The Dodgers kicked off their activities at the Winter Meetings by scooping up another veteran pitcher for their rotation. This time, it was another former NL Central tosser, as Los Angeles signed Aaron Harang to a two-year contract on Monday. The terms for the 33-year-old right-hander have not been released yet, but it is thought that the deal will be backloaded — similar to Chris Capuano’s contract, which was signed last week.
The Dodgers have been very busy this offseason, signing Juan Rivera, Matt Treanor, Mark Ellis and Adam Kennedy to free agent contracts. The team also negotiated a mammoth eight-year extension with centerfielder Matt Kemp. In spite of their increased activity, some questions remained around the diamond, one of which centered on the return of Hiroki Kuroda.
That question was seemingly answered on Friday when the Dodgers signed southpaw starter Chris Capuano to a two-year deal worth at least $10 million. With Clayton Kershaw, Chad Billingsley and Ted Lilly occupying spots in the rotation, and the team interested in using rookie Nathan Eovaldi in another spot, the addition of Capuano realistically completes the rotation. Kuroda looks like the odd man out, and whether that has more to do with his contractual demands, desire to play elsewhere (the Angels or back in Japan), or retirement considerations, assessments of Capuano’s deal should factor in, to an extent, the opportunity cost of losing Kuroda.
Every year it seems we hear about a former position player trying to transition to the mound in order to save his professional career.
Two years ago, it was Tony Pena Jr. with the Royals who moved from a light-hitting shortstop to reliever. In 2010, Sergio Santos of the Chicago White Sox grabbed headlines after making the big leagues as a shutdown reliever after struggling for a better part of a decade as a shortstop. Trevor Hoffman also failed as a shortstop before trying his luck as a pitcher. Carlos Marmol played two years as a catcher and outfielder for the Cubs before stepping foot on the mound for good.
It’s not uncommon. One can set foot in a big league bullpen and likely find a former position player lurking in that group — a player that just couldn’t cut it as a professional ballplayer at their respective positions — but the organization saw a special arm they wanted an opportunity to refine on the mound.
In 2011, the position-player-turned-reliever that firmly burst onto the scene was right-hander Kenley Jansen of the Los Angeles Dodgers.
The race between Ryan Braun and Matt Kemp for National League MVP is so very close. Most analysts lean toward Kemp: he played 11 more games, hit six more home runs, stole seven more bases and ended the season with a higher WAR (8.7 vs. 7.8 for Braun).
Let me tell you why Ryan Braun should be the MVP.
The awards season will wrap up when the National League Most Valuable Player is announced a little later this afternoon, and I think this race is a little more open than its AL counterpart. The Brewers have a pair of candidates, the Phillies have a pair of candidates, and the Dodgers have a pair of candidates as well. Clayton Kershaw already took home the Cy Young Award and doesn’t have the same kind of MVP buzz that Justin Verlander did, but he’s not even the best MVP candidate on his own club. That’s the new $160 million man, Matt Kemp.
In terms of our version of WAR, the trademark stat here at FanGraphs, Kemp was the most valuable player in the National League this season and by a not small margin either. His performance was worth 8.7 wins, a half-win ahead of Roy Halladay (8.2) and nearly a full win ahead of Ryan Braun (7.8). No other players in the Senior Circuit eclipsed the seven-win plateau. WAR is far from perfect and it’s not designed to end arguments; in fact it’s much more effective at starting them. So even though Kemp was pretty well separated from the pack in terms of wins over replacement, let’s further reinforce his candidacy for the MVP Award.
Clayton Kershaw received 27 of the 32 first place votes in the 2011 NL Cy Young Award balloting en route to his first major league award. He beat out all three of the Phillies horses — Roy Halladay finished second, with Cliff Lee third and Cole Hamels fifth — and Ian Kennedy to officially go down in the book as the best the National League had to offer this past season. But that isn’t necessarily true, and his case isn’t as shut and dry as all those first place votes make it seem.
It’s plausible to suggest that Roy Halladay and Cliff Lee were, at worst, Kershaw’s equals, and more likely than that his superiors. His winning the award is in no way a mockery, like it was when Bartolo Colon beat Johan in 2005, but it does feel like somewhat of a step back in the voting process. After Felix Hernandez won his award it sure seemed the voting body grasped that team context is important when evaluating players.
His wins total wasn’t up to par with traditional candidates, but voters understood that the Mariners offense was out of Felix’s control. He wasn’t penalized for perceived poor performance in a common performance indicator.
In the case of Kershaw v. Halladay v. Lee, a similar understanding wasn’t extended to strength of schedule and park effects. Kershaw deserves hearty congratulations, but his Cy Young Award win again illustrates the importance and utility of normalizing numbers. When adjusted numbers enter the fray, Lee emerges as a very viable candidate. Halladay steps forward as the best pitcher in the league, and by a long-shot. In our staff awards ballot, I did vote for Kershaw, but my stance has since changed. No matter how one chooses to slice it — unless they like slicing “it” incorrectly — Halladay was the best pitcher in the senior circuit this past season.
Clayton Kershaw has been one of the most hyped up young pitchers in the league since he made his debut as a 20-year-old in 2008. In 2011, he made that next step toward becoming one of the league’s true aces. With 21 victories, 248 strikeouts, a stellar 62 ERA-, a 2.47 FIP, 6.8 WAR — whichever way you slice it, Kershaw was an elite pitcher in 2011 and truly deserving of recognition, regardless of age. The fact that he has accomplished so much by age 23 is phenomenal.
At age 23, Roy Halladay was setting the MLB record for the highest ERA in a season, posting a 10.64 ERA in 67.2 innings with the Toronto Blue Jays. So much has changed since then, of course, with Halladay bringing in two Cy Young Awards over the past 10 years. This season marks Halladay’s second runner-up finish. If not for Kershaw taking home the pitching Triple Crown (leading in wins, strikeouts, and ERA), one could have imagined a closer vote.
The Dodgers have somewhat surprisingly been the most active team so far this offseason, signing Juan Rivera and Mark Ellis as free agents while shelling out huge bucks to retain Matt Kemp long-term. They added another free agent earlier this week, signing catcher Matt Treanor to a one-year contract worth a guaranteed $1 million. There’s also a club option for 2013.
The 35-year-old backstop spent last season with the Royals and Rangers, mustering an 82 wRC+ in 242 plate appearances, both numbers representing the second highest totals of his career. Treanor did shatter his previous career highs in walks and walk rate, drawing 34 free passes (none intentional) for a 14.0% rate. From 2004-2010, the first seven years of his career, he walked in just 8.9% of his plate appearances. Treanor nearly doubled his career walk rate in 2011 by simply not swinging the bat; he went from offering at 50.9% of the pitches he saw in 2009 to just 40.9% this year. Part of that may be explained by batting eighth ahead of the punchless Alcides Escobar for most of the season, but Treanor may have decided he just wasn’t a good hitter, so he wasn’t going to swing unless he absolutely had too.
The Dodgers, in the midst of a difficult transition period and sale, may have trouble getting approval to sign a big-ticket free agent. That doesn’t mean they can’t affect change in the free agent market place. As the team engages their 27-year-old once-maligned center fielder in extension discussions, they might be preparing do just that. Will the rumored numbers that will keep Matt Kemp off the market — eight years, $160 million — count as an asset for the team in the future?
Earlier this week I posted about the best bunts of 2011. Taking some of the comments to that post into consideration, the obvious follow-up is the worst bunts of the 2011 season according to Win Probability Added (WPA).