Contract Crowdsourcing 2013-14: Roy Halladay

Free agency begins five days after the end of the World Series. As in other recent offseasons, FanGraphs is once again facilitating this offseason a contract-crowdsourcing project, the idea being to harness the wisdom of the crowds to the end of better understanding the 2013-14 free-agent market.

Note that, this year, in addition to asking readers to estimate the years/dollars each free agent is likely to receive, FanGraphs is also requesting that readers make note of how much they’d pay each free agent were they, themselves, actual GMs.

In this edition: Roy Halladay.

Some relevant information regarding Halladay:

  • Has averaged 150.2 IP and 3.3 WAR over last three seasons.
  • Has averaged 3.9 WAR per 180 IP over last three seasons.
  • Recorded a -0.8 WAR in 62.0 IP in 2013.
  • Is entering his age-37 season.
  • Made $20.0M in 2013, as part of extension signed before 2010 season.

Using the form below, estimate the years and average annual dollar values both likely and ought to be received by Halladay this offseason.

Other Players: Bronson Arroyo / Carlos Beltran / A.J. Burnett / Marlon Byrd / Robinson Cano / Shin-Soo Choo / Bartolo Colon / Nelson Cruz / David DeJesus / Stephen Drew / Mark Ellis / Jacoby Ellsbury / Scott Feldman / Gavin Floyd / Matt Garza / Curtis Granderson / Omar Infante / Adam Lind / James Loney / Brian McCann / Nate McLouth / Kendrys Morales / David Murphy / Mike Napoli / A.J. Pierzynski / Carlos Ruiz / Jarrod Saltalamacchia / Juan Uribe / Chris Young.

You Aren't a FanGraphs Member
It looks like you aren't yet a FanGraphs Member (or aren't logged in). We aren't mad, just disappointed. We get it. You want to read this article. But before we let you get back to it, we'd like to point out a few of the good reasons why you should become a Member. 1. Ad Free viewing! We won't bug you with this ad, or any other. 2. Unlimited articles! Non-Members only get to read 10 free articles a month. Members never get cut off. 3. Dark mode and Classic mode! 4. Custom player page dashboards! Choose the player cards you want, in the order you want them. 5. One-click data exports! Export our projections and leaderboards for your personal projects. 6. Remove the photos on the home page! (Honestly, this doesn't sound so great to us, but some people wanted it, and we like to give our Members what they want.) 7. Even more Steamer projections! We have handedness, percentile, and context neutral projections available for Members only. 8. Get FanGraphs Walk-Off, a customized year end review! Find out exactly how you used FanGraphs this year, and how that compares to other Members. Don't be a victim of FOMO. 9. A weekly mailbag column, exclusively for Members. 10. Help support FanGraphs and our entire staff! Our Members provide us with critical resources to improve the site and deliver new features! We hope you'll consider a Membership today, for yourself or as a gift! And we realize this has been an awfully long sales pitch, so we've also removed all the other ads in this article. We didn't want to overdo it. In case you didn't read all that, here's the short version. Membership includes:
✓Ad-free browsing
✓Unlimited FanGraphs & RotoGraphs articles
✓Historical & platoon projections
✓Leaderboard & player-page stat heatmaps
✓One-click data exports
✓Customizable player-page dashboards
✓Dark & Classic site modes
✓Weekly Members-only mailbag
✓FanGraphs Walk-Off, your year in review
✓Optional homepage photo removal
✓Gift articles to non-Members
✓Full postseason coverage




Carson Cistulli has published a book of aphorisms called Spirited Ejaculations of a New Enthusiast.

13 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Alex D
12 years ago

Should have included a question about how many millions in incentives his contract will have. Halladay will undoubtedly sign a 1 year low annual value, incentive laden deal. My prediction 5 Mil base salary with up to 10 Mil in incentives. Id even take a gamble on him and give him 1 year deal with 5 Mil base salary and up to 15 Mil in incentives based on IP and Cy Young votes received.

AK7007
12 years ago

No idea. I put something like 1/10, but could be lower incentive laden deal. Just no clue with a guy like him. There is too much regarding health the crowd doesn’t know, that teams interested will know in order to make any kind of educated guess.

derp
12 years ago

Had the phillies just let Halladay recover from freaking shoulder surgery over the offseason we could easily see his form return. Now, it’s up in the air.

PetCharles
12 years ago
Reply to  derp

I’d change that to “forced Halladay to recover.” We obviously weren’t privy to the face-to-face conversations, but from what was out there on the airwaves, Roy was eager to get back and received no push-back from the front office.

LONNIE
12 years ago

1 year at a low-base with alot of money in incentives. IF he pitches well, he is paid well.

Matthew McGinnis
12 years ago

If I had a good financial situation, it’d be so easy to give him around a 3-5 million dollar contract, with incentives built in based on innings pitched, era, all star team, and cy young votes. If he wins the cy young, he’d earn around 25 million in incentives. A lot, but I doubt he’ll do that, and if you have a good financial situation, worth the gamble.

Hittfamily
12 years ago

The Rays signed Fausto Carmona to a 1 year, 3.2 mil contract with 1 mil in incentives. Using the “Would the Rays do this deal” model, my prediction is the Rays would sign Doc to a 2 year, 13 mil deal. Which means that some non-smart, non-poor team will likely double that. 3 years, 24 mil is my bet, which the Rays would not do.

Kevin
12 years ago
Reply to  Hittfamily

That’s not the way that incentive-laden deals work. Yes, a substantial amount can be earned to add to the base but not 5 times the amount of the total contract. An agent would say, if you think my guy would do that well (to pay him up to $25MM with incentives) then you can go ahead and sign him at a higher base.

Rob
12 years ago

I highly doubt any team would give Halladay 3 yrs. In fact I doubt that Halladay would even be willing to sign for 3 years. Is it confirmed that he actually wabts to pitch in 2014? My impression is that Doc is a fierce competitor who will likely try to come back, but if he doesnt achieve success he is not going to sit around and collect a paycheck for 3 years. I put 1 year and 5 million, presumably the contract would contain significant incentives.

Gricomet
12 years ago

I tend to think he can get a one year deal out of a club between 8 and 12 million based on his previous track record. I don’t think he will get more than a year from anyone.

WillieMaysField
12 years ago

If Haren got 12m last year I think Doc could get the same 1 yr 12m.

Rob
12 years ago

@WillieMaysField: It’s not a close comparison at all. In 2011 Haren pitched 176 IP w/ 4.24 FIP, which meant even if he didn’t improve he’d be an average starting pitcher, about a 2 WAR player. Halladay in 2012 pitched 62 IP with a 6.14 FIP, so if he doesn’t improve substantially he’s not league average, in fact he’s below-replacement.

Halladay is worth a gamble but I think it’s fair to say that the best teams can hope for is for Halladay to be a league-average or slightly better pitcher in 2014. Assuming he can sustain a high-80s fastball and what we saw in his last start was a temporary setback, he can probably pitch to a 3.50-4.00 ERA. I believe there is virtually zero probability he can return to pre-2012 Roy Halladay.

So making a really rough guess, assume there’s say a 50% probability he is a 3 WAR pitcher, a 45% probability he’s essentially worthless (0 WAR), and a 5% chance he is a 5 WAR pitcher. And you get expected value of 1.75 WAR. So if you’re risk neutral he’s worth maybe $9-10M in expectation.

Guy
12 years ago

I bet he retires on a 1 day contract with the Blue Jays