Stratos
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Everything posted by Stratos
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Older guys seem to get less years but the AAV isn't much or at all affected. Sonny Gray got 3 years at 25m AAV last year. Before that Verlander and Scherzer got 3 yrs and 43m AAV, which at the time I said were dumb high risk contracts. Flaherty seems quality but only has 1 season of recent success so there's some risk there, and Fried will probably get at least 5 years which means he'll be at least 35 when the contract ends so risk there as well. Burnes has had some K/9 reductions and velo drops in recent seasons (though velo ex back up last season but Ks still dropped for some reason) so also some red flags. Will be interesting to see how the Cubs go with SP.
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Ah ok, I just used a very rough estimate with about 10-15m for arb and other raises and typical bench/pen small contracts.
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This is anecdotal evidence. You can find exceptions to anything. A bunch of people smoke a pack a day and live until they're 100 isn't proof that smoking isn't harmful to health. Guys like Charlie Morton are an extreme case. Pitching injuries are far less predictable than age regression. How many SP in the top 40 of fWAR last year were over age 34? A quick glance I found a few 35 years old and none over 35. You can do the same for top 40 position players. If pitching injuring are common and not very predictable then why give a guy tens of millions and then up the risk factor significantly by signing an old one too? They should stay as young as they reasonably can in the FA market.
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I generally wouldn't sign a 34-35 y/o pitcher to a FA market value deal if there were similar options for guys several years younger. The odds they will suddenly regress is higher so I don't see the benefit of playing Russian roulette. Jed was willing to give Stroman a higher AAV with opt-outs over a longer deal based on this fact and it was the right decision, especially given how Stroman fell off this year. The age regression curve isn't much different if at all for pitchers vs hitters.
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He signed Stroman in the 2021-22 offseason. He's only 33 and his velo and K/9 is already dropping off significantly. I think the data would support preferring signing a 30 or 31 y/o SP over a 34-35 y/o SP, not much different than a position player.
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Do you think we should be signing 34-35 year old SP to not-insignificant deals? I'm generally against it unless the age risk is baked or its some HOF-type stud.
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True forgot about that one. Went poorly.
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If Belli opt out they have around 70m to spend after arb etc. They can't sign all those guys without trades or going over the tax line.
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Clay Holmes would be fantastic, i'm sure he gets paid well though. I like Jansen too, he's probably worth at least 1 win more over Bethancourt. Wouldn't mind signing Jansen and possibly keeping Bethancourt too.
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There's some other good SP available. But Kikuchi will be 34 next year and Eovaldi with be 35, so there's significant risk they become late career Jon Lester or Kyle Hendricks at any moment in any deal, so i'd avoid them. Hoyer has never given a multiyear deal to an older SP like them. Flaherty is another option. The Cubs are very likely going to acquire another SP, the tier of SP they go after is unknown. The Cubs have around 45 million under the tax line to spend after arbitration/raises even if Belli doesn't opt out. Few FA position players available to fit with our needs unless Belli opts-out. If we have 2 Max Fried's already it doesn't matter since we have 3 other SP slots to fill. Another quality SP can also push someone like Ben Brown or Assad to the pen while providing SP depth for inevitable injuries. Teams can't get by on just 5 or even 6 SP these days.
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Nico Hoerner underwent successful right flexor tendon surgery
Stratos replied to KCCub's topic in Chicago Cubs Talk
At the very least they could stay about the same. It's not like they wouldn't get good assets back for a 4 WAR guy with surplus value. Again I wouldn't have traded him this offseason anyways so its moot. -
Any non-Soto FA's you guys would like the Cubs to target? I like Max Fried a lot, especially with our INF defense and his high GB%. Snell got 5/125 last year, Nola got 6/150, Rodon got 6/162, so Fried will be in that range. Wicks could try out as our #5 and Assad/Brown in the pen. If Wicks struggles a bit we can try one of those other 2 in the #5 slot.
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Nico Hoerner underwent successful right flexor tendon surgery
Stratos replied to KCCub's topic in Chicago Cubs Talk
Next offseason seemed a lot more likely unless they planned to go with Shaw on Opening Day, which doesn't seem their style. Get Shaw some AB's this season and have him as a backup on the INF for injury depth for 3B/2B is probably how they were going to go. -
Maybe im an idiot but I can't find any statcast data for minor league hitters on BB Savant. Do you have a link?
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Soto is really good, but also not quite in the same league as Judge and Ohtani. But he's younger, so it gets complicated. I don't know how much he'll get. I don't think 500m is underselling, maybe 450m is on the low side, not sure. 500m would be the biggest deal of all-time and he's not as good as Ohtani or Trout. What do you think he'll get in non-deferred money so we can keep things simpler and comparable to other players? I think it'll come down to what teams project from him going forward. He was only age 25 this year, and was 8 WAR this year, which is quite a bit higher than his norm. Has he not even peaked yet? Or was this a career year in a walk year? He also gets some extra PAs hitting 2nd all year to bump the WAR a bit. If Yanks gave him 40m AAV for ages 26-33 then 30m AAV for ages 34-39 that's 500m. So 14/500.
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Ohtani's deal in non-deferred dollars is 10/460. He's a better player than Soto obviously
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True about Trout. I think he lands with the Yanks for a gazillion billion dollars. We probably make a good offer but are a bridesmaid as usual. If the Yanks don't dump a bank on his doorstep maybe we have a chance. Not getting my hopes up
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I could see 500m in the upper range. Can't see him getting an extra 100m for the latter half of his 30s. My thought is teams will want to lock him up for his career at that money and spread out the luxury tax hit. Trout got 12/426 in 2019 being 1 year older, and there's some inflation, but Soto also isn't Trout, plus Soto may be a DH in his 30s since his range is already poor and speed is below average. For as good a hitter as he is i see him as around a 6.5 WAR player at this point in his career and that's going to drop as a DH. He's also gets a modest bump in his WAR given he typically hits 2nd in the order which helps him rack up extra PAs on the year. They need a stat to normalize WAR for 150 games and 650 PAs.
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Wow amazing, thanks! Where do we find this, Baseball Savant?
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Since Paredes is out of the small foul lines of TB maybe he's more of a 3 WAR guy now. I'd be very pleased with that next year from him. Curious what the projections will give him for 2025. If he has a good season I wonder what they do with Shaw. They have Nico for 2 more seasons. Maybe trade Nico next offseason. Also curious what the EV and bat speed numbers are for Shaw.
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How much do you guys think he'll get? I think he could get 15/450m. Here's the most expensive contracts to compare: https://theanalyst.com/na/2024/10/the-highest-paid-major-league-baseball-players-and-largest-contracts-in-mlb-history Trout got 12/426 and Betts got 12/365, both at age 27. Judge was 9/360 at age 30 (older but a better player).
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Bad news for the Cubs hopes for Soto is this WS run gives the Yanks all the more reason to throw the money down to keep him, and more reason for Soto to want to stay. Plus fans will def put the pressure on Cashman. Heard the favs for Soto were Yanks and Mets.
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The point is the Cubs aren't coming up short because of the deals 3+ years long. Jed's errors in FA are coming from all the bad short-term deals and bad exercised options. The money given to Hendricks, Smyly, Neris, Mancini, Barnhart could have been spent better. Put Bote in there too (Theo deal). Maybe the Gomes option was understandable at the time, but he was also old, i can let that one go. Barnhart also wasn't very expensive but 2 years was stupid given he was coming off a 0.3 WAR, 63 wRC+ season and was 32 y/o. The others mentioned were just overpaid for their talent level and could have gone towards some better players. That's about 45m spent on meh players on 1-2 deals/options that combined for negative WAR in 2024. 45m could have payed for another Swanson + Happ or literally any player. Count Bote and its 50m, almost half the Brewers payroll spent on zero WAR. That's NOT efficient or good value. Value and efficiency are good things, and if Jed was as careful with the smaller contract as the larger ones we probably would have been in the playoffs last year and at least made it much closer (or better) this year. That wouldn't be bad for a team not getting a ton of WAR from cheap young players yet.
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Seiya, Swanson, Imanaga, Taillon. Jeds FA problem has been overpaying on the 1 to 2 year contracts for barely above replacement players, not 4+ year deals.
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Ohtani/Freeman/Betts seem like such nice dudes. Im going for Cleveland and Mets because it would be nice for fanbases. Would be fun to watch Yanks/Dodgers go at it though with those hitters
