Belt, Giants Avert Risk with Six-Year Extension
Contract extensions during arbitration seasons aren’t terribly common, especially when a player is just two seasons from free agency. Since Elvis Andrus signed his eight year, $120 million extension in 2013, there have been just three contract extensions handed to players who’ve recorded similar service time. One winter ago, Giancarlo Stanton signed his 13 year, $325 million deal. And over the last few months, the San Francisco Giants are the only club to take part in such an agreement. In November, the Giants signed Brandon Crawford to a six-year extension worth $75 million, and this past weekend they doubled down on their infield, signing Brandon Belt to a similar six-year extension for $79 million. While these extensions are uncommon, Belt and the Giants have achieved a reasonable common ground.
Without the new contract, Belt would have been eligible for free agency after the 2017 season heading into his age-30 season. That would have been Belt’s one big chance at a major contract. His new deal with the Giants will pay him $79 million over six years, which includes the roughly $6 million he was already expected to make this season. Now Belt won’t hit free agency until after his age-33 season, likely precluding him from signing a mega-contract given his age.
Signing a huge contract was actually never a certainty for Belt — with or without the present extension. Power pays and Belt has yet to hit more than 18 home runs in a season — although the raw power numbers are mitigated by San Francisco’s AT&T Park. Belt has recorded just 23 of his 64 career home runs at home, and San Francisco’s park factor indicates that it is the toughest park in which to hit home runs by a pretty wide margin. It isn’t that Belt lacks power; indeed, his .185 ISO since 2011 is among the top-third of all batters regardless of park. He has roughly the same amount of extra base hits at home (98) compared to the road (99), but when he is out of San Francisco a lot more balls leave the yard.
After breaking out in 2013 with a .289/.360/.481, a 140 wRC+, and 4.4 WAR, Belt was sidelined with a broken thumb for much of 2014 and it appeared to affect his numbers, even if he still produced a comfortably above-average batting line in just 235 plate appearances. Unlike the rest of his Giants teammates, Belt has excelled in odd years and 2015 was no different. He nearly replicated his 2013 season in 2015, recording a .280/.356/.478 slash line and 135 wRC+ last year. Given the injury in 2014 and the very good production in 2013 and 2015, it might be reasonable to assume that the two better years are more indicative of Belt’s talent level. Projections, nevertheless, are somewhat skeptical.
Belt’s career wRC+ is 128 — and over the past three seasons it is 134 — yet the projections see a 124-125 wRC+ season for Belt in 2016. The walk rate, strikeouts and power numbers are all in line with Belt’s career, but Belt has recorded a very high BABIP, especially in his most successful seasons. For his career, Belt’s BABIP is .339, with marks of .351 in 2012 and 2013 and .363 last season. Both Steamer and ZiPS have projected a .332 BABIP figure for Belt in 2016. For this season’s projections, that marks the difference between merely above-average production and the All-Star levels of the 2013 and 2015 seasons. Belt’s exit velocity was in the top half last season of all hitters, at 90 mph. That’s good, but not an elite. He posted one of the 10-best hard-hit percentages in the majors last year, but that has not been consistent throughout his career.
The elevated BABIP figures could (somewhat paradoxically) be a function of San Francisco’s suppression of home runs. Belt hit 13 homers on the road and just five of them at home. If Belt had record eight more homers at home instead of doubles and triples, his BABIP would have dropped to .347 instead of .363 last year. For this contract to work out for the Giants, Belt does not need to keep his BABIP way up. He needs to be merely average overall when the contract pays him $16 million per year over his four free-agent seasons. The Giants already guaranteed Belt $6.2 million for this season, and the $6 million signing bonus and small salary next season ($2.8 million) are roughly equivalent to his salary in arbitration.
The chart below forecasts a bit into the future to see what kind of production Belt would need to supply in order to justify his salary:
| Year | Age | WAR | $/WAR | Est. Contract |
| 2018 | 30 | 2.5 | $8.8 M | $22.1 M |
| 2019 | 31 | 2.0 | $9.3 M | $18.5 M |
| 2020 | 32 | 1.5 | $9.7 M | $14.6 M |
| 2021 | 33 | 1.0 | $10.0 M | $10.0 M |
| Totals | 7.0 | $65.1 M |
Value: $8M/WAR with 5.0% inflation
Aging Curve: +0.25 WAR/yr (18-27), 0 WAR/yr (28-30),-0.5 WAR/yr (31-37),-0.75 WAR/yr (> 37)
If Brandon Belt is the player he’s projected to be and ages normally over the next few seasons, he just needs to be a 2.5 WAR player at age-30 to justify the extension. Given the reasonable nature of those projections, it’s fair to ask why Belt would forego free agency in exchange for a relatively modest payday. The simple answer is that Belt simply enjoys playing for the Giants. The team locked up Brandon Crawford, Buster Posey, and Madison Bumgarner. They retain control over Joe Panik and Matt Duffy for many more years. Belt received a partial no-trade clause. Staying in a good situation and receiving $70 million in new guarantees might be worth more to Belt than the potential of a $100 million payday in a couple years.
Compared to the more recent contracts for players with their service time, both Belt and Crawford are on the low end:
| Contract Date | Terms | Career WAR | Prior Year WAR | |
| Brandon Belt | 4/9/2016 | 6/$79 M | 11.9 | 4.3 |
| Brandon Crawford | 11/17/2015 | 6/$75 M | 12.4 | 4.7 |
| Giancarlo Stanton | 11/17/2014 | 13/$325 M | 21.1 | 6.2 |
| Elvis Andrus | 4/4/2013 | 8/$120 M | 13.1 | 3.9 |
| Adam Jones | 5/25/2012 | 6/$85.5 M | 7.8 | 2.4 |
| Joey Votto | 4/3/2012 | 10/$225 M | 21.5 | 6.4 |
| Alex Gordon | 3/30/2012 | 4/$50 M | 11.1 | 6.6 |
| Troy Tulowitzki | 11/30/2010 | 10/$157.5 M | 16.0 | 5.6 |
These are the only contracts signed by players to have recorded at least four, but less than five, years of service time over the past five years, according to MLB Trade Rumors. While the contracts to Gordon and Jones were definite successes and Tulowitzki has been a positive overall, it’s possible there was something of a chilling effect after the Andrus contract. There were no contract signed the next season, and the only one from last season (Stanton’s) was in a different stratosphere and not directly comparable.
The Giants have signed two players to reasonable contracts while also buying out a of the few years past those players’ respective primes. The strategy is somewhat rare: most teams buy out the prime free-agent seasons before players reach arbitration. The Giants appear to have found a middle ground, avoiding the really bad tail years of most large free-agent contracts. They’ve locked up core players and managed to avoid both upside and downside. Brandon Belt has no worries about his play declining prior to hitting potential free agency. This is likely the type of deal that will make it seem like Belt made a poor choice after 2017 and the Giants likely made a poor choice four or five years from now. Right now, which is when the parties decide, it’s a reasonable deal with which both sides can be happy.
Craig Edwards can be found on twitter @craigjedwards.
The Giants have the best infield + catcher in baseball, it makes sense that they want to hold on to that unit.
I don’t really understand the reasoning to want to hold onto a specific “unit,” but it does make sense to want to keep good players.
It might help in recruiting and retaining pitchers, especially ground ball pitchers.
Okay, I took the comment to be referring to their overall ability, but I guess if you’re talking about having good all around infield defense there might some advantage – but I’m not really buying that.
What happens when Posey needs to start at 1B regularly in the very near future? Belt and his $79M to the bench?
The assumption in giants circles is that posey will be the regular catcher indefinitely.
Or… perhaps they know that the DH is coming to the NL?
That was my thought. Given this, I wouldn’t be surprised if the Giants are hoping for the DH in the NL.
I’m not joining them in that hope.
Why would the Giants want the DH when their pitchers as a group are the best hitters at that position in baseball?
Where does this notion come from that Posey will have to move full time to 1B anytime soon? I really don’t understand it.
Very near future? Figure it out when the problem comes around & a trade is always a possibility.
He recently turned 29, Russell Martin who recently turned 33 just played 994 innings at Catcher last year to Posey’s 901 (and 924 the year before) Brian McCaan as a 31 year old just logged 1042 innings at catcher. Yadier Molina caught 1149 innings last year as he turned 33. The very near future you mention could easily be 3 to 6 years away.
I will say I don’t remember any of those guys having a broken fibula plus ligament damage. Posey is also the smallest out of all those guys so I don’t know if the long term wear in tear will effect him more or less, but I do think 3 years is more likely than 5.
I’ve generally heard that being smaller is actually better for long-term viability at catcher. The “he’ll have to move away from catcher soon” label has been thrown on a lot of guys without it actually coming to fruition. It seems perfectly reasonable to expect a catcher who is 29 to have plenty of seasons left as a primary catcher. I don’t think the Giants need to worry at all about a problem in 2019. It’ll probably work itself out.
The assumption has been that posey will be the regular catcher indefinitely. There is no talk of moving him regularly to 1b.
Posey is 29 this season. I don’t see any scenario that moves Posey to first base until Posey is ptobably 33-34 years old. That’s 4-5 years from now.
So his games started at 1B increasing from 20 to 40 games over the last 2 years isn’t a cause for speculation? Abusing an amazing hitter for the life of his career ends horribly (see Joe Mauer). Atleast the response of the NL picking up the DH slot is more reasonable than assuming Posey will continue to get more than 120-130 plus games behind the plate, especially when Susac is in the system and is a pretty good catcher in his own right.
Considering that Susac didn’t even make the opening day roster I’d say he has a long way to go before he’s going to convince anyone that him catching + Posey at 1B is a superior configuration to Posey + Belt.
Also Mauer and Biggio aside, most top hitting catchers do actually remain at catcher their entire careers. So there’s really no reason to assume that leaving him at catcher primarily has to end badly.
Posey is an amazing hitter in the same sense that Belt is, if you look at recent healthy seasons Posey in 2015/2014 and Belt in 2015/2013, they’re basically the same guy by wRC+.
It’s certainly fine to prefer Posey as a hitter, since his peak year is better then Belt ever has and he’s had a more recent stretch of health, but they’re not all that far apart in being the same class of hitter. What makes Posey “amazing” is that he’s an excellent catcher, as a first baseman he’s “just” Brandon Belt anyway (probably slightly better as a hitter, likely slightly worse as a fielder).
Additionally, part of the increase of using him more at 1B over the last two years was a combination of concussion/injury problems for Belt in 2014 (why not give him more rest if you have the fill the position anyway) and a poor OF situation for the Giants in 2015, given that they stuck Belt in LF for 96 innings (13 starts).
Buster Posey at catcher: .304/370/475 137wRC+
Buster Posey at 1B: .346/.400/.540 164wRC+
So that Susac+Posey maybe closer to that Posey+belt than you think.
JediHoyer, Posey hits better as a 1B because he gets a lot more of his starts at 1B vs LHP than he does at catcher and because Posey for his career has always killed lefties. If he played at 1B everyday vs. RHP also you wouldn’t see nearly the disparity in those position splits.
@JediHoyer
As pointed out,
Posey vs L 165 wRC+
Posey vs R 132 wRC+
It’s the facing left handed hitters a lot more often at First Base thing (since that’s the most common day for Belt to be off) then it is actually playing first base.
Posey seems to want to keep playing catcher indefinitely and no one including Bochy is going to question this. And he’s a very good defensive catcher. Plus although there were high hopes for Susac after 2014, which might result in him eventually becoming the regular catcher and Posey moving to first, Susac was pretty lousy last year and the Giants chose to have Trevor Brown be the backup catcher on the roster on opening day this year. There has also been talk of Belt moving to left if Posey eventually moves to 1st, especially because the entire Giants outfield is getting up there in years and is goign to need an overhaul in a few years in any case. He actually hasn’t done badly out there, although physically he doesn’t exactly look like a normal outfielder.
ElJimador-Susac is injured. He would be the backup presently except for that, and he will be again very soon.
Susac is injured. He’ll be the backup catcher once he’s better.
Trevor Brown has been doing pretty well, Susac was lousy all last year, and the evidence that he can be good is pretty limited.
Posey played a lot of games at 1B last season because Belt was out for the last month or so with a concussion. Posey was playing 1B for most of September. Otherwise, he was playing catcher a regular amount, and with Belt healthy, he’ll most likely continue to do so.
In terms of quality of contact as measured by ld%+hard%, belt has been #8 in the major leagues since 2013, and he’s #27 in lowest ifflb%. The problem has been that he strikes out too much.
Also, BP in it’s annual said Belt was one of the ten best hitters in the majors according to TrAv.
I’d like to believe that. If you’re going on quality of contact, this is reasonable, but it’s hard to ignore the Ks. To judge from O-swing% and Z-swing%, he has a great eye, so that isn’t the problem. Something seems to happen when he gets two strikes on him, it isn’t clear exactly what but it isn’t good.
Why does the projection of every player always seem to show a decending WAR total in subsequent seasons in a perfectly linear fashion? Ballplayers never perform that way in real ife. Sometimes they have a better season at, say, age 34 than they do at age 31. Can’t projection systems take this into account? Just one example:
Adrian Beltre, WAR
Age 28: 3.8
Age 29: 5.6
Age 30: 3.3
Age 31: 7.8
Age 32: 5.8
Age 33: 7.2
Age 34: 5.6
Age 35: 7.0
Age 36: 5.8
Beltre is all over the map accordign to WAR, not in a linearly descending faashion. Obviously, injuries can mess up a projection but healthy players don’t perform according to a perfectly linear descending line.
Because you can’t accurately project that chaos, you can only model rough trajectories based on accumulated data. The goal isn’t to nail every individual year but rather the overall trend.
Good idea, pick the position player that has aged the best in the post steroid era. Just look at pujols that’s a more typical age curve. Post peak 4 war, then 3.6, then hurt, then 2.9, then 2. Still productive but steady decline. Outliers don’t change what is typical.
For What looks like a great actor that everyone can go down during the war in the next season linear. Games ever made in the production cycle. Sometimes they have a better season, say, 34 years, compared with 31 years ago. This projection system account? Just one example:
Adrian Beltre, rat
28: 3.8 years
29: 5.6 years
30: 3.3 Age
31: 7.8 years
32: 5.8 years
33: 7.2 years
34: 5.6 years
35: 7.0 years
36: 5.8 years
Bergeron is on the map, accordign to war faashion nonlinear reduced. It is obvious that injuries can mess projector, audio players, or do not work in a linear order.