly behind him are Bryce Harper and Adley Rutchsman.  Of his cohort of shortstops, he's half a win ahead of Trea Turner, two and a half wins ahead of Xander Bogaerts, and three wins ahead of Carlos Correa.  

It also feels pretty intellectually dishonest to spend 4 paragraphs on his one year decline in DRS and not note that Statcast says he's been the second best defensive shortstop in baseball this year?

[squally1313]

Cody Bellinger has made more money than Dansby over the last two years, the decision was made to sign him twice, and he has been significantly less productive (8.8 fWAR to 6.4) since the beginning of last year. His defense and offensive metrics both took turns in the wrong direction from last year. He can be pretty easily replaced if not upgraded next year if not for this player option that we gave him, which would guarantee him all of $500k less than Swanson (and he can do it again a year from now!), vs the gaping hole at shortstop we would have if not for Swanson, who you could extremely pessimistically pencil in for 3 fWAR next year. And yet we've spent, roughly, 10x the amount of message board and column space bemoaning this consensus top 35ish player who plays a key position where we have no other options. Bizarre. 

[Rob]

Swanson was worth nearly 5 fWAR last season. He's on track to be worth about 4 fWAR this year.

If he continues to lose 1 fWAR per season -- a very aggressive degradation of production --  he'd still put up a total of 15 fWAR (assuming we bench/cut him after he reaches replacement level) over the course of his contract. Which would mean we'd have paid him roughly $12 million per win. That is less than the rate we're paying Bellinger this year.

Is that a mild overpay? Sure. But that's only with a pretty pessimistic decline baked into that. Swanson could still easily be worth the contract. I don't know why everybody's talking about him like he's some big disappointment -- he's been the most valuable player on the Cubs since we signed him.

[Named After Maddux]

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Alas: not so fast. Swanson's Defensive Runs Saved rating has cratered, dropping from 17 in 2023 to 5 this year. He led MLB in DRS at shortstop last year. This season, he's 11th, and there are several players who would also pass him up if you prorated their lower innings total out to a full season like Swanson's. What's going on here? Why isn't the elite shortstop at the top of the ranks?

It's the range. Outs Above Average on Baseball Savant gives Swanson a ton of credit for rarely making errors. He's got a great set of hands. He's making all the plays that he can get to. He just doesn't get to as many balls as you would hope, especially while going to the right. He's gotten a step slower.

OK so I have to question the analysis here. DRS is an okay statistic, but it still has very real flaws, chief among them is the fact that it's an entirely human-driven statistic that doesn't take starting position into account!

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"DRS and UZR are solid stats and a huge step up from errors, fielding percentage, and the good ole eye test. However, the failure to account for positioning is still a big issue and is a drawback of both UZR and DRS"

OAA does take positioning into account and if we're talking range, Dansby's is the 99th percentile. It is hard, very hard to say that there is a statistical justification to say that Dansby Swanson doesn't have range.

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In 144 games played, Swanson has 495 total chances. This ranks him seventh in the league, but if you go by per-game number of chances, he drops considerably. He's just not getting to balls with the range of Ezequiel Tovar, Masyn Winn, Elly De La Cruz, or Taylor Walls. By this statistic, even Trea Turner has demonstrated more range on ground balls. Swanson does not field as many ground balls as many other players, which is what we should expect. Forty-nine players have played at least 220 innings at short this year. Including Swanson, only 12 are 30 or older. Turner, who is only eight months Swanson's senior, is the oldest regular shortstop in baseball.

Trea Turner is definitely not getting to more balls and making good plays. His defense has been deteriorating over several years. We can't just evaluate defensive players by how many opportunities they have to field ground balls. The Phillies are second in baseball with a 46% GB%. The Cubs are 17th with a 41.7% ground ball rate. Implying that Dansby Swanson (OAA [range] 16, 99th%, +5 DRS) doesn't have as much range as Trea Turner (OAA [range] -3, 31st%, -13 DRS[!]) because the Phillies staff has gotten almost a hundred more groundballs to the right side of the IF this season is just trying so hard to make the narrative work that we miss the whole point.

Fielding run value (FRV) is just a better statistic. It correlates to future season FRV and even better than future season DRS better than DRS. Swanson is second among shortstops (one run behind Lindor) with a FRV of 12. FRV isn't perfect, but I would still ay it more than matches the eye test that Swanson is an elite shortstop.