MLB Hot Stove Rumours Thread

ivanvamp

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Jul 18, 2005
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PrometheusWakefield said:
He is 35 and has accumulated WARs of -1.1, 0.4, and 0.3 over the past three seasons.
 
No sensible team would give that man a roster spot even if he played for free.
 
Sure there is.  His oWAR (b-ref) the past two seasons have been 0.9 and 0.2.  In other words, pretty much not good at all.  His dWAR the past two years have been -0.7 and -2.3.  In fact, his dWAR numbers have been awful (I mean, hideously awful) every year from 2006-2014.  Gruesome.  
 
So……. there is no way a team would acquire him to play 1b.  The only spot he should have is as a DH.  
 
And as a DH, you completely take away the defensive horror show and let him focus totally on hitting.  Put him in a good hitter's park and see what he can do.  He still has decent power (23 hr in 569 ab).  So the team acquiring him has to receive a prospect and a humongously subsidized contract, meaning they only pay a few million a year for him.  If he can put up 1 WAR as a DH, that's worth ~$6.5 million.  So a half a WAR is worth a little north of $3 million.  There's always a chance he'll be a little better than that if you take away the fielding responsibilities.  Plus you get a prospect in return as well.
 
For Philly, they get freed from most - not all, but most - of Howard's contract, and, because they HAVE to play him at 1b which makes him a negative WAR player, just replacing him with an average bench guy is probably going to represent a baseball upgrade as well.  So they have an incentive to do it.
 
I don't think it happens.  But an AL team that needs a DH and has a hitter's park could conceivably take him on if the trade was heavily subsidized.  Which means that Amaro won't do it.
 

MakMan44

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The guy literally came out and admitted (publicly) that he wanted Howard off the team. I think if he had even a single taker, at any price, he would have packed Howard's bags himself. 
 
That being said, it's still Ruben Amaro Jr, so I'm not sure how firmly I believe my above statement. 
 

ZMart100

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ivanvamp said:
Sure there is.  His oWAR (b-ref) the past two seasons have been 0.9 and 0.2.  In other words, pretty much not good at all.  His dWAR the past two years have been -0.7 and -2.3.  In fact, his dWAR numbers have been awful (I mean, hideously awful) every year from 2006-2014.  Gruesome.  
 
So……. there is no way a team would acquire him to play 1b.  The only spot he should have is as a DH.  
 
And as a DH, you completely take away the defensive horror show and let him focus totally on hitting.  Put him in a good hitter's park and see what he can do.  He still has decent power (23 hr in 569 ab).  So the team acquiring him has to receive a prospect and a humongously subsidized contract, meaning they only pay a few million a year for him.  If he can put up 1 WAR as a DH, that's worth ~$6.5 million.  So a half a WAR is worth a little north of $3 million.  There's always a chance he'll be a little better than that if you take away the fielding responsibilities.  Plus you get a prospect in return as well.
 
For Philly, they get freed from most - not all, but most - of Howard's contract, and, because they HAVE to play him at 1b which makes him a negative WAR player, just replacing him with an average bench guy is probably going to represent a baseball upgrade as well.  So they have an incentive to do it.
 
I don't think it happens.  But an AL team that needs a DH and has a hitter's park could conceivably take him on if the trade was heavily subsidized.  Which means that Amaro won't do it.
(Emphasis added.) I don't get it. If Philly subsidizes the contract so the acquiring team only pays a few million a year, then Philly is only freeing a few million a year from their payroll. Philly probably won't be competitive for a few years anyways, so what does that really buy the team? Why would Philly give up even a marginal prospect for the right to save a few million dollars. It seems to me like it would be counterproductive to the Phillies' rebuild.
 

ivanvamp

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Jul 18, 2005
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ZMart100 said:
(Emphasis added.) I don't get it. If Philly subsidizes the contract so the acquiring team only pays a few million a year, then Philly is only freeing a few million a year from their payroll. Philly probably won't be competitive for a few years anyways, so what does that really buy the team? Why would Philly give up even a marginal prospect for the right to save a few million dollars. It seems to me like it would be counterproductive to the Phillies' rebuild.
 
Why would it be counterproductive?  Howard helps them not at all, and freeing up a few million could be money spent on someone who could actually help the team perhaps.  
 

MakMan44

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ivanvamp said:
 
Why would it be counterproductive?  Howard helps them not at all, and freeing up a few million could be money spent on someone who could actually help the team perhaps.  
Furthermore, it frees up a roster spot/PT for Ruf and Franco. 
 

Carmen Fanzone

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ivanvamp said:
 
Why would it be counterproductive?  
 
Rather than send a prospect in order to save $6-10 million over the next two years, why not just keep the prospect, release Howard, and eat the $6-10 million?
 
Roster spot freed.
 

ZMart100

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ivanvamp said:
 
Why would it be counterproductive?  Howard helps them not at all, and freeing up a few million could be money spent on someone who could actually help the team perhaps.  
Yeah sort of my thoughts. Clearly they are not going to be competitive this year. Next year they have Cliff Lee's money coming off the books (minus the buyout), but they still need to find 4 credible SPs and ~5 position players. Even if they find several in their organization, I still think the few million dollars saved from the hypothetical Howard trade wouldn't leave them with enough money to build a postseason roster. Howard's contract has a team option for 2017, so that wouldn't change. Giving up a prospect for the right to save enough money for a good RP or a fraction of a SP for the next few years doesn't seem like it would really move their timetable. I think they are better off aiming for the 2017 season which means they should be acquiring prospects rather than giving them up. That's what seems counterproductive to me.
 

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ivanvamp said:
 
Sure there is.  His oWAR (b-ref) the past two seasons have been 0.9 and 0.2.  In other words, pretty much not good at all.  His dWAR the past two years have been -0.7 and -2.3.  In fact, his dWAR numbers have been awful (I mean, hideously awful) every year from 2006-2014.  Gruesome.  
 
So……. there is no way a team would acquire him to play 1b.  The only spot he should have is as a DH.  
 
And as a DH, you completely take away the defensive horror show and let him focus totally on hitting.  Put him in a good hitter's park and see what he can do.  He still has decent power (23 hr in 569 ab).  So the team acquiring him has to receive a prospect and a humongously subsidized contract, meaning they only pay a few million a year for him.  If he can put up 1 WAR as a DH, that's worth ~$6.5 million.  So a half a WAR is worth a little north of $3 million.  There's always a chance he'll be a little better than that if you take away the fielding responsibilities.  Plus you get a prospect in return as well.
 
For Philly, they get freed from most - not all, but most - of Howard's contract, and, because they HAVE to play him at 1b which makes him a negative WAR player, just replacing him with an average bench guy is probably going to represent a baseball upgrade as well.  So they have an incentive to do it.
 
I don't think it happens.  But an AL team that needs a DH and has a hitter's park could conceivably take him on if the trade was heavily subsidized.  Which means that Amaro won't do it.
I agree, I don't get this line of thinking at all.
 
First of all, WAR calculations take into account that one is a DH when calculating value. In other words, the fact that a player cannot or does not play defense actually hurts the team as the roster spot could go to someone that can play effective defense. In fact, many teams are starting to adopt the strategy of using the DH role as a rotation spot to rest position players. This is why, if you look at david ortiz, you'll see that he has very low WAR numbers despite hitting 35 percent better than league average (2.4 WAR for 2014). Therefore, one cannot simply look at oWAR to project at DH; one needs to examine the overall defensive value of a DH and adjust WAR for that. In the case of Ryan Howard, his actual fielding components are not horrific (-3.2 UZR/150 over 11,000 innings, -53 DRS, 0.991 FP) to the point where they drive the negative dWAR more than the positional adjustment; he'll actually provide less defensive value as a DH than as a 1B (obviously, an AL team should not employ Ryan Howard as a 1B based on this logic; a different 1B would probably be more valuable than Ryan Howard).
 
Second, one can simply not use WAR and look at this from a common-sense perspective. A DH needs to be a player that can hit, which means a sensible DH should be, at least, a league average hitter. Ryan Howard has a 88,112,93 wRC+ over the past three years, he's had an isolated power of .204,0.199,0.156 over the same span, and strikes out in about 30 percent of his at bats. None of the primarily DH players in the AL had a line that bad in 2014. Over the past three years, there are maybe two-four times that a player has played so poorly at DH.
 
Finally, Citizens Bank Park is typically considered to be a hitter friendly ball park, so I'm not so sure Ryan Howard would benefit moving to an AL park. I'm aware that its BPF has gone down over the past decade, but then again, so has the level of offensive talent on the phiilies.
 

axx

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CoolPapaBellhorn said:
@JeffPassan: The Phillies and Brewers have engaged in serious discussions on a Jonathan Papelbon trade. Story at Yahoo Sports: http://t.co/4ONAnoSEmu
 
Papelbon's overpaid but it's not like he was bad in 2014. 5th in saves, 0.90 WHIP, etc.. I'm assuming this is a straight salary dump, but if it's Paps+money for junk it could be very nice for the Brewers, even if they are forced to eat the option.
 

Snodgrass'Muff

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axx said:
 
Papelbon's overpaid but it's not like he was bad in 2014. 5th in saves, 0.90 WHIP, etc.. I'm assuming this is a straight salary dump, but if it's Paps+money for junk it could be very nice for the Brewers, even if they are forced to eat the option.
 
He's still avoiding walks quite well, but he's not an elite strikeout guy anymore and his velocity was down to 92.01 mph last year. His impressive ERA and FIP were held up by an unsustainable 0.27 HR/9. He's going to regress and he will probably decline some as well. The difference between his 2014 and his 2015 may be fairly severe. It wouldn't surprise me if his ERA jumps up into the mid 3's.
 
That's not terrible for a closer, but it's not good.
 

glennhoffmania

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I read in a couple of places today (too much of a pain to link from my phone at the moment) that Shields' price is tanking. Some people, including Olney I think, were speculating that he may end up settling on something like 3/50.
 

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glennhoffmania said:
I read in a couple of places today (too much of a pain to link from my phone at the moment) that Shields' price is tanking. Some people, including Olney I think, were speculating that he may end up settling on something like 3/50.
If true, the time has come to pounce.  I don't want to go beyond three years with him and $17M AAV seems decent.  About a week ago, I said I'd go as high as 3/$55M in the Beyond Lester thread.  
 

glennhoffmania

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It's hard to believe that none of the bigger market teams are in on this if the price ends up being 4/70.  I don't understand why Boston and NY wouldn't be interested.
 

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YTF said:
Not sure how reliable this is, but since it IS the rumours thread...I was listening to Jay Mohr Sports and it was reported that The Padres seem to be closing in on Shields. The numbers thrown out there were 4/70.
 
Makes sense,since he's from there. SI this morning had a column indicating that he wanted to play for a California team.
 

Plympton91

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E5 Yaz said:
 
Makes sense,since he's from there. SI this morning had a column indicating that he wanted to play for a California team.
Yup. As I said in another thread, Phillips and Hollandsworth on the morning show on MLB Radio have been saying this all winter. He wants a west coast team. Good for him if he's willing to forgo millions to live where he wants.
 

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It sure seems like, absent a big offer from a contending team, Shields is narrowing his market to West Coast teams. I think he ends up taking less from San Diego than he could get elsewhere. Maybe 4/$80 with money being backloaded/deferred.
 

P'tucket rhymes with...

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I look forward to the wailing and teeth gnashing on the main board after Ben mortally screws up and fails to sign a guy who doesn't want to play for the Sox.  And--internal contradiction be damned--the condemnation of Shields for not wanting to play for the Sox.
 

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I heard the Six offered 4/$70M but he was so insulted he broke of negotiations

I think it's hard to overstate the shift to youth; it makes for less exciting off seasons but as the price goes up its going to be harder and harder to get Even a decent return the FA market. People around here sometimes act like past performance guarantees future results way too much. Better to bet on players you reasonably can expect to get better
 

Rasputin

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OCD SS said:
I heard the Six offered 4/$70M but he was so insulted he broke of negotiations

I think it's hard to overstate the shift to youth; it makes for less exciting off seasons but as the price goes up its going to be harder and harder to get Even a decent return the FA market. People around here sometimes act like past performance guarantees future results way too much. Better to bet on players you reasonably can expect to get better
The more teams stay put off the free agent market, the more the prices drop.

Is a new market inefficiency!
 

mauidano

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Rasputin said:
The more teams stay put off the free agent market, the more the prices drop.

Is a new market inefficiency!
Or what did they used to call that? Collusion?
 

MikeM

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P'tucket said:
I look forward to the wailing and teeth gnashing on the main board after Ben mortally screws up and fails to sign a guy who doesn't want to play for the Sox.  And--internal contradiction be damned--the condemnation of Shields for not wanting to play for the Sox.
 
By and large Shields has been speculated more in the form of a consolation prize then anything else this winter. Isolated disappointment pointing out the hole that still exists at the top of our rotation maybe, but i doubt we see much wailing over him beyond the first day of that signing (that will come if/when Lester goes 4-0 in April  :) )
 
Think we are sitting at what, $15m+ over the cap atm? I doubt there were many left realistically expecting a 33 year old Shields to be the type they went out and took a F it stance on. 
 

Rasputin

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mauidano said:
Or what did they used to call that? Collusion?
It's only collusion of they get together and agree not to sign free agents. If a bunch of clubs independently decide that going after thirty year old free agents is bad business, that's not collusion.
 

Wingack

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I don't like Shields towards the end of that deal, but I think he certainly helps make the Padres become a legit ballclub this year and for the next couple.
 

Soxfan in Fla

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Wingack said:
I don't like Shields towards the end of that deal, but I think he certainly helps make the Padres become a legit ballclub this year and for the next couple.
In the NL I think it's more likely those last 2 years aren't bad. I like him at that price. Overpay is very small.
 

Snoop Soxy Dogg

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Moving from Rotation thread-
 
I think Shields did relatively well, this late in the game. Some people here were thinking 3/$50, apparently the Cubs offered something around 3/$60m..The $110m offer had been rumoured, it's not clear that he actually got that offer. The giants' offer was more around 4/$80m according to various reports, and that was at/around the time of the Lester contract. They moved on a long time ago.
 
The Padres are winning the winter, but I'm not convinced all these moves will look that great in 24 months. And if I'm Ruben Amaro, I pray that a Sox pitcher gets injured, and that Hamels does not..
 

glennhoffmania

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I don't see how this is a bad deal for SD.  His contract will end when he's the same age as Lester will be when his ends, or a year younger if Lester's option kicks in.  And the AAV is $6m or $7m less.  I would've loved Boston to sign him to this deal.
 

Rasputin

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glennhoffmania said:
I don't see how this is a bad deal for SD.  His contract will end when he's the same age as Lester will be when his ends, or a year younger if Lester's option kicks in.  And the AAV is $6m or $7m less.  I would've loved Boston to sign him to this deal.
 
I have to think the Sox offered him a little bit more oney and he decided it wasn't enough to lure him away from the west coast.
 

Rasputin

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Rudy Pemberton said:
Why? Is there any indication, at all, that this happened?
 
You mean other than that they were tied to Shields all off season, that he fits a need, that he signed for just a tad more than they offered Lester last Spring, and that pretty much everyone thought he was going to get a better contract than what he got?
 
If so, then no.
 

PrometheusWakefield

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swingin val said:
Shields/Myers trade ends up with both guys going to San Diego. Crazy
They were slammed at the time, but it's hard to argue that the Royals did badly in the trade in retrospect.
 
I wonder how Shields and Myers feel about each other.
 

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Soxfan in Fla said:
In the NL I think it's more likely those last 2 years aren't bad. I like him at that price. Overpay is very small.
unless shields gains more from pitching in the NL (or in SD) than other pitchers, is this really correct? whatever benefit shields gets from pitching in the NL is something that any pitcher the Pads play would get, so they'd still be overpaying for a performance increase over replacement, even if the actual number of runs Shields gives up looks good.
 

MikeM

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Rasputin said:
 
You mean other than that they were tied to Shields all off season, that he fits a need, that he signed for just a tad more than they offered Lester last Spring, and that pretty much everyone thought he was going to get a better contract than what he got?
 
If so, then no.
 
The media ties us to pretty much every major free agent anytime they match up with a need. If in reality we were out there with a legitimate interest and making the better offer then what Shields took from SD, it's a pretty safe bet we'd be hearing about it imo. 
 
Again, he's 33 years old and Ben has already made his moves that left us $15m+ over the LT. Maybe they make a move on a Moncada at this point, but James Shields just was not going to happen. That potential possibility ship had sailed a while back. 
 

Rasputin

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Rudy Pemberton said:
My bad, I guess. I don't recall any rumors that the Sox were in on Shields once they signed Masterson. If they signed him, they'd likely be bumping Kelly to the pen or trading him. Seems unlikely, once they signed Masterson, that they'd be in on another free agent SP.
There is no way on hell the Sox would let Masterson prevent them from signing Shields.

And why are we so sure Kelly gets bumped to the pen? Why not Masterson?