Archive for Yankees

I was on vacation last week, so in my absence, Jeff Sullivan handled the write-ups relating to Masahiro Tanaka signing with the Yankees. When the news broke on Wednesday, he wrote a couple of posts about it, and in typical Jeff Sullivan fashion, the second post was explicitly “not an evaluation of the Masahiro Tanaka contract.” Jeff’s takes are smart and nuanced, and you should read them, but I also think the Tanaka contract is worth an evaluation, especially because it is so different from most free agent contracts.

In general, most free agent deals are not that difficult to evaluate. The majority of free agents are already on the downside of their career, so there’s a tension in the negotiations between the player trying to get as many years as possible and the team trying to limit their obligations to an aging player who is expected to be get worse in every subsequent season. In recent years, it seems that negotiations have mostly shifted away from bidding in annual average value into almost entirely bidding on years, where the signing team is the one who guarantees one year more than the rest of the bidders. Negotiations for free agents can be pretty accurately described as a push and pull between teams and players over the number of guaranteed years the player is going to receive, with most everything else being secondary to that agreement.

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So we know, now. It always looked like Masahiro Tanaka would get six or seven years, and an average annual value a little north of $20 million. There was little to guess about, with regard to his contract. The question was which team would end up being able to give it to him, and now we know that team is the Yankees, who seemed like the favorites from the beginning. After all the rumors, after all the drama, after all the dead nothing in between, Tanaka went to the more or less predictable place for the more or less predictable commitment. As soon as the changes to the posting system were put in place, it was obvious that Tanaka would end up getting free-agent money.

Whenever something big goes down, people want to read about it, because they want to know what it means. Was it smart, or was it not smart? What does this mean for the team, now? What does this mean for the team down the road? What does this mean for the rest of the teams? Basically, what are the implications of the news? One here is that we know where Tanaka is going. Another one here is that the rest of the market should spring back to life. But as far as an evaluation of the deal is concerned, unfortunately that’s next to impossible. So an evaluation isn’t what follows.

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The annoying thing about Masahiro Tanaka’s signing window was that we knew nothing would happen until the very end of it. The convenient thing about Masahiro Tanaka’s signing window was that we knew there was a designated, set-in-stone end of it, so it’s not like things could drag on forever. This put Tanaka in a unique position, and in the end, he didn’t wait until the very last minute to make a choice — with a few days to spare, Tanaka’s elected to sign with the Yankees, for seven years and $155 million.

Also, there is an opt-out clause after the fourth year. Also, there is the matter of the $20 million posting fee. Put the numbers together and it’s a commitment similar to the one the Tigers made to Justin Verlander and that the Mariners made to Felix Hernandez, and while you can’t just add the posting fee to the salary total like that, and while the opt-out clause has its own value, and while some extra time has passed, and while this is the Yankees, and while those other guys weren’t free agents, it’s clear that Tanaka isn’t expected to contribute a serviceable 33 starts. Regardless of the fact that this is Yankees money, the expectation is that Tanaka will pitch like an ace. At least, like he’ll pitch like a good No. 2.

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The suspension portion of the Alex Rodriguez Legal Battle Royale Season One has finally been resolved. The Yankees and the writers who analyze them can officially remove the A-Rod variable. Yesterday, arbitrator Frederic Horowitz released his decision that Rodriguez’s suspension would be reduced from 211 games to 162 games. While Rodriguez benefits in the decision, it’s quite a bit less than he anticipated. A-Rod will appeal to federal courts, but as Wendy Thurm noted in her article yesterday:

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After having typically appeared in the entirely venerable pages of Baseball Think Factory, Dan Szymborski’s ZiPS projections were released at FanGraphs last year. The exercise continues this offseason. Below are the projections for the New York Yankees. Szymborski can be found at ESPN and on Twitter at @DSzymborski.

Other Projections: Atlanta / Baltimore / Boston / Cleveland / Minnesota / Philadelphia / San Diego / St. Louis.

Batters
It’s the ambition of the author, in the composition of these ZiPS posts, first to do no harm. For that reason, I’ll abstain from a prolonged discussion of Alex Rodriguez and/or The Alex Rodriguez Saga. The present state of affairs — at least with regard to how it affects the New York Yankees — appears to be thus:

1. Alex Rodriguez is appealing a very long suspension currently; and

2. The Yankees have signed Kelly Johnson; and

3. The Yankees, more recently, have signed Brian Roberts.

That’s three infielders, two of them injury-prone, for two positions. Johnson and Rodriguez are about equally valuable on a rate basis according to ZiPS, it looks like, while Roberts is closer to replacement level. That is all we will speak of that, for the moment.

Elsewhere, one finds both that (a) the WAR totals for the Yankees field players are sometimes low-ish and that (b) those same WAR totals are frequently low-ish (when they’re low-ish) because the playing-time projections are also low-ish. Brett Gardner, Derek Jeter, and Mark Teixeira: none of them are projected to reach even 500 plate appearances, for example. Also for example, each of them is considered the starter at his respective position.

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Though the research put forth by Jeff Sullivan today on teams following the loss of a six-win player wasn’t extremely damning — teams letting stars go didn’t even lose two wins more than teams that chose to retain their stars — it’s hard to see the Yankees as having done much more than tread water this offseason. For all the good that signing Jacoby Ellsbury and Brian McCann did, going from Robinson Cano to Brian Roberts and Kelly Johnson shot a hole in their infield. And now, with unclear remaining resources and a third baseman fighting to play in 2014, it looks like the Yankees are still an infielder short of a full deck. What available infielder could help the team the most?

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Imagine, if you will, that the Yankees signed Matt Garza. Alternatively, imagine that the Yankees signed Ervin Santana, or Ubaldo Jimenez. Those guys have been considered the three best domestic free-agent starting pitchers, and if the Yankees were to pick up one of them, it would be a major investment and it would be considered a major improvement to a rotation in some need. It would make headlines, and it would cost the Yankees three or four or five guaranteed years at something in the neighborhood of $15 million each. It would be a splash, the latest in what would be a series of offseason splashes for the front office.

The Yankees just recently signed a free agent who was more valuable than each of those guys in 2013. They signed a free agent who was more valuable than each of those guys between 2011-2013, and they signed a free agent who projects to be more valuable than each of those guys in 2014. I’ll grant that what Hiroki Kuroda doesn’t have on his side is age, but what he does have is ability, and for a year and $16 million, he ought to be Hiroki Kuroda again. Which is likely to be under-appreciated, again.

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In the winter of 2011, Carlos Beltran hit free agency. He was heading into his age-35 season, but he was also coming off a pretty great walk-year, as he posted a 152 wRC+ in 598 plate appearances, the best single season wRC+ of his career. Even with declining defensive skills and a sub-par UZR rating, he still racked up +4.3 WAR, 15th best in baseball among outfielders. And, because of a clause inserted in his contract, the Giants were not allowed to offer him arbitration, so he hit the market as a no compensation free agent.

And he got 2 years and $26 million. Heath Bell got $27 million that winter — granted, it was for three years instead of two — but the market still gave Heath Bell more guaranteed money than Carlos Beltran two off-seasons ago. Since then, two teams have paid to get rid of Heath Bell, and I think it’s fair to say that the market missed on that deal. But the market also clearly missed on Beltran that winter, as he was one of the most productive hitters signed that off-season and got a fraction of what the premier free agents were landing. That wasn’t a recessionary winter; that was the winter that saw Albert Pujols and Prince Fielder land deals for over $200 million apiece and $100+ million commitments for both Yu Darvish and Jose Reyes.

Now, Beltran is two years older, and heading into his age-37 season. His new walk year wRC+ is 132, still very good, but not at the level he was at the last time he went into free agency. His defense has continued to decline, and now his walk-year WAR is just +2.0. Still, the Cardinals made him a qualifying offer, so this time around, any team signing him would have to forfeit a draft pick in order to do so.

Two years older. Not as good of a player as he was. Compensation attached. This time, 3 years and $45 million.

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It was pretty weird when Alex Rodriguez left the Mariners for the Rangers. It was weird when Jose Reyes left the Mets for the Marlins, and it was weird when Albert Pujols left the Cardinals for the Angels. There have been unexpected big-money moves in free agency before, but this one feels like it might be unprecedented, given who the Yankees are, and given who the Mariners are and have been. It makes total sense, of course — Robinson Cano couldn’t turn down ten guaranteed years — but the fact of the matter is that the Yankees lost a superstar to a team that’s been an also-ran, a team criticized for not opening up its wallet. This is not what people expected would happen, as little as a month ago.

This is a page of 2014 Steamer projections. You’ll find Cano seventh in projected WAR, between Troy Tulowitzki and David Wright. No matter how you look at it, Cano, right now, is among baseball’s very best position players. The Yankees don’t have him anymore. Look at the rest of that first page of projections and you’ll notice most of the top WAR guys are unavailable. They are, rightfully, under control and difficult to acquire. The Yankees need to figure out life after Robinson Cano, but despite the sequence of events, the team has already started. Really, he’s already been replaced.

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Sometimes, baseball analysis can reveal new truths, things that nobody had ever noticed before. Other times, it can simply confirm what’s already obvious. Meander through Phil Hughes‘ FanGraphs player page and you’ll realize that playing in Yankee Stadium did him zero favors. But you don’t need to know anything about FIP or HR/FB% to understand that Hughes could benefit from pitching in a friendlier environment. He’s going to do that in Minnesota, and while I don’t know exactly what the Twins’ thought process is, I presume it’s in the vicinity of, Hughes is talented, and fewer balls should leave the park going forward. Target Field is bigger than Yankee Stadium, so Hughes stands a chance of bouncing back.

Hughes debuted in the majors in 2007. Since then, 151 pitchers have recorded at least 250 innings both at home and on the road. Hughes’ home ERA is 0.86 points higher than his road ERA, the sixth-highest difference in the pool. His home wOBA allowed is .046 points higher than his road wOBA allowed, the first-highest difference in the pool. Driving this, primarily? Hughes’ home HR/FB% is six percentage points higher than his road HR/FB%, also the first-highest difference in the pool. Hughes allowed more than twice as many dingers in New York as in not-New York, and there’s nothing more damaging than a dinger. The Twins clearly believe that Hughes was at least partially sunk by the home-field bandbox.

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