Continuing with our look at the Type B free agents available on the market right now, we will now venture into the land of offense. Eleven eligible free agent hitters were classified as Type B players by Elias this year. We will cover six of them now, and the remaining hitters tonight. The players of interest right now are: Moises Alou, Garret Anderson, Milton Bradley, Luis Gonzalez, Ken Griffey Jr., and Mark Grudzielanek. Bradley is the youngest of the bunch, but that isn’t saying much given his age of 31. This group has also experienced its fair share of injuries and decline.

Last season, their salaries ranged from Gonzo’s $2 mil with the Marlins to Griffey’s $12.5 mil from the 9-yr deal he signed back in 2000. Anderson made a lusty $12 mil as well, while Alou received $8.5 mil for very limited duty and Grudzielanek made $4 mil to play the keystone for the Royals. Bradley produced the best season of these six players and made just $5.25 mil. Suffice it to say, those on the high end of this group will receive lesser contracts while Bradley should see a somewhat significant raise. How do they look for the 2009 season?

Health has been an issue for Alou in recent years, as he has not played 150+ games since the 2004 season with the Cubs. Since then, he has participated in 123, 98, 87, and 15 games respectively. The guy can still rake, as evidenced by wOBA marks exceeding .385 from 2004-07, but his inability to stay on the field vastly reduces his value. If Moises can play around 90 games next season while amassing 300 PA, he could be worth around +0.80 wins.

At fair market value, that amounts to a one-year deal worth $3.7 mil. Unfortunately for Alou, the wide array of corner outfielders on the market this season drives down the price, meaning players like Pat Burrell and Bobby Abreu, who have better health histories and projections, could be had for much cheaper fees than, say, last season.

Garret Anderson has been covered here a couple of times, but he is the lone corner outfielder who actually projects better in the field than as a designated hitter. His defense projects more positively than his offense moving forward which says more for his offensive decline than defensive prowess. Anderson projects to be worth +0.75 wins next season, good for $3.6 mil. Something tells me he will sign somewhere for more than that, but given the amount of available outfielders, his price may legitimately be driven down this far.

Bradley produced a stellar season with the stick in 2008, despite missing some time with injuries. He is somewhat of a conundrum when it comes to the defensive side of valuations. See, Bradley has talent with the glove, as his UZR numbers will show, but it seems that playing the field fuels the injury fire and keeps him off the field and out of the lineup. Regardless, he has by far the sunniest projection for next season, at around +2.9 wins.

This calls for a $13.9 mil salary for a one-year deal. Again, given the amount of outfielders available, as well as the deal Pat Burrell recently signed for (AAV of $8 mil), it isn’t likely that Milton will earn anywhere near that fee. The Cubs have shown the most interest, and a 3-yr/30 mil deal similar to that recently signed by Raul Ibanez may be in the cards. He will have to prove himself capable of staying on the field long enough to play the field before his eventual contract can truly be evaluated.

Next up comes Luis Gonzalez. Gonzo has had a solid career that I will, in no way, try to detract from. However, after a 2008 season in which he actually cost the Marlins money, it is time to hang up the cleats. With a +0.50 win projection and a fair market value of $2.3 mil, not enough upside exists to merit signing him for anything other than veteran leadership and/or backup outfielder/pinch-hitting duty. Teams may be better-served to simply call up a prospect to fill the latter void.

As much as it pains me to say this: Griffey is now virtually a replacement player. He has been awful defensively lately while showing a strong decline with the bat. His representatives are attempting to pin a poor 2008 showing on a persisting injury kept hidden, but he currently projects to just +0.10 wins. Even if his supposed injury hindered his performance, I cannot imagine it bumps his projection up to anything more than +0.50 or +0.60 wins. These figures are still well below average. He is a no-doubt first ballot Hall of Fame player, but unless he is willing to accept a fee of $3 mil or under, not even his leadership will cause the deal to make sense.

Lastly, we have Mark Grudzielanek, who looks like a +1.6 win player in 2009. This would match his 2008 win value, even though his projection calls for around 90 games and 450 PA. He is a half-win below average on offense while playing close to +5 run defense at second base. He made $4 mil in 2008 and has tossed around the idea of retirement, but would be worth near $7 mil at fair market value. While players like Gonzo or Griffey realistically should retire, but likely won’t, Grudzy may be the opposite.

Tonight, we will review the remaining five Type B free agent hitters and come up with our end value rankings. So far, Milton Bradley is far and away the leader, with second place Mark Grudzielanek coming in at about 1.3 wins less valuable.

The Cleveland Indians organization has been busy this off-season with the acquisition of former Cubs infielder Mark DeRosa, as well as serving as the third team in the Seattle-New York (NL) trade of J.J. Putz. Prior to those moves, though, the club added four players to the 40-man roster (Five really, but Jeff Stevens was one of the players used to acquire DeRosa). The organization added right-hander Hector Rondon, outfielder Trevor Crowe, and catchers Carlos Santana and Chris Gimenez.

Rondon, 20, is on the fast-track to Cleveland. Prior to the 2008 season, his name was not even mentioned amongst the club’s top prospects. He just made Baseball America’s Top 30 Prospects List for the organization last year, coming in at No. 28. The 2009 handbook is not out yet, but you can bet Rondon is going to be listed a lot higher this season. In 145 High-A innings, the right-hander allowed just 130 hits and posted rates of 2.61 BB/9 and 9.00 K/9. He also allowed just 12 home runs (0.74 HR/9). His repertoire includes an 89-93 mph fastball, a developing curveball and a change-up. Rondon will be 21 when the 2009 season begins and he will also be in Double-A, not far from a Major League call-up.

Crowe has had an up-and-down minor league career and was considered one of Cleveland’s top prospects after the 2006 season. After stealing 45 bases that season, the 14th overall pick in the 2005 draft stole just 18 in 2008 while battling injuries. He also has not developed much in-game power and his batting average has fluctuated: .329 in High-A ball in 2006, .234 in Double-A in 2006, .259 in Double-A in 2007, .323 in Double-A in 2008, and .274 in Triple-A in 2008. With Grady Sizemore in center-field for Cleveland, Crowe’s only shot at playing everyday is at a corner spot and he lacks the offensive potential for such a position.

Santana was obtained last season from the Dodgers in the Casey Blake trade and instantly became Cleveland’s catcher of the future. He could eventually force Victor Martinez to first base full-time and Kelly Shoppach back to the second string catcher’s role. In 2008, split between High-A and Double-A, he hit more than 20 home runs, batted above .300 and walked more than he struck out. Did I mention he scored 125 runs and drove in 117? At this point the switch-hitter’s offensive game is pretty solid but he needs to focus on his defence behind the dish, having begun his career in the outfield and at third base.

Gimenez has the lowest ceiling of the bunch. The now 26-year-old began the 2008 season in Double-A and hit .339/.489/.537 with an ISO of .198 in 177 at-bats. He then moved up to Triple-A and hit .272/.349/.374 with an ISO of .103 in 195 at-bats. Gimenez also posted rates of 10.6 BB% and 30.8 K% at Triple-A. His true value comes from his versatility. Along with catching, he can also play at third base, first base and in the outfield.

Before moving on, I wanted to do one more post on the Win Value series we covered last week, emphasizing a few points that may have got lost in the shuffle. While we think these win value stats are a tremendous addition to the site and should be extremely useful, we also want to maintain integrity in how we talk about them and the ways they are used. So, with that said, here’s some things to keep in mind.

All catchers are assumed to be average defensively.

This is obviously not true, but in terms of quantifying catcher defense, we’re just not there yet. We have a pretty good idea that most major league catchers fall somewhere between -10 runs and +10 runs, based on their ability to block balls in the dirt, control the running game, and so forth. So, as a general guideline, if you think the catcher is awful defensively (maybe Ryan Doumit is a good example), knock one win off. If you think he’s just below average (Ramon Hernandez?), knock off half a win. If you think he’s above average (Kurt Suzuki?), add half a win. if you think he’s outstanding (Joe Mauer?), add a full win.

There are a few things not included.

The only aspect of baserunning that is currently included is SB/CS. Throwing arms and turning double plays are currently not included in the fielding evaluations. In general, no one’s going to be more than +5 or -5 in these minor areas, but for guys at the extremes, it could be half a win or so.

We’re measuring past performance, not necessarily true talent level.

Just because Jayson Werth put up a +5 win season in 2008 does not mean that we’re saying he is a +5 win player. It is pretty common for people to play above or below their actual level of abilities. Don’t get too wrapped up over a single season performance.

The leagues are not necessarily even in talent level in every year.

For recent years, there’s a good bit of evidence that the AL has been better than the NL. It may even be slightly more accurate to use league specific replacement level adjustments, especially for the ’05-’07 time period. We’ll work on trying to quantify the differences in leagues going all the way back to ’02 so that we could potentially include the league differences later on.

The dollars to win adjustments aren’t super easy to calculate.

Reasonable people can differ on what the market value of a marginal win was in different years. I think my methods work pretty well, but they aren’t perfect. The margin for error is probably around $500,000 in each direction for recent years.

Most importantly, we’re not claiming decimal point accuracy with these win values.

If someone is listed at 4.8 wins, and someone else is listed at 4.3 wins, there could be enough mitigating factors that the lower win value player was actually more valuable. When the differences are less than one win, don’t be dogmatic about your conclusions. I generally use whole number win values anyway, and I think we’re best served saying that we’re aware of some of the things we haven’t covered yet, and that there’s some wiggle room in the numbers.

Make no mistake – I think these are the best single value metric for evaluating a player on the internet today. I’d use a player’s Win Value number to describe his total performance before I used anything else. But we’re not saying they’re perfect or that they can’t be improved upon. We’ll keep working on getting better data, figuring things out, and making them even more accurate in the future. Right now, they’re great. Hopefully, by this time next year, they’re even better.

The biggest loser at the hands of an over-saturated designated hitter market is none other than the Big Hurt himself, Frank Thomas. 40-years-old and finally removed from a nightmarish 2008 season, Thomas is recovering from a right quad strain that kept him out for the majority of the second half. Eric covered the corner outfield/DH types not too long ago, so how does Thomas stack up?

Last season was hardly the first time Thomas’ right quadriceps caused a stir. The same injury cost him a few weeks in 2006, which just so happens to be the renaissance of Thomas’ career. Recall that Thomas was in his first season with the Oakland Athletics on a contract suitable more for Charles Thomas than Frank. Not only did Thomas out earn his contract by 12 million, but he also earned himself a multiple year contract with the Toronto Blue Jays, where again he would hit well enough to be worth eight-figures. Thomas and the Jays would have a falling out in early 2008, leading to his termination and return to the place of revival.

As an Athletic, Thomas saw his on-base percentage jump to .364, but still lacked the power that made him synonymous with homeruns in the 1990’s. As mentioned, Thomas’ quad would end his season early, but he still found a way to be worth positive value in 2008, finishing at 0.4 wins, or roughly 1.9 million.

Statistically, Thomas was fine. His line drive rates were in line with expectations, along with his batting average on balls in play, and walk rates. A slight increase in strikeout rates certainly was not to blame for his power collapse, so what gives? Thomas’ HR/FB percentage again declined, a trend that dates back to 2006. Down to 7.9%, Thomas would only hit eight homeruns, half of his total extra base hits.

Moving forward, the question is whether Thomas power was sapped due to his quad injury, or if this collapse is for real. It’s worth noting that this was the second worst offensive season of Thomas career behind 2001 which was also derailed by injuries. If teams feel comfortable placing the troubles on the big man’s right leg, which passes the logic test – Thomas leg-drive certainly plays a role in generating bat speed and power – Thomas can make a decent low-cost designated hitter option, capable of outplaying his paycheck.

I just finished a fairly large minor league stats update. A number of standard statistics have been added such as IBB, SF, SH, etc… so any stats that should have included those now actually do include them. This will mainly effect things like all the wOBA stats.

Things you can look forward to in the coming months and next season are minor league game logs, improved leaderboards, batted ball data (LD/FB/GB), and the addition of the Dominican, Venezuelan and Mexican leagues.

All of the minor league player-ids have also been updated, but you shouldn’t notice anything different on your end. If you do see any problems please let me know.

Yesterday we took a look at the five Type B free agent starting pitchers currently on the market: Paul Byrd, Jon Garland, Braden Looper, John Smoltz, and Randy Wolf. Today we will venture into the land of Type B relievers. What is a Type B free agent, though? Simply put, the top 20% at each position garner the Type A classification, and the next 20% become Type B players.

The rankings are determined by a specific formula implemented by Elias and an example of the end results can be found here. When a Type B free agent is signed, the team losing said player earns a supplemental draft pick. Unlike Type A free agents, however, the signing team does not have to surrender any picks. If a team does not offer its own pending Type B free agents arbitration, they will not earn any supplemental picks upon the departure of the free agent. This, as mentioned yesterday, happened with Smoltz.

Right now, six relievers on the market are classified as Type B players: Luis Ayala, Joe Beimel, Eric Gagne, Jason Isringhausen, Dennys Reyes, and Brian Shouse. To determine their fair market values, the formula introduced by TangoTiger and used most recently in Matt’s analysis of Brian Fuentes comes into play:

A: (RA + LeagRA) ^ 0.28
B: (LeagRA/RA) ^ A
Win%: B/(B+1)

After probing various projection sources to determine the RA numbers for these six pitchers, the results can be seen below:

NAME                  IP      RA
Luis Ayala            72     4.36
Joe Beimel            54     4.02
Eric Gagne            53     4.15
Jason Isringhausen    47     4.21
Dennys Reyes          51     4.08
Brian Shouse          53     4.08

Plugging the numbers above into the formula, assuming a replacement percentage of .451, as well as incorporating the leverage of innings pitched into the equation, here are the WAR results:

NAME                 WIN%     WAR
Luis Ayala          .514     +0.60
Joe Beimel          .550     +0.65
Eric Gagne          .536     +0.55
Jason Isringhausen  .529     +0.74
Dennys Reyes        .544     +0.62
Brian Shouse        .544     +0.60

And, with the going rate between $4.7-$5 mil per win, here are their fair market values as well as salaries earned in 2008:

NAME                2009 FMV   2008 SAL
Luis Ayala          $2.8 mil   $1.7 mil
Joe Beimel          $3.1 mil   $1.925 mil
Eric Gagne          $2.7 mil   $10 mil
Jason Isringhausen  $3.5 mil   $8 mil
Dennys Reyes        $3.0 mil   $1 mil
Brian Shouse        $2.8 mil   $2 mil

Relievers generally are not worth too many wins due to the small samples of performance, but all six of these pitchers project to be better than a half-win above replacement. Ayala is a workhorse, which makes him almost as valuable as the others despite the lowest winning percentage. He, Beimel, and Reyes are all 31 years old, the youngest of the group.

Gagne follows at 33 years old, but should not earn anywhere near the $10 mil Milwaukee signed him for prior to last season. Izzy is 36 and coming off of a poor, injury-plagued season. The projections see him bouncing back a bit, but his days as a dominant force are likely behind him. Shouse, a lefty specialist in every sense of the term, is 40, but still adds value. Much of the bullpen talk this offseason has centered around the closers like K-Rod and Fuentes, but here are six relievers that could be had on the cheap while strengthening a bullpen and not costing their new teams a draft pick.

Ryan Howard is overrated by the general public and media, one only has to look at the 2008 Most Valuable Player Award voting compared against his actual value and performance this past season to see that.

Much ruckus was raised last winter when Ryan Howard went from a club dictated salary of less than $1 million to an arbitration-awarded $10 million. There were calls that this was an insane leap and would do much to upset the balance of the market for future and current players.

Ryan Howard has a down year in 2008. He lost about ten runs off his offensive totals from 2007, which was down a little less than 30 runs from his peak in 2006. That would seem to be a recipe for an under performance on the whole.

If you buy the park adjustments and UZR as adequate measures, than Ryan Howard put forth about $15 million in value during the 2008 season, for which he was paid $10 million. In other words, Ryan Howard was the prototypical player to be over rated (heavy on power offense and short on position and defense), he was coming off a record arbitration award and he had a down season. All that and he was still only paid at about two-third of his worth.

This is not to say that a long-term contract for Howard would be a good idea; the Phillies have an incredible opportunity thanks to Howard’s advanced age at premier to squeeze most, if not all, of his fruitful years out while under team control and then let him become some poorly-run team’s mistake during his mid 30s. This is, however, to provide yet another illustration of just how valuable getting team-controlled players is.

Ryan Howard is about to embark on his second arbitration experience and buoyed not by performance, but by hype this time, he might engineer another extraordinary raise. But with his performance projected to return back to 2007 levels, there’s still a good chance that Howard will remain a net asset for the Phillies.

The Chicago Cubs recently traded infield veteran Mark DeRosa to the Cleveland Indians for a trio of pitching prospects. The transaction was more about clearing salary room ($5.5 million) for the National League squad than it was about acquiring said prospects. The money saved by the Cubs could possible allow the organization to acquire free agent outfielder Milton Bradley or reopen trade negotiations with San Diego for starting pitcher Jake Peavy.

All three players – Jeff Stevens, John Gaub, and Chris Archer – are interesting but none of them are future impact players and they all appeared destined for roles in Major League bullpens. It was suggested in one Internet report that some or all of the above prospects could be used to help snag Peavy from San Diego but none of the prospects would be key players in a deal for a pitcher of his caliber.

Stevens is currently the closest to being Major League ready. He spent last season in both Double-A and Triple-A. Combined, Stevens allowed 38 hits in 59.2 innings of work and posted rates of 4.02 BB/9 and 12.22 K/9. His flyball tendencies resulted in a ground ball rate of 39.2%. He was originally selected by the Cincinnati Reds in the sixth round of the 2005 draft out of Loyola Marymount University. Stevens was traded to Cleveland as part of the Brandon Phillips (robbery) deal. He throws an 89-94 mph fastball, curveball and change-up.

Shoulder surgery in college robbed Gaub of a few million dollars. The southpaw was touching 96 mph in college before injuring his arm and he now operates in the 87-91 mph range with his fastball. He also utilizes a slider and an occasional change-up. The Indians grabbed him in the 21st round of the 2006 draft out of the University of Minnesota. Last season, as a 23-year-old in A-ball, he allowed just 44 hits in 64 innings and posted rates of 4.50 BB/9 and 14.06 K/9. The strikeouts are eye-catching, but the control issues are worrisome. If he can harness his stuff, Gaub could move quickly in 2009… but that is a big if at his point.

Only 20 years old, Archer has a little more time to develop than his trade mates. He allowed just 92 hits in 115.1 A-ball innings in 2008 but it may have been partly due to the fact that he could not find the plate to give the batters a chance. Archer’s aim is not nearly as impressive as his surname suggests as he walked 84 batters, good for a rate of 6.55 BB/9. His strikeout rate was 8.27 K/9. His repertoire includes an 88-92 mph fastball, curveball and change-up.

Stevens could easily surface in Chicago in 2009 if injuries strike the Major League bullpen but Gaub and Archer will not set foot on a Major League mound in the Windy City until 2010 or 2011.

Over the first five parts of this series, we’ve discussed all the components of what makes up a Win Value. Today, we tackle the conversion of that win value into a dollar value.

First off, a little background. Since we’ve set replacement level at around a .300 win% (or 48 wins per team), that means that there are about 1,000 marginal wins in a major league season. All 30 teams are fighting over these 1,000 wins, each trying to get more than 45 or so to get them in the playoffs.

Every dime a major league team spends above the major league minimum is theoretically spent in an effort to buy as many of those 1,000 wins as possible. A major league team’s minimum payroll is about $12 million, so MLB as a whole has a floor of $360 million in salary per season. Total payroll for MLB teams in 2008 was reported at $2.67 billion. That means that major league teams spent $2.31 billion to try to buy their share of those 1,000 marginal wins. Basic division tells us that the cost of a win in MLB salary was $2.31 million per win for 2008.

However, a huge share of those wins were created by players whose salaries were not determined by a free market system. Every player with zero to six years of service time had an artificially depressed salary due to not being able to qualify for free agency. As well, most players who signed long term contracts that bought out some of their arbitration and free agent years had salaries below market value as well – they had traded some potential cash for the security of a deal several years ago. The amount of money that teams are paying per win for their cost controlled players is far less than the $2.31 million league average.

So, the market of wins available for purchase doesn’t total 1,000. A significant batch of MLB players simply aren’t available for acquisition at any given time. The Cardinals aren’t trading Albert Pujols. The Mariners aren’t trading Felix Hernandez. The Rays aren’t trading Evan Longoria. The wins that these players generate are not for sale.

Who is available? Obviously, players who qualify for free agency in a given season are available. Also, there are players traded from one club to another, so those players are also available for the right price. But what is the right price?

In general, we can say that the market price of a win is the mean of the dollars per win handed out to free agents in any given year. If you approached CC Sabathia this winter and offered him $12.65 million because he was a 5.5 win pitcher and the league average cost per win is $2.3 million, you wouldn’t have gotten very far. If you want to compete in the market for available wins, you have to know what the going rate for a win is, and the easiest way to calculate that is to look at the free agent market. Let’s look back at 2007, for instance.

90 free agents signed major league contracts last winter, ranging from Alex’s Rodriguez $275 million deal to Josh Towers‘ $400,000 contract with the Rockies. The sum of those 90 contracts paid out $396 million in 2008. To figure out what the average cost per win of a 2007 free agent was, though, we need to know how many wins that group was worth.

To calculate this, I did a three year weighted average of their win values, then multiplied that value by .95 to factor in aging and estimate what teams considered considered a player’s true talent win rate for 2008. In total, I came up with 88 wins, or $4.5 million per win. That’s what major league teams were paying for a marginal win last winter, so for 2008, that’s a players dollar per win value as listed on the site. I re-did this for all years going back to 2002, and the dollars per win for each are as follows:

2002 – $2.6m / win
2003 – $2.8m / win
2004 – $3.1m / win
2005 – $3.4m / win
2006 – $3.7m / win
2007 – $4.1m / win
2008 – $4.5m / win

Now, I know there’s some sentiment that teams don’t pay for wins linearly, because a six win player is worth more than three two win players. While I agree with this in theory, major league teams just don’t operate this way. If you just look at the dollar per win costs for the multi-year contracts handed out to hitters last year, the cost per win was $4.3 million for guys with an average win value of 4.4 wins per player. Alex Rodriguez signed for about $3.8 million per win last year. Teams just don’t pay exponentially more for higher win value players than they do for average and below players. You could argue that they should (and I would probably agree), but they don’t. The dollar per win scale is linear.

This afternoon, we’ll look at the opportunities that are presented to teams due the linear nature of dollar per win, and how the smart teams are exploiting this to their advantage.

Well, it is officially 2009, meaning pitchers and catchers report in less than two months. This offseason has seen CC Sabathia and A.J. Burnett sign extremely lucrative deals with the Yankees, Javier Vazquez shipped to the Braves, and negotiations begun on a deal between Derek Lowe and the Mets. As obvious as it may sound, starting pitching is very importance to the success of a team, and these teams have made great strides to strengthen their respective staffs.

There are several other options available on the free agent market, though, that would not require long-commitment/big-money contracts. Doubly important, their classification as Type B free agents means that the teams they eventually sign with do not have to surrender a first-round draft pick next season. As of right now, there are five such pitchers on the market: Paul Byrd, Jon Garland, Braden Looper, John Smoltz, and Randy Wolf.

Byrd is 38 years old and coming off of a relative down season spent with both the Indians and Red Sox. It did not seem to make much sense when the Red Sox acquired him last season and it won’t make much sense if he signs anything other than a 1-yr deal with little monetary investment. Byrd projects to log 175 innings with a 4.78 FIP next season. These numbers make him worth +1.2 wins. This below average projection pegs his fair market value at around $6 mil. If a team finds itself needing some veteran experience in the rotation, it could do worse than Byrd, but anything over 1-yr/$6 mil is really overvaluing his potential contribution.

Garland, 29, happens to be the youngest of this quintet. He has also been one of the more overrated pitchers in recent history. Garland has shown himself to be very durable, but his combination of good, not great, ERA figures with 200+ innings pitched has hidden his poor controllable skills. Next season, Garland projects to 184 innings at a 4.58 FIP. This makes him a +1.7 win pitcher, just slightly better than Byrd, and nine years junior. Jon is coming off of two consecutive seasons during which his salary exceeded $10 mil. At +1.5 wins, his fair market value is $8.5 mil. I can definitely see Garland signing a 3-yr deal somewhere, but fear that the signing team will pay much more than this fair market value. In fact, I would not be surprised if Garland signs a 3-yr/$36 mil deal similar to the one currently offered to Derek Lowe.

Next up is Braden Looper, of whom I wrote about not too long ago. Though Looper is 34 years old, I am very surprised his name is not being tossed around that much. His projections are sunnier than Garland and in the same vicinity as other pitchers making substantially more money. He also projects to 184 innings next season, but with a 4.42 FIP, deeming his value at +1.9 wins. Braden’s fair market value would then be $9.5 mil. A team looking for a safe bet to fill out the back end of their rotation would do themselves wise to sign Braden to a 2-yr/$18 mil deal.

John Smoltz, 41, is the elder statesman of the group as well as the most curious case. From 2005-2007, he easily surpassed the 200-innings plateau. Last year, however, injuries sidelined him for the majority of the season. Marcel has him pegged for 94 innings at a 3.50 FIP, numbers that fall vastly above or below his marks from the previous three seasons. Under this scenario, Smoltz would still be worth +2 wins. A more optimistic projection would see Smoltz pitch 190 innings with a 3.35 FIP, deeming him closer to +4 wins. Ideally, Smoltz would return for the Braves for one more season before hanging up his glove. Smoltz could be worth anywhere from $10-$20 mil next season, but he definitely has the potential to be the best of this group, even at 41 years of age.

Lastly, we have Randy Wolf, who has been linked to a slew of teams, including the Mets. The former all-star has seen his fair share of injuries over the last several seasons, but projects to log around 180 innings with a 4.40 FIP. These numbers, very similar to those projected for Looper, place Wolf around +2 wins, $10 mil. At 32 years old, a 3-yr deal would not be in the realm of absurdity, but his injury history may make him risky to some front offices. Whoever inks Wolf to a deal should include an option and performance bonuses to protect themselves if he should find himself on the familiar disabled list.

Later on tonight, we will look at the Type B relievers on the market.