A Tale of Two Sluggers
Over the last two days, two American League teams have had to make decisions about their aging yet productive designated hitters. The Rangers held a $9 million option on Vladimir Guerrero, while the Red Sox had a $12.5 million option on David Ortiz. Boston decided to pay Ortiz, while the Rangers chose to let Guerrero become a free agent. Why the different decisions?
Well, there’s one obvious factor that help explains the different paths Boston and Texas took – the Red Sox just have more money to spend than the Rangers. Boston spent about $100 million more than Texas in 2010, and even with the Rangers having new ownership and the projected revenue gains from a World Series appearance, the two franchises are not operating under the same budget. The Red Sox can afford to pay market value or above to retain players that they want on their team, while the Rangers have to be a bit more choosy.
That said, the Red Sox don’t make a habit out of paying a premium to players just because they can. They let Jason Bay leave when they deemed that his price outstripped his value last winter, and have shown that they are willing to let popular players leave if they believe they can get a better return on their investment by going another direction. That they were willing to pay Ortiz $12.5 million for 2011 shows that they don’t believe that they could have done significantly better at the position for the money.
The Rangers, on the other hand, are willing to take the risk that Guerrero goes elsewhere in order to gain the opportunity to shave a few million off his price tag. Their hope is that the market won’t support a $9 million payday for Vlad in 2011, and they’ll be able to bring him back at a lower figure. That the Red Sox were willing to pay $12.5 million for Ortiz may not help their case much, however.
Ortiz is both better and younger than Guerrero, but not by that much in either case. His .380 wOBA was only marginally better than Guerrero’s .360 mark this year, and even when you adjust for park effects, the difference in offensive value comes out to about one win over the course of the season. In terms of age, they’re only nine months apart.
The big difference between the two seems to be the timing of when they produced during the season. Ortiz was famously horrible in April again, but then went back to being one of the league’s best hitters after that. Guerrero, meanwhile, was a monster during the first half of the season, but fell off dramatically in July and August and then struggled in the playoffs as well. The Red Sox ended the year watching Ortiz hit well, driving his struggles from their recollection. The Rangers spent the last few months watching Guerrero look old, and that is the freshest memory they have of him.
I would imagine if the schedule of their production had been flipped, we might also have seen two different decisions on their options. Even though there’s not much data to support the idea that second half stats are useful in projecting future performance, there is certainly a natural tendency to place more value on the most recent events. In Guerrero’s case, he slumped at the wrong time, and now he’ll have to see what the market is for his services once again.
Dave is the Managing Editor of FanGraphs.
I contest that loyalty IS a factor in this.
Agreed. Pretty hard to compare the loyalty due Jason Bay who was with the team 1 1/2 seasons (or the Rangers’ one season of Vlad) to David Ortiz, an icon from both World Series teams.
Furthermore, the Guerrero option was mutual, and one Jon Daniels claimed was always meant to be denied as a way of deferring $1 mil of salary til 2010.
I don’t think these moves were as identical as they’re made out to be.
What do you suggest the alternative for the Red Sox would be? .380 wOBA’s don’t grow on trees. This move was clearly based on the best available options, not on loyalty. The only way to improve at DH would be to trade for a guy like Prince Fielder, and their talent/money would be better spent elsewhere.
I’d say its a little of both, and add in a premium that they were willing to pay to not have to negotiate a multi-year deal with him.
The Rangers want to move the offensively challenged Michael Young out of third base and into the DH spot, that is why they let Vlad walk. I don’t think they ever planned to keep Vlad longer than a year and I don’t think they plan on re-signing him for 2011.
“defensively” challenged. but they are sticking with Young at third, and will still attempt to sign Vlad.
Michael Young’s ability to play something resembling defense is the reason he’s in the majors. His bat doesn’t play at DH, and Texas surely knows that.
I’m a little surprised to see the assertion that the Rangers and the Red Sox, between them two of the most widely respected as ‘smart’ FOs in baseball, make their decisions based on half a season’s worth of play rather than any sort of analysis.
Most of the thread commentators here can see the flaws in that. I imagine Jon Daniels and Theo Epstein have an even better perspective.
Older players who may any year break down, need to be monitored on a month to month basis, SSS be damned.
Maybe Texas saw something they didn’t like. Or maybe Texas thinks the league saw something teams won’t like. Either way, a DH who looks to be worth about 9 million was denied the option. Maybe he’ll still make 9 million somewhere else.
Vlad was bad in the playoffs even in his prime. But his body has broken down considerably — as we all got a chance to see during his horrific outfield performance in the World Series — and it’s understandable that the Rangers would want to follow Branch Rickey’s dictum that it’s better to get rid of a player a year too early than a year too late. If the Rangers truly felt that Guerrero was worth $9 million on the open market, they could have picked up his option and just traded him elsewhere. The fact that they did not says a lot about their perception of his value.
1 offensive WAR isn’t a big difference over the course of the year? When the players we’re talking about don’t play defense? Am I remembering wrong, or did multiple races come down to the last game this year?
That’s what I was thinking – how is a difference of one WAR, or a WOBA difference of 20 points, now negligible? There are 28 players between them on the wOBA leaderboard – that’s a pretty big difference. Especially for a team (Red Sox) in search of those marginal wins to make the playoffs. By fangraphs own valuation, Ortiz was worth 13 million last year. And since he’s been talking about wanting a multi-year deal, picking up the option assumably shuts him up about it (or he’ll have to complain about a team paying him 12.5 million, which never goes well).
Because there is a large amount of uncertainty whether those numbers accurately show the true talent level of those players. Vlad could well be a better hitter than Ortiz at this point, or he may not. Given that there isn’t a huge difference in their production last year, there is a lot of uncertainty about what that means, we don’t know how each is going to fair in the future, and they’ve been pretty comparable over the last few seasons, it’s probably best to say that they are more or less equal offensive players right now.
Not having the DH open on a team where you have Hamilton is simply an impossibility. Why pay 9 million for a guy that you might want/have to bench at any given time because he simply can no longer field?
If at all possible, they should move Michael Young to the OF and let him and Hamilton split the DH duties.
I’ll add: The Rangers are making a play for Cliff Lee and as Dave mentioned can’t afford to break the bank on multiple players.
The Sox may not have to worry (much) about salary dollars, but they must be very concerned about fading fan appeal. Three popular players who were part of the ’04 team – Ortiz, Varitek, Wakefield – are nearing the ends of their careers; it’s worth going a few million above market for the most viable of these if it gives them a freer hand with the rest of the roster.
Fading fan appeal? From Ortiz, Varitek, and Wakefield? I’m pretty sure having these guys play regularly is causing fading fan appeal, with the non-slumping Ortiz being the exception.
They’ve already been replaced with the new team stars Youkilis, Pedroia, Ellsbury, Lester
Think back a few years: Boston was in love with Nomar, Manny, Pedro… and they went to other teams while they were still loved by Sox fans.. and it didn’t stop anyone from caring about the team
Wakefield only pitched because of injuries to other members of the staff. Varitek was only playing against LHP before he got hurt, and he was hitting them quite well. Ortiz produced AND is a fan favorite so they took his option, partially in order to keep him happy.
Wakefield and Tek still have a small role on the team, but they and the fans understand it.
Ortiz is a much bigger factoring in the Red Sox team marketing than Vlad is in Texas. Besides that you did say:
“even when you adjust for park effects, the difference in offensive value comes out to about one win over the course of the season”.
Isn’t the cost of one WAR around $4M-$4.5M A one WAR difference is nearly perfectly reflected in their price tag, except that a .5 WAR decline for Vlad puts his value just below his option salary, while a .5 WAR decline still makes Ortiz’s deal a slight win for Boston. Combine that minor discrepancy in possible value with what he makes them in T-Shirts and Ad-sales and it is easy to see the difference in valuation for both teams.
I know, think of how much money the Red Sox could save if they didn’t spend so much money to pay better players just to win some more games. Seems like such a waste.
The Rangers never planned to exercise Vlad’s option. At the time they signed him they agreed that they would tack on a $1M buyout instead of paying him an additional million in 2010 – because they couldn’t afford it due to the team’s payroll constrictions. One of many ways Daniels worked around the team sale fiasco.
Vlad was inflated by the Texas launching pad. Jonny Gomes could do better.
hate to spoil the Vlad-dump with some pesky stats, such as his Sept 332/359/521/880… also contributed 4HR and 15 RBI EACH, in both Aug and Sept…
What Vladdie did do is commit to some sort of physical regimen that got his supposedly done legs in very good shape – anyone who was watching him in the last couple of months saw him motoring pretty darn good, 1sts to 3rds and all…
dude did look lost in the outfield, but this is not so different from his FIRST full five MLB years, during which he committed no fewer than 10 errors each year. Difference this year was, he had less than 20 games during the regular season to prepare for his one game, post-season “audition.”
Actually, the data show that 2nd half performance does have some predictive value. Also, Vlad does a poor job of earning walks, which is usually one of the ways that aging sluggers retain their value. Combine those factors with the other factors cited in your article and in the comments, and it’s not surprising that Vlad wasn’t re-signed.
It can be argued that Vlad’s higher contact rates negate his lower walk rates.
Texas will likely still resign Vlad, but at a lower cost. Look it up.
Look it up? Where can I look up such things (today)?